Difference between revisions of "Places in Gramps"

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{{languages|Places in Gramps}}
 
{{languages|Places in Gramps}}
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An overview of countries with the relevant genealogical information about them:
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* genealogical organisations with contact information
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* digital archives you can consult online (free or fee based) with an appraisal
 +
* location of archives, and how to consult sources there
 +
* relevant history of the country viz-a-viz genealogy
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* pointers to locations in the country, with details (as always, relevant to genealogy, eg an abbey of which many sources are available, ...)
  
 
== What is a Place? ==
 
== What is a Place? ==
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A [[Gramps_Glossary#P|Place]] in Gramps generally refers to where an event occurred. This is different to an Address (see for example [[Why residence event and not Address%3F]]).
 
A [[Gramps_Glossary#P|Place]] in Gramps generally refers to where an event occurred. This is different to an Address (see for example [[Why residence event and not Address%3F]]).
  
The {{icon|plac}} [[Gramps_3.4_Wiki_Manual_-_Main_Window#Places_Category|Places View]] lists all the places in your Gramps database, and is a handy spot to make sure your places are named consistently.
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A place is a geographical region of any size ranging from that of a country to a burial plot.  Boundaries of a place may vary over time.  The latitude and longitude of an approximate centre point can be recorded.
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A Gramps ID and place type can be specified.
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Notes and media can also be attached to a place.
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== Place names ==
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A place is identified by a name which may change over time and can be entered in different languages.  For example, the city of Saint Petersburg in Russia could be defined with the following names:
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* Санкт-Петербу́рг (1703-1914) [ru]
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* Петрогра́д (1914-1924) [ru]
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* Ленингра́д (1924-1991) [ru]
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* Санкт-Петербу́рг (1991-) [ru]
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* Saint Petersburg (1703-1914) [en]
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* Petrograd (1914-1924) [en]
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* Leningrad (1924-1991) [en]
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* Saint Petersburg (1991-) [en]
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Assuming the default Places [[Gramps_5.0_Wiki_Manual_-_Settings#Places|Preferences]] settings of auto-generation of titles is enabled,
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automatic place title generation will choose the appropriate name, given the date of an event and the language code specified in the preferences.  Where there is no event date available, or if the place is displayed without reference to an event, then today's date is used.
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Each name is processed in turn.  A name is matched if the date range contains the event date and the language code is the same as the language preference setting.  An empty date range is interpreted as matching any date.  If there is no language code match, names defined with an empty language code are used as a fallback.
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The main name is processed before the alternative names.
  
== Organising your Places ==
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[[File:SaintPeterburgFullNames.png|600px|thumb|right|Fig. 1. Saint Petersburg Place example]]
There are several ways you could organise your places. The concept of a place in genealogy is very complex, due both to the level of detail you wish to capture, and the changes over time to the name of a place. Ultimately how much of this complexity you record in your database is up to you, but you will probably find it advantageous to consider your options before you have too many places in your data.
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For example, Figure 1 shows the Place view for the above described Saint Petersburg. Note the order of the entries, the date ranges, and the language codes.  
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{{-}}
  
The summary below indicates some of the ways current Gramps users organise their places.  
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[[File:EventViewSaintPeterburgPlace.png|600px|thumb|right|Fig. 2. Saint Petersburg Event example]]
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Events can be created at specific dates for this place and the title generation will follow the rules above. In the first event in Figure 2, the title generated is '?' because the place has no entries for this date (1500 is not between 1703 and today). In the second event in Figure 2, the generated title - Петрогра́д - corresponds to the first place that matches the date range since the language preference setting is blank. In the fourth event, again the generated title is the first place that matches the date range. Note that the order of the Alternate Names in Figure 1 is important in title generation when the default language is blank. If the Language is specified in the Places [[Gramps_4.2_Wiki_Manual_-_Settings#Places|Preferences]], then that language will be used if found. If the language is not found, the first date match will be used.  
  
