Hi Poppy, If you have not gotten the answer: A USB port is a slot somewhere on the edge of your computer... a female type plug. You buy a flash drive or sometimes called thumb drive from most anywhere from Wal-mart's to Best Buy, Sam's etc. You can often get a 8 gig for abt 20$ Wait until they are on sale so you can get the most for your $$. Even though you think you won't need that much if you start adding photos and images you will want lots of space. RootsMagic-to-go comes with the latest version of RootsMagic when you purchase the updated 4 version.

Hi just joined
I have a the Rootsmagic 4 on trial, i would love to buy the full version for the Microsoft XP, but when i try to buy through a debit card it tell me that the address compared to the card is wrong, this is not so, as i have since used it to buy articles over the internet, Anybody else had this sort of problem!!.

I have been a RootsMagic user since the days of Family Origins and am very pleased with the newest version. I have a questions about chart making though. I recently created a wall chart for a family reunion and ended up using coloring crayons to color the different families their own unique color to help with the segregation since the chart was over 10 feet long. Is there a way to assign different colors to different descendant families rather than all boxes having the same color?

I cannot find how to access/find the Fact Without Source report...can anyone help me? I love the concept!

Laurence: That is the address verification the credit card processor does. If you want to send an email to orders@rootsmagic.com (so that we would then have your email) I can help you out with this.

Karen: You can use color coding in RootsMagic (Tools > Color code people) and color code the different lines. Then when you print the wall chart you can tell it to use the color coding.

Susan: Do Reports > Lists > Fact List. There are a bunch of options, one being to print a list of facts without sources.

Hopefully someone can help me with this. Normally when I receive a genealogy related email, I copy it to my forum (making sure to say it's from an email) and use the forum as the source. I only do it for simplicity sake as it's easier to keep track of the forum than emails.

My question: Is it okay to do this? If not, please explain something that would work better.

Thanks.

Bernard that seems to be a general question about sourcing, and to me, the answer seems that you can store and keep track of emails however you like, but that the email remains the source of the information.
You may want to join Mark Tucker's Genealogical Proof Standard group to discuss this further.

This seems like a silly question but I have been curious... say you have a source you have used alot. You then edit that source. I know the answer.. ;) but does it change previous uses of that source or just future ones? Back with another in a few~

If you have a database (not mine) Version 3... there are a few thousand people. I want to create a repository for the sources. What is the easiest way to do this. I don't have a ves. 3 book just vers 4 - thanks

Oh.. Vers 3: I have one file (that I am aware of) that will not put things in chronological order. it does birth 1850; census 1860-1870-1915-1920-1925-1930 then death 1943; obit 1943; burial 1943; - then marriage 1870 and then.. it starts with the older census ie; 1880-1900-1905-1910... NOW.. why are the 2nd batch of census in the right order. This is looking at a printout of a Family Group Sheet... If you understand this.. great! ;) got an answer? ;)

I had the pleasure of meeting Bruce Buzbee this past weekend in Spokane at the Washington State Genealogy Conference. He was a delight to listen to and has inspired me to utilize more features in RootsMagic Ver. 4. He was especially helpful in demonstrating the sourcing features in his program. If his book is anything like the man in person it should be a great asset. I am ordering a copy today.

Brenda,
RE: Source: THere are two parts to a source in RootsMagic, the Master Source and the Source Details or Citations Details.If you change the Master Source portion, it changes for all citations - past, present and future - using this source. If you change the Details portion, that changes for only current citation.

RE: Repository. Repositories are associated with the master Source. In ver. 3, click Lists, Source List, highlight a source, then click Edit, then select the repository tab. Select "Edit Repository" to add or edit the repository details, or "Select repository from list" to reuse an already entered repository. Unfortunately, there is no way to add a repository to multiple sources.

RE: Chronological Order. The first thing to check is the sort date, which controls the order in which the facts appear. All the facts with a valid sort date sort first. Those without a sort date follow in generally the order they were entered, but this is not guaranteed. If you don't have a valid date, you can still enter a date into the blank sort date field. You can even add a sort date if there is not date in the date field, which places the fact or event in the proper order.

Hi Bill!! Bless your heart for answering all my concerns: I love that the Master Source changes the old citations as well. The Repositories I will play with! ;)
now: RE_Chronological Order. The first thing to check is the sort date, which controls the order in which the facts appear. All the facts with a valid sort date sort first.
--------------I checked help on the software and it does not have a working help assist within the software! So, can you tell me where I find the area to change the Sort Date? I noticed other printouts are the same way.

I have printed out your answers for a reference until i 'get' it! :) Thanks again! Brenda

Branda, I'm not sure why you cannot get the help. I can view the built-in help by pressing F1 or going to Help, Help Topics.

Highlight any fact in the Edit Person screen, and click the Edit fact button. The Sort date appears at the lower right corner of the window.

