# How to set the Startperson

**URL:** <https://gramps.discourse.group/t/how-to-set-the-startperson/9480>\
**Category:** Gramps Web\
**Created:** [May 12, 2026, 7:05pm UTC](https://gramps.discourse.group/t/how-to-set-the-startperson/9480 "2026-05-12T19:05:46Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![trond.mjoes](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e56c9b/32.png) [@trond.mjoes](https://gramps.discourse.group/u/trond.mjoes)\
**Post date:** [May 12, 2026, 7:05pm UTC](https://gramps.discourse.group/t/how-to-set-the-startperson/9480/1 "2026-05-12T19:05:46Z")

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I managed to delete the Startperson in my database. And now I can not manage set up any Startperson. Another question: Is it possible reuse an old gramps person id nr?  
By the way, I have Grampsweb on Grampshub.

Regards  
Trond Mjøs

Gramps 6.0.8  
Gramps Web API 3.13.0  
Gramps Web Frontend 26.5.1  
Gramps QL 0.4.0  
Sifts 1.3.1  
locale: en  
multi-tree: true  
task queue: true  
OCR: true  
chat: true

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**Author:** ![DavidMStraub](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/free1/user_avatar/gramps.discourse.group/davidmstraub/32/7_2.png) [@DavidMStraub](https://gramps.discourse.group/u/DavidMStraub)\
**Post date:** [May 12, 2026, 7:47pm UTC](https://gramps.discourse.group/t/how-to-set-the-startperson/9480/2 "2026-05-12T19:47:23Z")

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Hi Trond!

In Gramps Web, the home person you can set on the dashboard does not change the home person in the Gramps database - it is purely for display.

Which problem are you encountering after deleting your home person?

And yes, you can reuise Gramps IDs after deleting an object that used it.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![trond.mjoes](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e56c9b/32.png) [@trond.mjoes](https://gramps.discourse.group/u/trond.mjoes)\
**Post date:** [May 12, 2026, 8:19pm UTC](https://gramps.discourse.group/t/how-to-set-the-startperson/9480/3 "2026-05-12T20:19:24Z")

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Thanks for quick answer. I finally managed to solve the problem by first using Revisions to undo the delete of the person. And then I used the repair database function to repair the broken links. When I tried earlier today to undo, I got an error message. But now it worked.  
Regards  
Trond Mjøs

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**Author:** ![DavidMStraub](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/free1/user_avatar/gramps.discourse.group/davidmstraub/32/7_2.png) [@DavidMStraub](https://gramps.discourse.group/u/DavidMStraub)\
**Post date:** [May 12, 2026, 8:33pm UTC](https://gramps.discourse.group/t/how-to-set-the-startperson/9480/4 "2026-05-12T20:33:20Z")

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Good to know, thanks!

If deleting the database home person causes something to break, this is something we should fix, so if you encountered some errors, please do let us know the details.

Best, David

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**Author:** ![DavidMStraub](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/free1/user_avatar/gramps.discourse.group/davidmstraub/32/7_2.png) [@DavidMStraub](https://gramps.discourse.group/u/DavidMStraub)\
**Post date:** [May 13, 2026, 7:22am UTC](https://gramps.discourse.group/t/how-to-set-the-startperson/9480/5 "2026-05-13T07:22:03Z")

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I think we had an actual bug there, that I now fixed:

> <https://github.com/gramps-project/gramps-web-api/pull/845>
>
> This pull request updates the deletion logic for \`Person\` objects to ensure that… the default person handle is properly unset when the default person is deleted, or when all \`Person\` objects are deleted. This prevents dangling references to non-existent default persons in the database. Additionally, there is a small code style fix in the variable assignment for citation referents.
> 
> \*\*Handling of default person on deletion:\*\*
> 
> \* When deleting a \`Person\` by handle, if the handle matches the current default person, the default is unset by calling \`set\_default\_person\_handle(None)\`. (\`gramps\_webapi/api/resources/base.py\`, \`gramps\_webapi/api/resources/delete.py\`) \[\[1\]\](diffhunk://#diff-56840781bd46323628e72402f3c77faff27e17132bd2ca104ec108fbf60306f6R324-R325) \[\[2\]\](diffhunk://#diff-52b967cf5d8cd99f2e35f12ef4dca9f3ac6c79e5dc8b1667fb8f94464fdee7ddR572-R573)
> \* When deleting all \`Person\` objects, the default person handle is also unset if it was set. (\`gramps\_webapi/api/resources/delete.py\`) \[\[1\]\](diffhunk://#diff-52b967cf5d8cd99f2e35f12ef4dca9f3ac6c79e5dc8b1667fb8f94464fdee7ddR610-R611) \[\[2\]\](diffhunk://#diff-52b967cf5d8cd99f2e35f12ef4dca9f3ac6c79e5dc8b1667fb8f94464fdee7ddR621-R622)
> 
> \*\*Code style improvements:\*\*
> 
> \* Simplified tuple unpacking in the \`delete\_source\` function for clarity. (\`gramps\_webapi/api/resources/delete.py\`)