=== Place hierarchy ===
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The title generation is done at the event update, and it not refreshed if the Place is edited. In the case where the Place is updated, the event would have to be subsequently updated as well to regenerate the title with the corresponding change in the Place.
Gramps stores places in a hierarchy. Places at the top of the hierarchy are usually countries. The level of detail increases the further the place is down the hierarchy.  Places at the bottom of the hierarchy represent small areas such as individual houses or burial plots.  The hierarchy can contain any number of levels.
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{{-}}
  
For example, Hobart in Australia would be stored as three places: Australia, Tasmania, and Hobart. Australia would be at the top level of the hierarchy and have a place type of ''Country''. Tasmania would be at the next level down and have a place type of ''State''. Hobart would have a place type of ''City'' and would be stored in the next level below ''State''. Any of these three places could be referenced in an event.
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== Place hierarchy ==
  
=== Level of detail ===
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[[File:SaintPeterburgPlaceHierarchy.png|600px|thumb|right|Fig. 3. Saint Petersburg Place Hierarchy example]]
The level of detail recorded for a place affects the number of places you have.
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Places can be linked together to form a hierarchy.  This enables different places with the same name to be distinguished from each other.  For example, there are also places called Saint Petersburg outside of Russia:
  
One option is to not include detail finer than town or city in a place. When further detail is to be recorded for an event, it can go in a note associated with that event. This has the advantage that your places are easier to manage, and can appear more consistent in reports. A disadvantage is that you may need to include the same note text against many events, for example if they all occurred at the one address.  
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* Saint Petersburg --> Russia
In Gramps 3.0 you can have multiple notes, making copy/paste of this address in a note easier. You could also add the place ones to the source used for the event. Another possible disadvantage is that the place details may not be displayed in reports in the way you wish.
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* Saint Petersburg --> Colorado --> USA
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* St. Petersburg --> Florida --> USA
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* St. Petersburg --> Pennsylvania --> USA
  
The other extreme is to specify as fine detail as possible. A drawback is that you will end up with a very large number of Place entries.
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A title can be generated by following the links. So "Saint Petersburg, Russia" would describe the city in Russia. Figure 3 illustrates the Place Editor view (with autogenerated titles) for these cities.
  
An approach that is between the above two involves treating a place as a geographic location on the Earth. The land use (e.g. St Luke's Church) would be a note. How you identify the geographic location may not always be obvious: a street address (e.g. 25 High St) will often be sufficient.
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{{-}}
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[[File:AlsacePlaceHierarchy.png|600px|thumb|right|Fig. 4. Alsace Place Hierarchy example]]
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The place hierarchy can also be used in filters, to find all places located in another place.
  
=== Changes over time ===
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Multiple links with date ranges are allowed. This makes possible more complex cases where a place moves from being located within one place into another. Alsace makes a good example:
A given place may be part of different regions or even countries over time. The ''Enclosed By'' tab allows you to specify these regions along with a date range. The default region, used for constructing the place title, is the first region in the list.
 
  
Data imported from older versions of Gramps (before v4.1), may contain an ''Alternate Locations'' tab. It is recommended that information in this tab is deleted and stored in either the ''Enclosed By'' or ''Alternative Names'' tab. When all information is deleted, the tab will no longer be visible.
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* Alsace -(1618–1674)-> Holy Roman Empire
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* Alsace -(1674–1871)-> France
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* Alsace -(1871–1918)-> Germany
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* Alsace -(1919–1940)-> France
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* Alsace -(1940–1944)-> Germany
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* Alsace -(1945–)-> France
  
Variations and different spellings of a place may be recorded in the ''Alternative Names'' tab.
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{{-}}
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[[File:EventViewAlsacePlace.png|600px|thumb|right|Fig. 4. Events with different dates in Alsace example]]
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Figure 5 is the Event Editor view which illustrates that the generated title for an event is based on the date of the event when traversing the place hierarchy.
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{{-}}
  
=== Place ''Title'' field ===
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== Source description ==
The first field in the Edit Place window is generally displayed where space is limited, such as in some graphical reports. Gramps will populate this field for you from the place name and the names of all places higher in the place hierarchy.
 
  
However, some people like to put in here a short descriptive name. For example, for a location of ''Street'': Rundle Mall, ''City:'' Adelaide, ''State:'' South Australia, ''Country:'' Australia, different people would set the ''Place Name'' field to one of:
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Places in the hierarchy provide standardized titles. Event attributes with a key of "Place" can be used to record places as described in a source.
  