Bill it says a file ?.exe is no long there. Thanks! I am doing this for someone and I cannot get her to use RM 4 until after it has been out and 'down and dirty tested' .. thanks again-- are you saying we cannot do this as a master for the entire software? that I have to check each fact (or for whole software) cannot imagine doing each fact for each person etc.. ;) - love the 1-2-3 steps! only way to go! bk

Unfortunately, RootsMagic does not have the capability to determine the sort date when no date is entered into the main date field, or the date field soes not contain a valid date. The only way is to enter a sort date by hand. The sort date can be an educated guess based on other facts, or it can be a fictitous date to force the fact into a certain place in the list of facts. However, it is up to you.

Brenda, if there is a missing file, the person could try downloading the latest ver. 3.2.6 and install that over the existing software that is installed. NOTE: Be sure to do a backup of any files before running the new install, just in case.

Hi Bill, I am a tad confused by: valid date. The entries I am viewing have dates. (see old message-it tells just how they were listed-using dates) To edit every person in the database ;) goes beyond time! ;) But that might be a good option to add. If they all have dates I would think they would sort by date. I did do one person (will do future edits of course) and they were all in date order but 1; census famy was under the marriage date while the rest were in date order except the marriage. Thanks for all the time and effort you have taken. This version is right from her CD so will check out the 3.2.6 version. Appreciate all the effort you have done in helping me! I am now wiser in these areas ;) hehe

Brenda, an easy way to check if the date is valid in ver. 3 is to look at the sort date. If the date is valid, there will be a sort date. If the date is not valid or it si empty, there will be no sort date. RootsMagic sorts by Sort date, not the Date field, so if the sort date is empty, the fact is sorted at the end of the facts that have sort dates. If there is more than one fact without a sort date, the order of these facts without a sort date appears to be usually by the date entered or modified (I'm not entirely sure which), or sometimes in a seemingly random order. (Bruce assures us that there is no programming logic to sort facts without a sort date field.)

In version 4, if the date is not valid, the date field background turns yellow to highlight the fact that the program can't decifer the date as entered.

I have the newest update on RM, how do I enter Will Recorded, I cannot figure that out.

Debby,
There is no specific fact for that purpose, but you have two choices.

If this is a fact that you will be only using a few times, you might consider using the Miscellaneous fact. The details can be entered into the Description field.

On the other hand, if you believe that you will be using this type of fact quite a bit, you may want to create your own new fact type, something along the lines of Will_Proven, which I created for my Ontario, Canada probates. (There are details in hte online help to guide you in adding a new fact type.) Here are the sentences I use for my fact:

Will_Proven
Role: Principal
The will of [person] was proven and registered with the court< [Date]>< [PlaceDetails]>< [Place]> and administration of the estate was granted by the courts to [Executor]< [Desc]>.
Role: Executor
[ThisPerson] was granted the right to administer the estate of [person] by the courts< [Date]>< [PlaceDetails]>< [Place]>.

The nice thing about creating a new fact type is that the fact type name appears in the list of facts in the Edit Person window making it easy to spot.
Bill

have a question. is there a way on RM that searches names through place search? We have a hugh data base withbdifferent lines and it would be nice to bring up everyone that connected with a certain place.

Reports-->Lists-->Place list, select the place and create a report.

If you are using RM4:
Go to the People screen, you can click on birth place or death place (or any other fact place you chose to show) and it will arrange everyone by place.

Anyone know why? on occasions the age does not show up? I have redone the event ; rewrote the dates... thanks

for RM3 sorry..

If there is no birth date, you will not see the ages. RM uses the birth date as the base to calculate ages. Also, RM needs the date in the Date field, it will not calculate a date based on Sort dates.

Actually dates are there. Ages show until the last 2 entries. I have seen a couple like this but not able to change them = sometimes if I just rewrite it things will change but not this time. Thanks have a great weekend~

Brenda, any facts after the date of the death fact, such as burial, obituary, or probating a will, will not show ages.

Thanks Bill, I understand that too.. but this is a census - age 51 then a death and it shows no age. It cam be dealt with as is, I was just curious as I have 2 that I am aware of. I did dl 3.26 or ? as you suggested to and it did give me the help file. ;0

Brenda, what is the exact birth date and census date as entered? If RM can't figure out the date (year) then it can't calculate an age.

Just a comment concerning dates----I have noticed if I have a birth date entered, say "January 1, 1900", then I enter a death date of say "Thursday, January 1, 1990", RM may totally disreguard the death field for certain reports. I just saw that this week. But once I took out the day of the week, RM saw the fact. I would like to record the day of the week, but I will have to figure out some other way to note it, rather than in the date field.

In the Customnize sentence window (or in the Lists, Fact Type List and select the Fact Type, then Edit), you can change [date] to [date:DayOfWeek] or [date:DayOfWeek:Commas] to include the day of the week with the date. It will appear as "Thursday January 1 1990" or "Thursday, January 1, 1990" respectively. The order of the day and month will depend on the date setting in the Tools, File options, Date Format.

I looking for a Circle Chart Generator that I can print out from RM4 Gedcom. I want a Circle Wall Chart to look at while doing research. I am not looking for anything fancy as this chart will be constantly updated. Any Ideas?

Customized Lists: I would like to do two things. 1. Print a list of people born between a specified date range and 2 Print a list of people born in a specified location. Is this possible?

