I try to understand how the religion of a person is represented in GEDCOM 5.5. I came across the RELI token, but could not find any standardized values for this token. In some GEDCOM files I find localized descriptions of the religion, but it seems to me that such a localized version is not suitable if GEDCOM files are exchanged across language boundaries. e.g. how would I represent the fact that a person is "roman-catholic"
I think that for the purpose of exchanging GEDCOM files some sort of language independent taxonomy for these tokens would be required. Does anybody know of such a taxonomy?
> I try to understand how the religion of a person is represented in > GEDCOM 5.5. I came across the RELI token, but could not find any > standardized values for this token. In some GEDCOM files I find > localized descriptions of the religion, but it seems to me that such a > localized version is not suitable if GEDCOM files are exchanged across > language boundaries. > e.g. how would I represent the fact that a person is "roman-catholic"
> I think that for the purpose of exchanging GEDCOM files some sort of > language independent taxonomy for these tokens would be required. > Does anybody know of such a taxonomy?
I have never thought of this as interesting
the religion is pretty obvious from the location of baptism or christening, confirmation, marriage and burial
otherwise I am using notes more and more becasue they display better when uploaded to world connect for example
>> I try to understand how the religion of a person is represented in >> GEDCOM 5.5. I came across the RELI token, but could not find any >> standardized values for this token. In some GEDCOM files I find >> localized descriptions of the religion, but it seems to me that such a >> localized version is not suitable if GEDCOM files are exchanged across >> language boundaries.
It's not just the RELI field, but just about every field in GEDCOM that lacks standardised representations (even in one language), let alone several. Places, date formats etc all vary between software program and personal usage.
> I try to understand how the religion of a person is represented in > GEDCOM 5.5. I came across the RELI token, but could not find any > standardized values for this token. In some GEDCOM files I find > localized descriptions of the religion, but it seems to me that such a > localized version is not suitable if GEDCOM files are exchanged across > language boundaries. > e.g. how would I represent the fact that a person is "roman-catholic"
> I think that for the purpose of exchanging GEDCOM files some sort of > language independent taxonomy for these tokens would be required. > Does anybody know of such a taxonomy?
> Best regards > Carsten Leue
As far as I know there never was such a list, at least not officially. I don't suppose a person's religion was really of much interest to the mormons other perhaps than the fact it was not mormon.
> > I try to understand how the religion of a person is represented in > > GEDCOM 5.5. I came across the RELI token, but could not find any > > standardized values for this token. In some GEDCOM files I find > > localized descriptions of the religion, but it seems to me that such a > > localized version is not suitable if GEDCOM files are exchanged across > > language boundaries. > > e.g. how would I represent the fact that a person is "roman-catholic"
> > I think that for the purpose of exchanging GEDCOM files some sort of > > language independent taxonomy for these tokens would be required. > > Does anybody know of such a taxonomy?
> I have never thought of this as interesting
> the religion is pretty obvious from the location of baptism or > christening, confirmation, marriage and burial
> otherwise I am using notes more and more becasue they display better > when uploaded to world connect for example
I guess the main issue is that a missing taxonomy complicates the exchange of GEDCOM files significantly, due to different ways to express the same information and most importantly across language boundaries. A genealogical software could translate standardized tokens that identify the religion and display them in the desired locale to the end user. With "free text" this is not possble.
On Feb 5, 9:32 am, "Kerry Raymond" <kraym...@iprimus.com.au> wrote:
> >> I try to understand how the religion of a person is represented in > >> GEDCOM 5.5. I came across the RELI token, but could not find any > >> standardized values for this token. In some GEDCOM files I find > >> localized descriptions of the religion, but it seems to me that such a > >> localized version is not suitable if GEDCOM files are exchanged across > >> language boundaries.
> It's not just the RELI field, but just about every field in GEDCOM that > lacks standardised representations (even in one language), let alone > several. Places, date formats etc all vary between software program and > personal usage.
> Kerry
Yes, that's unfortunately a significant weakness of the format. Do you know of any taxonomy that has evolved as "common usage pattern" although not standardized?
On Mon, 5 Feb 2007 18:32:07 +1000, Kerry Raymond wrote: >> [6 quoted lines suppressed]
> It's not just the RELI field, but just about every field in GEDCOM that > lacks standardised representations (even in one language), let alone > several. Places, date formats etc all vary between software program and > personal usage.
> Kerry
After all GEDCOM is a standard for exchanging information between computers, it wasn't intended to enforce any form of standardisation on the data being exchanged.
DATE however is interesting, in one part of the standard it is defined as : DATE {DATE}: = The time of an event in a calendar format.
