Was Gramps your first?

Genealogy
21

Yes I did start with Gramps (~15 years ago), when my then-ill aunt passed me her paper archives.
Since, I have subscribed to several commercial services like Geneanet and Ancestry, for their matching-with-other-trees services. They’ve been quite useful to me for the branches in other countries.

One warning to new users selecting a software, should be that IME all commercial services try their darnedest to lock in their customers, so provide only minimal ways to port your data elsewhere. You are effectively pretty much their prisoner after you have over a few thousand people in your tree. Their marketing knows this and tend to milk the herd…
I always keep my database on my PCs in Gramps, and only copy
Now support-wise, IME the quality of response by the Gramps community is way above that of paying sites. The service staff try their best, but the level of competence is is not nearly the same (commercial companies do not ‘waste’ highly competent tech staff on user support).

Let’s not be shy: Gramps is not only the smartest-designed genealogy app, it is also the best supported and one of the most user-friendly. And it won’t lock you in like the commercial ones.

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22

Gramps is my third program. Started with GedView (an app) on an iPod in 2010, and not long after began using PhpGedView. In 2012 or early 2013 I started using Gramps and have used it ever since.

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23

I started with Gramps after researching some alternatives. I wanted something offline, where I would own all data. Also, Gramps proved to have one of the most expansive data models, and its own file format allows exchanging that (whereas GEDCOM is really basic in that regard). I looked at some self-hosted web-based solutions as well but did not feel like actively managing a deployment with all the updates that come with it (as much as I do that professionally, did not want that for a hobby site). Additionally Gramps’ own built-in web publication turned out to be rather simple and a bit out of date (no shame, a desktop app and web functionality are both two different, challenging things!). In the end I decided to use Gramps for data collection and management, and build https://betty.readthedocs.io/ for web publication.

I like Gramps, but I think the UX could use a major refresh. One of my main pet peeves is the lack of proper keyboard accessibility, which means most actions require a mouse and that is literally a pain (in the hand) when doing batch work.

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24

What about data? Blank page, a gedcom or paper files from somewhere? Something else?

Craig

25

I started with a small stack of papers that a friend of the family had assembled some twenty years prior, and from then on it was digging through online archives. I’m interested in provenance so being able to keep citations is a major asset for me.

A second major drawback for me is that Gramps’ own file formats are not quite as stable and consistent as one would hope, and DTDs are harder to read than XML schemas. However I’m hoping to avoid all that by refactoring Betty’s current parsing of Gramps XML into integrating with Gramps’ Python APIs directly.

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28

I began my geneology research with a hand written notebook handed down by my great-grandfather to my grandmother to me in the 70’s. I first kept the information on paper and retyped the information yearly with updates. This became too overwhelming, so I input all the information into the software Sierra Generation Family Treemaker, in the 80’s-90’s. This software is no longer supported and I have updated my computer to Windows 11 this year. Sierra Generations Family Treemaker software will not work on Windows 11. I need a new software. However, the thought of reinputing all this information into a new software is challenging. I am looking for a software that will be supported for a number of decades. I am focusing right now on finding a software that will allow me to transfer existing Sierra information into the new software. Is there a way to accomplish ths transfor on Gamps, without simply reinputing all the information manually? I am not the most tech savy, but I have a basic understanding.

29

Hmm, before upgrading your PC to Windows 11, did you do a GEDCOM export from Sierra Generation Family Treemaker? If you did you should be quite safe, since almost all genealogy software including Gramps can import GEDCOM files.
If you don’t have a GEDCOM export file, best hope is to find a Windows 10 PC and get your Sierra Generation Family Treemaker up and running, and then do a GEDCOM export.