* Rundle Mall
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This allows spelling variations to be recorded without the need to create extra places.  It also allows more than one place to be recorded for an event.
* Rundle Mall, Adelaide
 
* Rundle Mall, Adelaide, South Australia, Australia
 
* Australia, South Australia, Adelaide, Rundle Mall
 
  
There are, of course, also minor variations on those listed above.
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For example, an event in Saint Petersburg could have two citations. One may describe the place as "Saint Petersburg" and the other "St. Petersburg".
  
 
== Editing Places ==
 
== Editing Places ==
[[Image:EditPlaces-PlaceEditorWindow-41.png|300px|thumb|right|Fig. 1. Example Edit Place dialogue]]
 
  
Gramps provides a window in which you can edit a place:
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The {{icon|plac}} [[Gramps_5.0_Wiki_Manual_-_Categories#Places_Category|Places Category View]] lists all the places in your Gramps database, and is a handy spot to make sure your places are named consistently.
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Gramps also provides a [[Gramps_5.0_Wiki_Manual_-_Entering_and_editing_data:_detailed_-_part_2#Place_Editor_dialog|window in which you can edit a place]]:
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[[File:PlaceEditor-dialog-example-50.png|450px|thumb|right|Fig. 5. Example Place Editor dialogue]]
  
Enter the ''Name'' and ''Type'' of the place in the fields provided. The ''Title'' and ''ID'' fields will be populated automatically by Gramps.
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Enter the ''Name'' and ''Type'' of the place in the fields provided. The ''ID'' field will be populated automatically by Gramps.
  
 
The ''Code'' can be used to store a country code or postal code.
 
The ''Code'' can be used to store a country code or postal code.
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The region in which the place belongs should be recorded in the ''Enclosed By'' tab.  Every place except for countries should have at least one entry.  Multiple entries are useful to record a place that has been part of different administrative regions over time.  The first entry in the list will be used to construct default place titles.
 
The region in which the place belongs should be recorded in the ''Enclosed By'' tab.  Every place except for countries should have at least one entry.  Multiple entries are useful to record a place that has been part of different administrative regions over time.  The first entry in the list will be used to construct default place titles.
  
Variations of a place name, such as alternative spellings, can be recorded in the ''Alternative Names'' tab.
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Variations of a place name over time or different language versions, can be recorded in the ''Alternative Names'' tab.
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{{-}}
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== Known Issues ==
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* The place views and event editors always display the modern place title.
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* The mechanism for selecting an existing place or adding a new place needs improving.
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* The place tree view only displays each place once.
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* Using an empty language code for endonyms, makes entering some place names cumbersome.
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== Possible future enhancements ==
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* Time dependent place types
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* Hierarchy types in links between places
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* Imports from one of the gazetteer databases (See [[Addon:GetGOV]] or [[Addon:PlaceCleanupGramplet]] )
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* Experimental place gazetteer (See: {{bug|8812}})
  
 
{{-}}
 
{{-}}

Revision as of 13:46, 3 October 2018

An overview of countries with the relevant genealogical information about them:

  • genealogical organisations with contact information
  • digital archives you can consult online (free or fee based) with an appraisal
  • location of archives, and how to consult sources there
  • relevant history of the country viz-a-viz genealogy
  • pointers to locations in the country, with details (as always, relevant to genealogy, eg an abbey of which many sources are available, ...)

What is a Place?

A Place in Gramps generally refers to where an event occurred. This is different to an Address (see for example Why residence event and not Address?).

A place is a geographical region of any size ranging from that of a country to a burial plot. Boundaries of a place may vary over time. The latitude and longitude of an approximate centre point can be recorded.

A Gramps ID and place type can be specified.

Notes and media can also be attached to a place.

