Global Places editor

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1

Gramps version 6.0.8

I import my tree from Ancestry. The Place information is just imported as a Name. I have a lot of data. I’d like to add Enclosed By details but doing this one by one would take forever, even using the Places Filter. Similarly, most of my places contain a UK postcode, which I would like to copy into the Code field. Are there any tools that would make this task possible?

2

There are a few addon tools to explore. Here are some with which to start:

  • The Multimerge addon gramplet from the Isotammi curated collection of addons will allow manually merging MORE than 2 Place records at a time. It has extra capabilities when run in Place category sidebar/bottombar. It has a Place “automerge” feature that finds duplicate by title, or name (dangerous, since the Place names are rarely unique and are used for locations with different enclosing Places)
  • The Extract Place Data from a Place Title addon tool will break out the Place Hierarchy from a Place Name that is a comma separated list.
  • The Place Cleanup addon gramplet takes a little bit of setup for a free GeoNames account. But then will use the GeoNames gazetteer online database to find the place and offers many options (including filling in the GPS coordinates, Postal Codes, alternative names in multiple languages, setting enclosing place, or resetting to a Standardized GeoNames ID.)

Note

When you undock any gramplet (by dragging the gramplet tab to the toolbar or menubar), the floating window will have a Help button at the right bottom. Clicking that navigates to Wiki documentation for that Gramplet. (For built-in Gramplet that do not have a registered link the wiki page, it opens the table of built-in gramplets. Each of those listings has a link to the more-detailed documentation.)

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3

Thank-you! It sounds like the Extract Place Data from a Place Title addon tool might be what I am looking for.

4

…except it only seems to work with USA addresses! Is there any way to set up a template for UK addresses?

5

It looks like the developers have configured conversions for the USA, Canada, France and Sweden. The UK looks… complicated. It looks like untangling the rules to enhance the add for the UK hierarchy might require a native. Definitely beyond my ken.

background

There is a PLAC.FORM tag to help decipher PLAC comma separated hierarchies. That form can be added to the header or to each PLAC in each event. Unfortunately, because it is optional and can trigger compatibility problems, most GEDCOM exporters (including the one in Gramps) tend skip that tag.

Although Gramps support Postal Codes for both Places and Personal Addresses, GEDCOM does not typically include “postal codes” for event Places, only for a person’s Addresses (see page 31 of the GEDCOM specifications). That’s true for both for the standard v.5.5.1 and the more recent v7.0 release.)

PLACE_HIERARCHY:= 
This shows the jurisdictional entities that are named in a sequence from the lowest to the highest
jurisdiction. The jurisdictions are separated by commas, and any jurisdiction's name that is missing is still accounted for by a comma. When a PLAC.FORM structure is included in the HEADER of a
GEDCOM transmission, it implies that all place names follow this jurisdictional format and each
jurisdiction is accounted for by a comma, whether the name is known or not. When the PLAC.FORM is subordinate to an event, it temporarily overrides the implications made by the PLAC.FORM structure stated in the HEADER. This usage is not common and, therefore, not encouraged. It should only be used when a system has over-structured its place-names.

Bottom line

I don’t have an automated solution for you. I’d use the Multimerge to consolidate duplicates, then clean the Place list one-by-one with the Place Cleanup.