Re: Will this work?

Bob,
if you're using Gramps, doesn't that import from CSV? Couldn't you  
convert your TSV file into CSV? Though I appreciate the desire to  
write a Perl program, you may just be reinventing the wheel. Just a  
thought...
/mike

On 25 Feb 2010, at 13:21, Bob McConnell wrote:

> Michael Ionescu|Karlsruhe wrote:
>> Bob,
>> first off, Gedcom is a perl programming library, not a finished  
>> program.
>> You have to create a perl program to make use of it.
>> You might want to consider going at the problem differently: If  
>> there is
>> a program that can convert your TSV files to GED, you'll only be  
>> faced
>> with the quite common task of merging two trees instead of creating a
>> specialized program. If there isn't, you can do it with Gedcom -
>> depending on whether your TSV files are internally consistent. But it
>> will take quite a bit of perl programming.
>> Once you have the two GED files, use some standard tool to perform  
>> the
>> merge. This is a task virtually all genealogists are faced with at  
>> some
>> point, so there is ample discussion of the subject to be found on  
>> the net.
>> For pruning you will probably also find a standard program to do the
>> job, depending on what you mean by immediate family. That's much more
>> efficient than programming your own pruning tool using perl/Gedcom.
>
> Yes, I realize it is a Perl module. That doesn't bother me as I  
> have been writing applications with Perl for more than ten years. I  
> just wanted to make sure it was possible to get where I want to go.  
> The external documentation is not at all clear on its capabilities.  
> They talk about reading GED files but not creating or writing them.
>
> The TSV files were created by copy and paste from a related family  
> report on familytreemaker.genealogy.com. They are consistent across  
> the set, but not specific to any application I am familiar with. I  
> kept the labels in the header line on each page when I copied them.  
> Just converting them into a GED file would be a good first step.  
> This is where I was interested in using Gedcom. I also need to  
> include references to that source and the distant cousin that  
> posted the data there.
>
> The GED file I have came from one of my sisters. Years ago she was  
> playing with Family Tree Maker and had access to documents our  
> paternal grandfather had collected while tracing his lineage back  
> to Ireland. It contains all of my siblings, many of our cousins on  
> that side, and most of our children, but only a few of our  
> grandchildren. I need to grow that in several different directions.  
> But I am trying to avoid having to add those several hundred  
> records by hand when they are already available online.
>
> I recently installed Gramps 3.1.2 to manipulate the GED file. I  
> have some problems with it as it is very different from version  
> 2.0.12 which I used several years back, but it is still the best  
> application I have tried so far. Part of my problem is that I still  
> don't know my way around it very well, so some operations seem  
> awkward yet. I don't know if it can merge multiple files, nor how  
> good it will be at pruning them. I simply haven't gotten that far  
> with it.
>
> Thank you,
>
> Bob McConnell
> N2SPP

-- 
Mike Elston
London, England
Email:	[email protected], [email protected]
AIM:	mdelston