Place names

A place is identified by a name which may change over time and can be entered in different languages. For example, the city of Saint Petersburg in Russia could be defined with the following names:

  • Санкт-Петербу́рг (1703-1914) [ru]
  • Петрогра́д (1914-1924) [ru]
  • Ленингра́д (1924-1991) [ru]
  • Санкт-Петербу́рг (1991-) [ru]
  • Saint Petersburg (1703-1914) [en]
  • Petrograd (1914-1924) [en]
  • Leningrad (1924-1991) [en]
  • Saint Petersburg (1991-) [en]

Assuming the default Places Preferences settings of auto-generation of titles is enabled, automatic place title generation will choose the appropriate name, given the date of an event and the language code specified in the preferences. Where there is no event date available, or if the place is displayed without reference to an event, then today's date is used.

Each name is processed in turn. A name is matched if the date range contains the event date and the language code is the same as the language preference setting. An empty date range is interpreted as matching any date. If there is no language code match, names defined with an empty language code are used as a fallback.

The main name is processed before the alternative names.

Fig. 1. Saint Petersburg Place example

For example, Figure 1 shows the Place view for the above described Saint Petersburg. Note the order of the entries, the date ranges, and the language codes.

Fig. 2. Saint Petersburg Event example

Events can be created at specific dates for this place and the title generation will follow the rules above. In the first event in Figure 2, the title generated is '?' because the place has no entries for this date (1500 is not between 1703 and today). In the second event in Figure 2, the generated title - Петрогра́д - corresponds to the first place that matches the date range since the language preference setting is blank. In the fourth event, again the generated title is the first place that matches the date range. Note that the order of the Alternate Names in Figure 1 is important in title generation when the default language is blank. If the Language is specified in the Places Preferences, then that language will be used if found. If the language is not found, the first date match will be used.

The title generation is done at the event update, and it not refreshed if the Place is edited. In the case where the Place is updated, the event would have to be subsequently updated as well to regenerate the title with the corresponding change in the Place.

Place hierarchy

Fig. 3. Saint Petersburg Place Hierarchy example

Places can be linked together to form a hierarchy. This enables different places with the same name to be distinguished from each other. For example, there are also places called Saint Petersburg outside of Russia:

  • Saint Petersburg --> Russia
  • Saint Petersburg --> Colorado --> USA
  • St. Petersburg --> Florida --> USA
  • St. Petersburg --> Pennsylvania --> USA

A title can be generated by following the links. So "Saint Petersburg, Russia" would describe the city in Russia. Figure 3 illustrates the Place Editor view (with autogenerated titles) for these cities.


Fig. 4. Alsace Place Hierarchy example

The place hierarchy can also be used in filters, to find all places located in another place.

Multiple links with date ranges are allowed. This makes possible more complex cases where a place moves from being located within one place into another. Alsace makes a good example:

  • Alsace -(1618–1674)-> Holy Roman Empire
  • Alsace -(1674–1871)-> France
  • Alsace -(1871–1918)-> Germany
  • Alsace -(1919–1940)-> France
  • Alsace -(1940–1944)-> Germany
  • Alsace -(1945–)-> France


Fig. 4. Events with different dates in Alsace example

Figure 5 is the Event Editor view which illustrates that the generated title for an event is based on the date of the event when traversing the place hierarchy.

Source description

Places in the hierarchy provide standardized titles. Event attributes with a key of "Place" can be used to record places as described in a source.

This allows spelling variations to be recorded without the need to create extra places. It also allows more than one place to be recorded for an event.

For example, an event in Saint Petersburg could have two citations. One may describe the place as "Saint Petersburg" and the other "St. Petersburg".

Editing Places

The Places Places Category View lists all the places in your Gramps database, and is a handy spot to make sure your places are named consistently.

Gramps also provides a window in which you can edit a place:

Fig. 5. Example Place Editor dialogue

Enter the Name and Type of the place in the fields provided. The ID field will be populated automatically by Gramps.

The Code can be used to store a country code or postal code.

The region in which the place belongs should be recorded in the Enclosed By tab. Every place except for countries should have at least one entry. Multiple entries are useful to record a place that has been part of different administrative regions over time. The first entry in the list will be used to construct default place titles.

Variations of a place name over time or different language versions, can be recorded in the Alternative Names tab.

Known Issues

  • The place views and event editors always display the modern place title.
  • The mechanism for selecting an existing place or adding a new place needs improving.
  • The place tree view only displays each place once.
  • Using an empty language code for endonyms, makes entering some place names cumbersome.

Possible future enhancements