I've been updating my family tree and in so doing often found web pages with useful information I wanted to copy but I got sick of all the copy/paste for person after person, especially when it was a list of several people! Even more aggravating was that most sites have a nice structured that "should" be easy for a program to extract the relevant data from.
What I needed was a way to pass raw text into a format that most Genealogy applications/sites could understand [GEDCOM files]. After lots & lots & lots of searching and testing of the import capabilities of lots & lots & lots of Family Tree programs and finding nothing remotely useful I decided I needed to write one myself!
Key Requirements:
- Text layouts can vary widely so the program had to be able to be easily adjusted to suit [Some sort of user configurable rules would be needed]
- Interactive/iterative approach needed to allow rule generation/testing
- Handle marriages and multiple generations of descendants
- Output would need to be in a GEDCOM format
- Running on WindowsXP (and hopefully above)
The result:
Program: FamilyTreeHelper.exe
Usage (Simple formatted text file [eg: Simple Text File]):
- Create a text file with with following layout...
- <@><Name>, <Sex>, <Birth date, <place>>, <Death date, <place>>, <Marriage date, <place>>
- Note: @ = + If child of the above [use multiple if the above is already a child]
- Note: @ = _ If spouse of the above [use after child if required]
- Paste text in the top box
- Can be edited further if required
- Use a rule button to pre-load the rules or create your own
- No need to edit if you followed the suggested format
- Run the Rules
- The results should be a list of names with some keywords/markers
- Process all
- Generates the INDI & FAM sections of a GEDCOM file
- Save generated file
- Creates a GEDCOM 5.5.1 compatible file
Usage (Web page text [eg: My Genealogy - Family Tree Maker]):
- Paste text in the top box
- HTML & Special characters will automatically be stripped!
- Use a rule button to pre-load the rules or create your own
- Use the [E]dit/delete or [A]dd buttons to modify any of the 4 different rule types
- Run the Rules
- People list will be generated with names and keywords/markers as follows...
- + = Child of the person above [supports nesting with ++, +++ for extra generations
- _ = Wife or Husband of the previous person [would ideally have the wedding info]
- |_S_ = Sex [followed by M or F]
- |_B_ = Birth detail [date, place (can have multiple commas in place]
- |_D_ = Death detail [date, place (can have multiple commas in place]
- |_M_ = Marriage detail [date, place (can have multiple commas in place]
- Click on a result and press "Test individual..." to see if the data parses properly
- Fills the individual data elements to the right
- Note: Data elements can be edited before processing!
- Press "Process the test"
- Appends the INDI and FAM [GED] sections for that user
- Repeat for next user and data appends so you can step through 1 by 1
- Press "Process All"
- You can skip this if you did the people 1 by 1
- Save generated file
- Creates a GEDCOM 5.5.1 compatible file
Licensing:
This is Version 1.0 so I'm sure their is lots of room for improvement, particularly as more complex text layouts are tried. As such, I'm not going to put a price on it as yet. If you test it and it looks like it does what you want eMail me if you want to activate it [Note: Donations improve chances].
This software is provided "AS IS". There is no guarantee or warranty on this software and I am NOT responsible if it eats data. Back up your data just in case. This software comes WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. You download and use it entirely at your own risk.