Michael, you can either do the Individual List (Reports > Lists > Individual List) or a custom report. In either case the trick is to select the criteria for the people you want to include.

1. Birth | Date | Is after | date1 AND Birth | Date | Is before | date2

2. Birth | Place | Equals (or Contains) | place

You can also do Reports > Lists > Place list, select a place and get a list of all events (not just birth events) which happened in that place.

A year or two ago, I was suckered into giving FTM another try. I used it for 6-8 months and entered data. Sometimes I would open both programs, kinda a side-by-side comparison. I have since gone back to RM 3, and intend to upgrade to RM 4 soon. However, now I have data in FTM, but I don't know exactly what it is.
How can I combine the FTM file with RM 3 data?
Should I export a gedcom from FTM, and merge it with my RM 3 file.
Please give specific steps, as I have never merged any file into my file.

Linda

If you are using FTM2008/2009/2010, you will need to create a GEDCOM and import that into RM. Versions prior to FTM16 can be imported directly by RM without going through a GEDCOM file. Whichever way you do it, import the FTM data into an empty RM database and clean up the data - place names, people names, etc. - before bringing the data into your main database You can then copy (drag and drop) people from the FTM converted database into your master database. To copy family facts, you must drag both people in the fact at the same fact. BUT BACKUP your database before starting, and make sure you can open the backup without a problem.

There are those of us who would suggest that you bring up FTM and RM side by side and enter the data into RM without going through the import and merge step. This way is more tedious, but there is less issues with sorting out the merged data (RM creates a second fact if two facts (one in each database) exist rather than merging facts, and there can be linking problems.) You can also copy and paste text from one screen to the other, which can lessen the typing effort, particularly for Names, Notes and Sources.

Thanks for the Customized List instructions Bruce. I had a bit of a challenge until I discovered that I needed to do the following. Individual List (Reports > Lists > Individual List>People to Include (Select from List)>Mark People>Select People by Data fields. Now I can do lots of slicing and dicing of the info. I will enjoy this very much.

Hi Again, How can I generate a report for a lineage society? I have not found a lineage report. I only want to print the direct line and each individual's birth, marriage, death, and associated references if possible. - Thank you.

Hi all, I have switched to RM4. In checking things out I see 'print a report' for family group sheet appears to use more pages. Example: page 1 half filled up; the next page has one line for documenting the source. Is there a way to get all of this on one page vs 2. It will consume way to many pages this way. Thanks Brenda

There are definitely some great new items in the software.

Brenda, unfortunately, there is no option to put all the data and sources onto a single page. Data, sources, person index and place index are all placed on separate pages.

Michael, there is no specific report for Lineage Societies. Are you looking for an ancestor report or a decendant report? Are you looking for a narrative type report, or a "chart" type report? Have you looked at the Lists, such as Ahnentafel or Descendants Lists. Perhaps the Ralationship Chart, with the boxes turned off. If you are looking for a narrative, you may have to generate a GEDCOM file with only those people who you want to include (with spouses), then go into the Fact Type List and set any fact you don't want included to No, don't include it.

Hi Bill, I was afraid of this.. I didn't run into this issue with RM3... and I was trying to see if I could change her over but with the number of printouts she makes doubling the paper is not good. I really like the east of working with 4. What kind of mess does it make to make a gedcom from 4 and use it for reports in 3? Can this be put before Bruce so he can 'fix' the issue. Thanks

I did dl the 4.0.6 release

Brenda, If when you generate a GEDCOM, you check to option to exclude "Extra details (RM specific)", the GEDCOM can be taken back into RM3. Be sure to check that all facts are included in the GEDCOM in Lists, Fact Type list, and that Privatize living people is off, include private facts and notes are on, but strip brackets is off.

Do you know of another way to utilize the reports in a sensible manner without wasting reams of paper. I think it best I forget RM4 until this is changed and just do RM3 where I can do just whats she wants. Thanks. Can we get this suggestion to Bruce?

Brenda, try this. In the FGS setup, uncheck Start notes on a new page. Click the Sources button, and click Footnotes printed at the bottom of the page, and click OK. Then click Generate Report. If you want, you can click on the Indexes button, and select No Name Index on the Name Index tab, and No Place Index on the Place Index tab. This will print the notes and sources on the same page, unless there is too much stuff to fit on one page, it will overflow onto other pages. However, you won't have extra pages for the sake of extra pages.

Well it almost worked, Bill! Out of five pages the only disjointed one (not full page) is pg 4 about 1/2 and then skips the other half page to pg 5. I did catch the index earlier and had gotten rid of that. Thanks for all your good answers! and so prompt!~! Brenda

I have an obituary fact. I would like the sentence to say: [name]'s obituary was in the [newspaper] on [date]. I can get close but not quite right. Can anyone help?

If you are using RM4, you can change the sentence so that all obituary facts say that or just one person's. To change them all, go to Lists>Fact Type List>Obituary>Edit>Edit Role and paste the following in. To change just one person's, click on their obituary fact and then click "customize this sentence." You put the newspaper name in the description field. Paste in the following: [Person:Poss] obituary appeared in the [desc] on [date]< [place]>.