Behold Version 1.1 - Sat, 27 Jun 2015

Thanks, Keith.

And thanks Klemens for your ideas. Yes, I do agree with you that the age on the first line may be confusing as to whose age it is. I like your suggestion that the date and age be kept first and the relationship and life event be added following that. Also this would allow the “With Wife” to move up which would be more efficient. But I think I’d still like the event to start on a line of its own. That would make it easier to pick out what the actual event is, e.g.:

Sep 1899, age 27, married 10y to 13y with Wife Margerett (Donovan) McCarthy MCC-2, age 24
   Son 4 Birth: John J. McCARTHY MCC-52 in Boston, Suffolk, MA
   Source: 1900 Census Theodore H. McCarthy Household …

Good idea. I’m not sure offhand if my current data structure will allow simple switching of the order. If it does, I might make the change in a point release (1.1.1). If not, I’ll consider this for Version 2.

I had to think a bit about your suggestion that an event sort order in the place list might be wanted. Usually these will already have a source (otherwise, how did you come up with it?). Therefore, you would rarely want to check your birth lists at a place with a birth list record. I would see it normally work the other way around, where you would find a new birth source for the town, and see if each potential entry from the source would be in your list. In that case, the date order would be fine and maybe even preferable. For example, you might not have the birth record, but do have the Christening record a few days later. Or you don’t have the death but you have the burial.

But once I add source-based data entry, that methodology won’t be needed. Instead, when you get a new source, say a list of births in a place, you’ll enter it as a new source along with all the events it contains that may be relevant to you. Then you’ll link them up to the relevant people.

Klemens,

I’ve taken a look at the idea of putting the date before the event. But at this point, it won’t work. It only became apparent to me when I checked my code and determined my data structures. You need some complex examples with dates and places and sources and notes to see the problem. I won’t try explaining that detail now, but I’ll at least give you this:

Each line is representing an event. So the event comes first, following by the date and place and other event information.

When it’s an event of the person, it is obvious, e.g.:
Birth in 1910 in France

But when it is a Life Event, the relative for the event must be shown, e.g.:
Birth Son 1 in 1940 in France

The line naming the son is extra information that is not part of the event, so it is added after.

Moving the event off the first line removes what is important. And a bit of a logistic problem: If you didn’t have a date or place, then nothing would show on that line.

So the real concept is that the event line is the event as it is related to the main person, which is why the age of the main person is shown there.

As I’m implementing the database for Version 2, I know I’ll be promoting events internally to be their own record. Once I do that, I’ll consider your idea and if there’s a good way to implement it, I might be able to change it then.

Louis

Klemens,

Events without dates generally show up first, with a few exceptions (e.g. Behold tries to be smart about marriages and births and keep them in order if possible).

When I say “event”, I am also including facts and other information that normally don’t include dates, e.g. height, eye color, number of children, DNA info, etc. So there might be quite a bit of information without dates, and it isn’t necessarily because the date is missing.

But it still seems t me that it is the event that is most important and should be first, not the age. I think I want to know that it is a Birth, or a Death of Older Sister 1, or the Death of Father before anything else. And all the following indented information all relates to that event.

For indentations, I’m using the HTML character for a space, which are the 6 characters:   I’ve updated your comment to include them.

Louis

I’m now playing around with better representations.

The solution to putting the date first might be to also have the event and the person on the same line, e.g.:

Age 30, married 2y (wife first name, age 28), Wed 5 June 1940 in France. Birth of Son 1: (Name) (ID)

or possibly (which do you like better, age first or date first?):

Wed 5 June 1940, age 30, married 2y (wife first name, age 28) in France. Birth of Son 1: (Name) (ID)

Then if the date and place is not given, then there is still something on the line for reference, e.g.:

Birth of Son 1: (Name) (ID)

I’m playing with this now to ensure this would work consistently across all the different event types. I’ll post another blog post explaining what I’ve decided on once I’ve done it, and then I’ll release a version 1.1.1.

Thanks again Klemens, for this idea.

Louis