2 Likes
30

Started off on paper, but when my first binder was full I bought a Dutch software. This was 1992 and it ran under DOS. Over time I tried every software I could find. But since the old software had the opportunity to write my own plugins (in a sort of BASIC style) I stretched it far beyond its orriginal capabilities. Also writing my own software in visual-basic to perform comparisons, find doubles, find loops etc. I kept using it through all versions of Windows, but it being a DOS program it got to be a hindrance. About 2015 It had hit a technical wall and the possibile ways to stretch it became to an end. [it now runs on dosbox, I still use it to open and review my oldest reseach] I started with gramps, but I couldn’t get it going properly. I then tried a huge amount of inflexible commercial stuff. In the end buying a new Dutch package. This helped my research along greatly, but also within a couple of years I bumped into limits I couldn’t resolve. I couldn’t enter my data they way I needed to. Then tried Gramps again, which had come along greatly. Alas export from old > import to Gramps was cramped and incomplete. Except continuing my research I’m still in progress of editing and correcting the import. A tedious job with over 7,6 Gig of scans, sources to trawl and correct (or tick off), next to 10Gig [7000+ files] of ‘parked and to be done in the future’

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31

Hi, new guy here on the Gramps discourse group. :wink:

I undertook my first steps into genealogy on paper in the 80’s, after seeing a dutch tv series by Teleac. Started writing down info I’ve got from my parents. Later discovered a genealogy program on a 5,25” inch floppy for windows 3.1. Due to studies. military service and a time consuming job as a trucker did push this hobby to the background.

Early this century, I’ve picked it up again and started with a dutch software called Pro-Gen. Not quite happy with the possibilities I’ve started looking for something else. Mid 90’s I’ve dumped Windows in the trash and switched to linux so limited choice for software. Tried out some software under wine like ald-faer, PAF, etc.. but not really to my liking. Tried out 2 java apps (Ancestris and Ancestor Tree Manager) but ended up using Humo-Gen for online presentation and Gramps as the main program for research and data management.

Of course I’ve read a lot of stories on the web about the steep learning curve of Gramps. But to be honest, with some youtube tutorials and some plain old reasonable thinking it isn’t as bad as a lot of people say. :+1:

So, didn’t start out with gramps. But ended up with it and the way it goes now probably will stick with it.

5 Likes
32

Like most people, I started with written notes telling what I learnt from aged relatives. These sheets slept in a drawer because of hectic active professional activity. My first Mac Plus happened to be equipped with a nice database (now defunct 4D) and I fancied to write my own genealogy application. I quickly came to the general idea of persons and family but my implementation resulted in some chaotic plate of spaghetti as I didn’t fully understand the 4D workflow, which was quite unusual, neither SQL, nor key-value pairs. Nevertheless, it already gave some more power compared to paper and pencil.

About 10 years later, around 2000, using a company laptop under Windows 3.11 was such a pain that I subreptitiously converted it to Linux (which I didn’t know anything about, except rumours). First surprise, the laptop was twice as fast. Exploring the software library, I discovered a “mysterious” genealogy program Gramps.

Some time later, in the evening, at home, I experimented entering my paper data into Gramps. It was quite easy and appealing. This encouraged me to really start researching my ancestry.

My first use was really basic: I only kept persons, families and their related events (birth, death, marriage), full stop. I was able to really augment my knowledge about the lineage(s) and also discover the contradictions between oral tradition and facts. In particular, one of the lines appeared to be completely broke or invented.

Then professional life forced me once again to a halt on this topic.

When I retired, I decided to consolidate my data with a more methodic approach. This is at this time that I became aware of the importance of citations which I completely disregarded until then. I could not check my notes because there no references to original data. I realised that Gramps had everything to document and prove the accuracy of data. I reviewed the whole DB to add citations, sources with annotations, … During the process, my harvest more then quadrupled.

I’d like to mention a few original features:

  • multiple names on a person, so that you can keep track of clerk misspelling, bearer’s mood or voluntary actions regarding identity, migrations needing transliteration, …
  • location names with validity period, so that you connect with History through name changes
  • tagging system
    I reserve attributes to “secondary” data related to an object and tags to scoring the state of my research. Tags can have a colour which is echoed in the lists on screen. This way, I immediately see new people, source, family, … as a red line (requiring full further research), records on which I have only partial knowledge, “desperate” records because written evidence has disappeared or been destroyed as “brick”, records for which legal access restrictions apply as orange. Complete records are ordinary black and “no posterity” people or family are gray.
    This comes as a nice visual feedback to a more literate To do note in the Dashboard.

I really appreciate all these “extensions” to pure genealogical data.

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