Re: [LegacyUG] Geobase international location questions

[John B. Lisle]

Randy,

Sorry, that is above my pay grade... ;-)

I do not know or remember why this was done, but I too would like to see this changed. As it is now, Legacy seems to be converting back and forth between decimal and dms a lot.

I know when I enter the cemetery coordinates from FindaGrave, or coordinates from Wikipedia, I need to do the conversion.

Considering that the Gedcom 5.5.1 standard is for decimal coordinates, it should be better for Legacy's internal format to be Decimal.

The issue may be that the internal standard for the GeoDB is DMS...

I know I would be willing to put up with a conversion if we then could work on a consistent unit, as long as a tool continued to exist to convert DMS to decimal.

thanks for your question.

john.


At 03:09 PM 12/3/2013, Randy Clark wrote:

Why won't Legacy use decimal coordinates which are quite prevalent nowadays?


On Tue, Dec 3, 2013 at 2:25 PM, John B. Lisle <leg...@tqsi.com> wrote:

Pam,

Please indulge me to talk about Location in

Legacy 8. Actually, little has changed since

Legacy 7 but many users do not have a strategy

for locations and mapping and such.

--> One of the major changes (and it is rather

minor) for L8 is that the GeoDB is now unified.

Instead of picking and choosing which regions you

want, you get to install a file that has all

regions. The file is a large download but it is

about the same size as the program installer file

so it should be no more of a problem to download.

Everyone should want to download and install this for L8.

Legacy has 2 tools for Geo Coding your locations.

Unfortunately, both operate, more or less, based

on current place names, not historical place names.

The strategy I use for a historical name is to

determine what the name of the place is now and

use the Bing map to find it. And, if that does

not work, try to find it with the GeoDB.

---> The GeoDB can be made to format the name of

a location with great flexibility using the

GeoCode-alt.txt files, but that is another lessone.... ;-)

Then, if found, go back to the Bing Map to use

more precise right click placement.

--> Sometimes, neither works. This is when I go

to Wikipedia or Google to have one of them try to

show me where the place is. Then "transfer" those

coordinates to Legacy. I will make a lot of use

of the Bing satellite views to try to place the

pin at the most favorable location.

Once I have the location resolved, I will then

create a new location with the historical name,

prefixed by the current name. When editing the

name, I check the box that says do not automatically geocode.

Then I go to the present day location, showing

the pin where the place is, then move to

historical named place and right click the pin to

the same place. Then edit the location to remove

the prefix new name which I only added so the two

places were next to each other in the place list.

This may sound confusing, but once you have done

it once or twice it becomes easy. And you can

figure out shortcuts to the process.

I have done 1000s of locations using these techniques.

Please note that the Bing maps can give a more

precise location than the GeoDB. But the GeoDB is

a great tool for assuring that the location name

is constructed correctly and all of the parts are spelled correctly.

For most US, Canada, and UK locations, the less

info you give Bing, the better it does. IE,

adding a county will often confuse it. For US, it keys off of City and state.

OK?

Do you have more questions?

john.

At 12:25 PM 12/3/2013, Pam Gosling wrote:

>Hello,

>

>I there any recommended format to list locations

>for the older Prussian now Pommeranian areas of

>former Germany now Poland? I’m new to thishis,

>and in the archives from 2010, it seems that it

>is not possible for the Geobase to properly

>identify these locations? Â So, if this is true, are these my only options?:

>

>1.       Just not use the geobase feature and

>list the location as well as possible?

>2.       Look up lat/long date from online maps

>and insert to program? Or does that even work?

>3.       Another idea?

>4.       If I do add lat/long to database, does

>that get saved for others to use? Or just my file?

>

>If there is no way to use this mapping feature

>for international locations, is there a standard

>recommended format for myself to list, just so I have the proper format anyway:

>

>For example:

>

>Zeitlitz, Kreis Regenwalde, Pommerania, Prussia (old German )

>

>Which is now in:

>

>( town Polish not yet translated),

>Resko(Regenwalde), Lobez(“like countyââ€

>missing the Poland diacritical mark), Poland

>

>e.g. should I write either the (old) or

>new/current names in parentheses/inside

>brackets, with hyphens, or only list the current

>names and describe older German names in notes or something? Or what?

>

>And, is there a way to import the Polish

>diacritical letters(?right way to describe

>them?); they are not included in the options I

>can click on. When I tried to paste one to the

>family name in the address location field, it didn‬™t keep the mark.

>

>I want to write the locations in such a way so

>that in the future if the mapping function for

>international locations ever comes about, I

>don’t want to have to rewrite all of theseese.

>

>And, I’m assuming this applies to both

> >“events† such as residence, and and the address

>field for births, deaths, etc? Or would that make a difference?

>

>Thanks so much for all the gracious help on this list; very appreciated.  Pam

>

>

>

>

>

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