It then goes on to add various "Subtypes"
DATE_PHRASE: = {Size=1:35} (<TEXT>) Any statement offered as a date when the year is not recognizable to a date parser, but which gives information about when an event occurred. The date phrase is enclosed in matching parentheses.
and DATE_RANGE: = {Size=8:35} [ BEF <DATE> | AFT <DATE> | BET <DATE> AND <DATE>
I think a lot of software ignores these sub-types and just assigns what the user enters as a date(with any local checking) to DATE. Examining one Gedcom at random I find
1 DEAT 2 DATE 10 May 1984 2 PLAC LONDON ENGLAND 2 CAUS HEART ATTACK 1 BURI 2 DATE BURNLEY LANCS
Which is pure nonsense but shows that the software didn't do any elementary checking.
Incidentally unless dates are escaped to another calendar GREGORIAN is assumed and the format IS defined as : DATE_GREG: = {Size=4:35} [ <YEAR_GREG> | <MONTH> <YEAR_GREG> | <DAY> <MONTH> <YEAR_GREG> ]
Although /presentation/ may differ with different software / locales.
The point is that even when the gedcom standard does allow for choices of values it is up to the software being used to validate and make sense of the data. Even if your software prevented you from entering "Jedi Knight" into the RELI field, you can't assume you would never receive a record with that text in it. If you did would you want your software to reject it ?
>>>I try to understand how the religion of a person is represented in >>>GEDCOM 5.5. I came across the RELI token, but could not find any >>>standardized values for this token. In some GEDCOM files I find >>>localized descriptions of the religion, but it seems to me that such a >>>localized version is not suitable if GEDCOM files are exchanged across >>>language boundaries. >>>e.g. how would I represent the fact that a person is "roman-catholic"
>>>I think that for the purpose of exchanging GEDCOM files some sort of >>>language independent taxonomy for these tokens would be required. >>>Does anybody know of such a taxonomy?
>>I have never thought of this as interesting
>>the religion is pretty obvious from the location of baptism or >>christening, confirmation, marriage and burial
>>otherwise I am using notes more and more becasue they display better >>when uploaded to world connect for example
> I guess the main issue is that a missing taxonomy complicates the > exchange of GEDCOM files significantly, due to different ways to > express the same information and most importantly across language > boundaries. A genealogical software could translate standardized > tokens that identify the religion and display them in the desired > locale to the end user. With "free text" this is not possble.
I rather suspect that the lack of a standardized format or of a definition in the GED standards suggests that the issue is not one of importance to many people in the US. And GED was a child of the US and of the LDS Church.
As with anything else, if it's important to you, put it in the NOTES/more about sections, because those sections tend to GED in and out fairly cleanly.
> I think a lot of software ignores these sub-types and just assigns what > the > user enters as a date(with any local checking) to DATE. Examining one > Gedcom at random I find
The form as given in the Gedcom you found is correct. This is an approximate date, not a date range or a date period. There's no such tags as DATE_RANGE, DATE_PERIOD or DATE_PHRASE anyway. A date range is used when you know an event happened at a particular time, but all you know is that it occurred some time between two dates. For example, a person is listed as age 30-40 in the 1840 Census. His birth would be:
2 DATE BET 1800 AND 1810
A date period is used to describe a condition that lasted for some time, for example military service:
2 DATE FROM MAR 1863 TO JUL 1864
> and in the same Gedcom
> 1 DEAT > 2 DATE 10 May 1984
(I cut off the rest) Dates in a Gedcom are usually seen capitalized. Nevertheless this one is still technically correct since capitalization is ignored in the line value and May has three letters. However be aware that the month in a date must be written as a three-letter code, so
2 DATE 10 January 1984
would have been illegal.
Any date description that does not fit the patterns listed in the Gedcom spec may be used in a date phrase:
> I rather suspect that the lack of a standardized format or of a definition > in the GED standards suggests that the issue is not one of importance to > many people in the US. And GED was a child of the US and of the LDS > Church.
Having spent a decade or so doing IT standards in ISO and other organisations, it might be the exact opposite -- too many people thought it was important but they all wanted something different and no consensus could be reached.
Can you imagine getting any group of people to agree on the "complete list of religions/occupations/whatever)" in order to assign codes to them? Before you know it, you'd have the butcher, the baker and the candlestick maker, closely followed by the sausage maker, the meat smoker, the organic butcher, the kosher butcher, the halil butcher, the vegetarian butcher, the vegan butcher, the organic vegetarian butcher, the free range organic vegetarian kosher butcher, ...
Kerry Raymond wrote: >>I rather suspect that the lack of a standardized format or of a definition >>in the GED standards suggests that the issue is not one of importance to >>many people in the US. And GED was a child of the US and of the LDS >>Church.
> Having spent a decade or so doing IT standards in ISO and other > organisations, it might be the exact opposite -- too many people thought it > was important but they all wanted something different and no consensus could > be reached.
> Can you imagine getting any group of people to agree on the "complete list > of religions/occupations/whatever)" in order to assign codes to them? Before > you know it, you'd have the butcher, the baker and the candlestick maker, > closely followed by the sausage maker, the meat smoker, the organic butcher, > the kosher butcher, the halil butcher, the vegetarian butcher, the vegan > butcher, the organic vegetarian butcher, the free range organic vegetarian > kosher butcher,
