This list is pretty quiet. Does anyone think it's worth trying to get
genealogy-related discussion going on Wikimedia Space
<https://discuss-space.wmflabs.org/>?
I'm not much of a help-- Can't even figure out how to say 'YEA' or Nay!
:-)
I go to sign in, and not even sure which part to sign in thru--
Developer or data! :-)
All I am looking for, is something simple, safe and practical for us old
timer's to be able to figure out, and share in with you younger'
Technically gifted' ones!
Irving "MACK" Baxter "*He has made
everything beautiful in its time. *8971 Pardee Hollow Road
*He** has even put eternity in their heart;"*
Wayland, NY 14572
Ecclesiastes 3:11
*Home Phone 585-534-9852 Text-* G-Voice # -- *585**-204-0504
Cell (no signal at home)*
On Sun, Dec 31, 2017 at 7:00 AM, <
wikimedia-genealogy-request(a)lists.wikimedia.org> wrote:
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> Today's Topics:
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> 1. Case for a genealogy system outside of Wikidata (Sam Wilson)
>
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Message: 1
> Date: Sun, 31 Dec 2017 13:48:49 +0800
> From: Sam Wilson <sam(a)samwilson.id.au>
> To: Wikimedia Genealogy <wikimedia-genealogy(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
> Subject: [Wikimedia-genealogy] Case for a genealogy system outside of
> Wikidata
> Message-ID:
> <1514699329.2438118.1220044440.1157F703@webmail.
> messagingengine.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"
>
> (Thanks Dan for sending out the newsletter today! Maybe that'll bump us
> over the 100-supporters line!)
>
> I just want to draw people's attention to a discussion started by
> Christian on Phabricator about whether it's best to not target Wikidata as
> our main data repository, and what to do about unsourced information and
> private sub-trees:
>
> https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T183001
>
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Subject: Digest Footer
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> End of Wikimedia-genealogy Digest, Vol 7, Issue 4
> *************************************************
>
Hey, Irving, the youngsters don't all have all the answers. At 77 I'm still
a major contributor to Familypedia (where another oldie has made over
400,000 edits) but I hope Wikimedia can come up with something even better.
Robin F. Patterson, Plimmerton, Porirua City, New Zealand
http://familypedia.wikia.com/wiki/User:Robin_Patterson
----- Original Message -----
From: <wikimedia-genealogy-request(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
To: <wikimedia-genealogy(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
Sent: Tuesday, January 02, 2018 1:00 AM
Subject: Wikimedia-genealogy Digest, Vol 8, Issue 1
.....
> Today's Topics:
>
> 1. Re: Wikimedia-genealogy Digest, Vol 7, Issue 4 (Irving M. Baxter)
>
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Message: 1
> Date: Sun, 31 Dec 2017 13:48:23 -0500
> From: "Irving M. Baxter" <imackbaxter(a)gmail.com>
> To: wikimedia-genealogy(a)lists.wikimedia.org
> Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-genealogy] Wikimedia-genealogy Digest, Vol 7,
> Issue 4
> Message-ID:
> <CANL4zWS2s9emp9iBKWYpbm5NA5zjOJkT7_0EtbSz5Bz1M7ZnWw(a)mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"
>
> I'm not much of a help-- Can't even figure out how to say 'YEA' or Nay!
> :-)
> I go to sign in, and not even sure which part to sign in thru--
> Developer or data! :-)
> All I am looking for, is something simple, safe and practical for us old
> timer's to be able to figure out, and share in with you younger'
> Technically gifted' ones!
>
> Irving "MACK" Baxter "*He has made
> everything beautiful in its time. *8971 Pardee Hollow Road
> *He** has even put eternity in their heart;"*
> Wayland, NY 14572
> Ecclesiastes 3:11
> .....
(Thanks Dan for sending out the newsletter today! Maybe that'll bump us over the 100-supporters line!)
I just want to draw people's attention to a discussion started by Christian on Phabricator about whether it's best to not target Wikidata as our main data repository, and what to do about unsourced information and private sub-trees:
https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T183001
Dear fellow Wikimedians, on the Meta page "Wikimedia genealogy project" is
now only 6 votes lacking, in order to get 100 supporting votes. Please try
to get some more guys voting so we reach 100 before the end of the year.
https://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikimedia_genealogy_project&di…
I would also like to encourrage you all to join the demo wiki at:
https://tools.wmflabs.org/genealogy/wiki/Special:ListUsers
You can already now submit genealogies, I have so far submitted the Pharaes
from the 18th dynasty in Egypt, and some generations from the house of Wasa
in Sweden. I think the more users who involve in this demo wiki, the more
arguments to start it as a wikimedia project.
