Our Fathers.org

When this project is completed, it will automatically generate movies about your ancestors, free of charge.  All you do is upload your GEDCOM file.  Your genealogy data will be used  to generate a free movie about your ancestor, complete with an audio narration, pictures and maps. Pictures can come from you and/or other people.

Feel free to log in and leave a comment. 

I have created a prototype for this project, so that you can get an idea of how this works.  It is a flash movie.  Click here to view the video.

– Larry Maddocks  801-759-1604

Since I live in Salt Lake City, Utah, where this conference is going on, I might as well go down there and talk to my fellow genealogy enthusiasts.  I snapped some photos of the booths that I was able to get to.

Genealogy Today

Genealogy Today was the first booth that I came to, and perhaps it is the best kept secret in the whole Conference.  Shown here is the owner/programmer/genealogy data gatherer.   He has a search engine that goes out to many resources, publishers, web pages, etc.,  and pulls in the source records of your ancestors.   There are free resources and paid resources.

Second Life

The owner’s name is Illya James D’Addezio.  He is also known as Constantine Kyomoon. He runs a genealogy discussion group almost every night (7 or 8 pm Pacific Time) at his virtual digs in Second Life. Check it out at http://wiki.genealogytoday.com/Live_Roots_Genealogy_Zone.html

Another helpful person who is on Second Life (how did I get on this subject?) is Dear Myrtle.

General Land Office Records

These guys were really nice and helpful.  They are out of Washington, C.D., and apparently are a government entity that provide a free service (courtesy of your tax dollars).  You put your ancestor’s name in the form on their web site, hit the button, and you get a list of land transactions that involved purchasing land from the federal government.

For example, if I enter “Nathan Smith,” I get a list of all land purchased by people named Nathan Smith.  You can then download a copy of the original transaction document.

They are at http://www.glorecords.blm.gov

More Images

Read more…

This is a discussion of the GEDCOM specifications, for developers and interested parties.

Archives of GEDCOM-L@LISTSERV.NODAK.EDU

Genealogical Data Communications Specs

via Archives of GEDCOM-L@LISTSERV.NODAK.EDU.

The purpose of this group is to discuss the use of XML for storing, displaying, and exchanging genealogical data. The group is a place for meeting others, asking questions, providing help, and sharing ideas.

Potential topics include genealogical concepts and principles, questions/advice about XML and XSLT, conversion of GEDCOM 5.5 to XML, genealogy visualization tools, genealogical data models, XML-based web sites, and other applications of XML to genealogy.

As a whole, the group is not engaged in developing standards, specifications or projects. In fact, our members have diverse interests, so as a courtesy please limit messages about the details of any specific project. Individuals or special interest groups desiring public input from the group should make their information available externally and post a message telling members where it can be found.

via GenealogyXML : Applying XML to Genealogy.

GenXML

What is GenXML?

GenXML is a file format for exchange of data between genealogy programs. It is an alternative to Gedcom 5.5. The idea of GenXML is that:

* it shall be easy to read by most genealogical programs

* it shall be easy to write by most genealogical programs

* it shall be easy to manipulate by third party programs

* all kinds of information shall fit into one and only one place

For more information:  GenXML 2.0.

I attended the Family History Expo in Salt Lake City today.  It was so nice to just hang out with these fellow genealogy people.  They were all so nice! Read more…

Found the following that has a lot of resources for genealogy developers.

Developers

Genealogy Software Developer Resources

If you are looking at developing your own genealogy software, above and beyond setting up a database using software like FileMaker, on this page your going to find links to genealogy-specific development resources (such as libraries), as well as links to open-source genealogy software projects that are always looking for additional developers. Generally, “open-source” means that the source code is available, and the developers are looking for contributions from other developers. For an explanation of just what “open-source” software is, please see this link at Wikipedia.org.

Most of the links listed below will take you to SourceForge.net. This will be continuously added to, so if your interested in development, check back here often.

See the rest of the links and resources at GenealogySoftwareGuide.com » Developers.

We have recently gone public beta with a project we developed in the

BYU Computer Science Department. It is a site that allows users to

contribute information about the existence / whereabouts of their

ancestors’ journals (and upload scanned images of the journal pages if

they wish), and also tag who is written about in the journals with

their corresponding PersonIDs from new FamilySearch. The site will

automatically check all journals and tags that have been contributed

to the system against users’ ancestors that are listed in new

FamilySearch and let them know if any of their ancestors have been

tagged or have journals in the system.

We have implemented an “invitation only” registration system in case

it starts growing faster than we can handle, but I’ll leave that

turned off until it starts looking like the server can’t keep up with

the growth rate. Right now anyone with an account on new FamilySearch

can create an account.

If you are interested in just taking a look, helping tag the journals

already referenced in the system, or adding reference information

about journals you know about that aren’t in the system, check out the

site at:

http://journals.byu.edu

-Doug

via collaborative project at BYU – BeyondGen | Google Groups.

phpGene

If you want to code your own genealogy site, but you don’t know where to start this stuff may give you a head start. phpGene is a collection of PHP scripts that you can use to create your own dynamically driven genealogy site using PHP and MySQL. These script ran infused.org for several years, but have since been replaced with Retrospect-GDS.

These scripts are offered free of charge. Feel free to copy any of the code to do with as you please. That being said, they are also offered without official support.

via Infused Solutions.

Ged2Csv

Use Ged2Csv to export the information from your gedcom files into a format suitable for importing into a database. With Ged2Csv you can export to a set of delimited files which you can then import into a database, or you can choose to export directly to a Microsoft Access database.

Ged2Csv is compatible with Windows 95/98/NT/2K/XP

Ged2Csv is now free.

via Infused Solutions.

Retrospect-GDS

Use Retrospect-GDS to display your genealogy information on the web. You can change the look and feel just by creating new templates. Multiple languages are also supported. There are currently language files for English, Spanish, Dutch, German, Polish, Norwegian and French.

Retrospect-GDS is licenced under the GNU Public License. This means, that under most circumstances, you are free to use and modify this software.

Retrospect-GDS is written in PHP and can use many popular databases such as MySQL, Microsoft SQL Server, or Oracle.

via Infused Solutions.