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Dates
Nov 10, 2007 7:28:03 GMT -5
Post by robertplowden on Nov 10, 2007 7:28:03 GMT -5
Hi, I am fairly new to genealogical software. I have been using Mac's since '88 and II's before that!. I have made about 80 entries in Mac Family Tree, but it kept locking up, so I decided to look for something more reliable. I imported the content from Mac FT, but to my dismay it has garbled the dates. The stated date format for PAW is English. I enter the date in English format e.g.. 5/7/1947 (My DoB) and I get 7 May 1947 not 5 Jul 1947 as is displayed, and as I expect from an English date. The date entry appears to be American format, and the display, English format. Given I am a UK person I find this extremely confusing. I have looked at the preferences, but there seems no way of altering this. I hope I missing something? The rest of the programme seems very good, simple in execution, and straightforward to use, yet powerful. I am starting a large project of researching and recording my ancestors, and can do without the additional complication of having to convert all dates to American format. Mistakes are easy enough to make without needing to add a date conversion to the equation. I note there seems to be a provision for title, but this seems to consist of (American?) military ranks. I need English and European nobility ranks, e.g. Earl, Lord, Duke, King, Queen etc. is there any way to substitute the embodied military ranks with nobility titles?
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Dates
Nov 10, 2007 20:45:25 GMT -5
Post by Howard Metcalfe on Nov 10, 2007 20:45:25 GMT -5
Hi, I am fairly new to genealogical software. I have been using Mac's since '88 and II's before that!. I have made about 80 entries in Mac Family Tree, but it kept locking up, so I decided to look for something more reliable. I imported the content from Mac FT, but to my dismay it has garbled the dates. The stated date format for PAW is English. I enter the date in English format e.g.. 5/7/1947 (My DoB) and I get 7 May 1947 not 5 Jul 1947 as is displayed, and as I expect from an English date. The date entry appears to be American format, and the display, English format. Given I am a UK person I find this extremely confusing. I have looked at the preferences, but there seems no way of altering this. I hope I missing something? The rest of the programme seems very good, simple in execution, and straightforward to use, yet powerful. I am starting a large project of researching and recording my ancestors, and can do without the additional complication of having to convert all dates to American format. Mistakes are easy enough to make without needing to add a date conversion to the equation. I note there seems to be a provision for title, but this seems to consist of (American?) military ranks. I need English and European nobility ranks, e.g. Earl, Lord, Duke, King, Queen etc. is there any way to substitute the embodied military ranks with nobility titles? Yes, short dates with spaces, slashes, periods are interpreted American style. But you can enter 5 May 1947 or May 5 1947 or May 5, 1947. You need only enter the first three letters of the month. Changing the program to allow European short dates is not in the cards. As to titles, you can enter any title as Smith, John, Capt. or whatever the title is. The popup list of titles is just a convenience for frequently used titles. You can enter anything after the surname and given names, as long as there are two commas. For example, Jones, Robert, Field Marshall or Stewart, James, King. In the last case it might be nice to add VI of Scotland as a suffix: Stewart, James, King, VI of Scotland. This will print in reports as King James Stewart VI of Scotland. ;D
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Dates
Nov 11, 2007 5:47:49 GMT -5
Post by robertplowden on Nov 11, 2007 5:47:49 GMT -5
Thanks for the reply Howard.
I can understand you don't feel inclined to alter the software.
I still don't understand why you have it swap the American format input to English display?
Anyway, I will try it for a little longer, but I don't think I can live with inputting the dates back to front... I will try the alpha month method you suggest, most of the references I am using quote the month in alpha, usually the full word.
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Dates
Nov 11, 2007 13:29:13 GMT -5
Post by Howard Metcalfe on Nov 11, 2007 13:29:13 GMT -5
Thanks for the reply Howard. I can understand you don't feel inclined to alter the software. I still don't understand why you have it swap the American format input to English display? Anyway, I will try it for a little longer, but I don't think I can live with inputting the dates back to front... I will try the alpha month method you suggest, most of the references I am using quote the month in alpha, usually the full word. Hi Robert, I think you are saying why do I change a short date (American style) to a full date (three-letter month), e.g., 9/5/1850 to 5 Sep 1850, in displays in various windows. This full date format is the standard used in displays in most genealogical programs, and is the GEDCOM standard. So however you input the date, it will always be displayed in this full date format. Note you can spell out the month on input, say 5 September 1850 or 5 Sept. 1850 or September 5 1850 or September 5, 1850 or Sept. 5, 1850, etc. (You can even misspell the month as say Sepmber since PAWriter only looks at the first three letters!) BTW, PAWriter accepts upper- and lower-case letters equally on entry -- 5 sep 1850 is the same as 5 Sep 1850. You can copy and paste dates into a date field if they conform to the above. Note also that when dates appear in reports, they use the abbreviated month if the month is more than five letters. For example, May is May, March is March, but September is Sep. This is the standard used in most genealogical publications here in the colonies. Personally, I think that the European short form is superior but there it is (even though the American short form of 9/5/1850 is short for Sep. 5, 1850.) So with the exception of using American short forms, I believe that date entry is as or more flexible than most other genealogical programs. Best, Howard Addendum: A preference will be added in version 76 to "Use European short dates" on date entry. If this preference is checked, then dates such as 1/5/1915 will be interpreted to mean 1 May 1915 instead of 5 January 1915. So that will solve our Mother Country's problem and add even more flexibility.
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Dave
New Member
Posts: 19
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Dates
Nov 14, 2007 15:17:02 GMT -5
Post by Dave on Nov 14, 2007 15:17:02 GMT -5
Most appreciated!
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