Finally, I think its time to make a new newsletter, and ask you all kindly
fr some ideas suggestions, or even read text to submit in the newsletter.
A merry christmas and a happy new year
Dan Koehl
-----------------------------------------------------------
Kontor/Office: Ljusterö Information
Box 75, 184 03 Ljusterö
Tel: +46 (0)8-542 424 01
Mobil telefon 1 (Comviq): 0767 15 45 70
Mobil telefon 2 (Telia): 0739 17 17 89
Skype: DanKoehl ICQ: 40467 87
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I assume most people on this list know about the wikiproject
https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:WikiProject_Genealogy but I
thought I'd mention it, because it seems there aren't that many members
yet.
I've been looking at BMD records in Australia, and am wondering how I
can cite them. It's easy to create an item for each registry, and add
that as a 'stated in' property in a reference, but one also needs to
cite the registration number, and often the district and year. Does
anyone have an idea of the correct approach? Do we need to request a new
property or two?
Are civil registry districts considered "administrative districts"? I
created https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q42333974 as an example of a
person with this sort of reference, and
https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q42650404 as an example of a civil
registry district, but I'm not sure I've done them in the best way.
http://tinyurl.com/y92fjjbs is WDQS list of all the civil registries
that Wikidata knows about so far. Lots missing! Please add ones you know
about. :-)
—Sam.
Digest response to James Mason and Robert Shaw, for which I apologize.
> Message: 1
> Date: Fri, 08 Sep 2017 14:09:10 -0400
> From: James Mason <jrm(a)slashmail.org>
> To: "Discussion about the Wikimedia genealogy project."
> <wikimedia-genealogy(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
> I'm not quite sure what is meant by the remarks that GEDCOM structures -
> imposed on a Wiki - lead to something clunky. Are we talking about UI
> design, code implementation, maybe both?
Wow, I just wrote a 7 paragraph response to this, which is way too long
and complex. Here is a brief synopsis:
The basic solutions are all a kluge - a way to work around the
underlying structure of Mediawiki. This makes them slow to render on
save, and usually both brittle and high maintenance. Basically you are
storing data inside text which is parsed to html and then stored in a
database - so no one can work with just the data directly.
A different solution is to write a Mediawiki extension to do everything
a genealogy software does except the presentation layer, except it also
has to at least do Create and Update so you still have some
presentation. Which means you basically invented another genealogy
wheel. If we are going to do this much work to bring genealogy data to
Mediawiki we could save effort by reversing - add a free form text
article to a genealogy software - which would then retain the benefits
of data manipulation and surfacing.
> So maybe a semantic MediaWiki basis would allow for WeRelate to be
> implemented without reliance on hacking the base code? Thereby less
> clunky?
The semantic relationships should allow for bi-directional
relationships, but I have avoided SMW after my first experiments with it
because it is mind-bendingly difficult for me to grasp. You could ask
the good SMW folks in IRC at irc://chat.freenode.org/semantic-mediawiki
(browser IRC client at
http://webchat.freenode.net/?channels=semantic-mediawiki)
Amgine
> Message: 2
> Date: Fri, 08 Sep 2017 16:27:43 -0700
> From: Robert Shaw <rsshaw(a)zoho.com>
> To: "wikimedia-genealogy(a)lists.wikimedia.org"
> <wikimedia-genealogy(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
> Subject: [Wikimedia-genealogy] Structuring of genealogical information
> So there may be a range of ideas about what the project might produce (if it produces anything), one aspect of which is how the information about a person should be kept and presented.
...snippage...
> Genealogists need to have the core data about their subjects, and since computers arrived they mostly have been transferring that core data about in some form of file, which is most always some dialect of GEDCOM. The widespread use of it, inadequate as it is in some ways, is highly useful to genealogists. Thus import and export in that format is needed, and structuring of the core person data in the contents of the system itself needs to be fundamental in the approach.
I might quibble about some of the details, but over all I have strong
agreement with what you said Robert Shaw. There are multiple optional
standards which improve on GEDCOM, but GEDCOM is the most-widely used
dumbed-down exchange format. We should be aware the LDS and related
groups are migrating away from it for storage - they are using richer
proprietary representations, but also GEDCOMx - but as the de facto
standard, with hundreds of common extensions, it is pretty much central
to any data discussion.
But the biggest point of supporting a public standard is to avoid having
to maintain that standard in-house. We could import/export GEDCOM, but
actually use Gramps XML[1], and also export .gw and .tmg (and/or
others.) By avoiding trying to maintain a standard we may reduce the
costs associated with starting up and reinventing such a complex data
standard, and we would avoid censure for being standard-agnostic for
import/export.
Taking a quick turn through Packagist I see gedcom, gecomx, and webtrees
libraries, as well as several self-contained units like Sam's and
SilverStripe-genealogist.
Amgine
[1] https://gramps-project.org/wiki/index.php?title=Gramps_XML project
repo https://github.com/gramps-project/gramps
I fully agree that a genealogy website needs structure
(parent/child/sibling/event etc), though there should be room for free-form
narrative as part of any individual's page.
Familypedia has been using Semantic MediaWiki and Semantic Forms (which
will, we trust, be upgraded eventually by our host so that it has the
current name "Page Forms") since 2009. It has over 60,000 articles about
individuals and tens of thousands of subpages automatically displaying
people's ancestry trees or descendant tables for four generations (subject
to data availability). Example at
http://familypedia.wikia.com/wiki/Charlemagne/tree It can do complex-looking
searches such as tabulating (in a way that allows sorting by a particular
column) all Familypedia people born in Pennsylvania whose father was stated
to be born between 1849 and 1875:
http://familypedia.wikia.com/wiki/Semantic_MediaWiki/demo_query-subquery And
it has pages for several thousand places (villages, counties, nations, etc)
automatically tabulating the people who had events such as birth and
marriage at the place.
However, I also agree with one or more correspondents that such a wiki
should be able to handle GEDCOM files. Familypedia people have tried, with
little success.
So on the Demo wiki I've asked for semantic extensions to be made available
and I will start agitating for programmers to work out how to import GEDCOM
files and siphon their data into individuals' pages with minimum
duplication. A tall order, but several big genealogy websites have ways of
doing it, generally by alerting the contributor to apparent duplications and
offering to merge the individuals' pages. The WikiTree experts may be able
to help there. Probably WeRelate people can too.
Robin F. Patterson, Plimmerton, Porirua City, New Zealand
http://familypedia.wikia.com/wiki/User:Robin_Patterson
(I hope you folks are pleased that I cut off all of the earlier stuff; I
hope other contributors will similarly trim so as to leave little apart from
the points they are answering.)
So there may be a range of ideas about what the project might produce (if it produces anything), one aspect of which is how the information about a person should be kept and presented. Sam recently wrote:
---- On Thu, 07 Sep 2017 17:46:43 -0700 Sam Wilson <sam(a)samwilson.id.au> wrote ----
I'm not sure I agree that genealogical research is *uniquely*
structured. It's no more sturctured than, say, writing histories of
companies, or political parties, or railways... I mean that there are
always requirements for strucutred data in any research, but that we
don't bother with bespoke tools for most of them. I think primarily
because the ultimate desired output is readable, linear prose, with
images, figures etc. — I think this is my usual goal with genealogy too.
I view the aim to be something more structured than a collection of pages of unstructured prose, as might be appropriate for histories of railways or Pokemon characters, or for an encyclopedia. It certainly would be nice to have a biography of an ancestor in well-written prose, with photos and maybe circles and arrows and graphs. I do see a need to allow for free form prose and graphics about people so that such biographies can be constructed and preserved.
However the bulk of family history and genealogy doesn't, and often can't, get to that level of knowledge and detail. As we go back in time, less and less information is available. Genealogists are used to dealing with this, and have been using structured data and tools to support the research and analysis since long before computers.
That's why I think the project should produce a system that at its core has structured data, but allows supplementation with free prose where that can be supplied. At the core, every person has a mother and a father, and very often has other relationships such as siblings and children. Every person was born somewhere on some day and died (or will die) somewhere and some time. These are things that are key to researching, establishing, and convincing one another that particular people are related,
The project can serve varying needs, but a major need is to serve as a repository and presentation of the relationship data and the reasons those presented relationships are correct. With hardly any conflict, it can also support producing and reading biographies.
Genealogists need to have the core data about their subjects, and since computers arrived they mostly have been transferring that core data about in some form of file, which is most always some dialect of GEDCOM. The widespread use of it, inadequate as it is in some ways, is highly useful to genealogists. Thus import and export in that format is needed, and structuring of the core person data in the contents of the system itself needs to be fundamental in the approach.