Steps for Method 1: "Facts" in GEDCOM File

To use this method, first add information to your family data file, then export that data to a GEDCOM file, and then enable the custom features in GED-GEN. The steps are as follows:

1. First devise a folder layout for your website, such as the example given.
   

2. Next decide upon a naming convention for the "facts" (or "events") you will define for the custom features. By default, GED-GEN uses the following fact tags:

   Custom Feature	"Fact" Tag
   Biography Link	*Biography
   Relationship Text	*Relation
   Individual Image	*Image
   Narrative Link	*Narrative
   Imported Text	*Import
   Group Image	*Group

   You can use any tag naming convention you prefer as long as you use the same fact name for all facts of the same type. If you use *Biography for a biography fact, be sure to use *Biography for every biography fact.

3. Run your favorite genealogy program, with which you maintain your family tree data. This is a program like Family Tree Maker or Personal Ancestral File.

4. Navigate to an individual or family for whom you want to define custom features.

5. Simply create a new "fact" (or "event") for this individual or family. How you do this depends upon your genealogy program, but it is similar to creating an event for say, a baptism. For example if you want to define a biography link for an individual, create a fact using the biography tag (e.g., *Biography).

   Facts for families should generally be created at the family level rather than for a specific individual in the family. Family facts include narrative links, imported text and group images. For instance to define a group image, create a fact under the marriage information using the group image tag (e.g., *Group). This is just like adding an alternate marriage date.

6. The fact's date field is ignored and can be left blank.

7. Specify the fact's place field according to the custom feature you are defining:

   Custom Feature	Place Field Contents
   Biography Link or Narrative Link	Specify the name of your web page file containing a biography for this individual or the narrative for this family (e.g., grandpa.html). Do not include a folder because it is specified within GED-GEN.
   Relationship Text	Specify the relationship phrase that indicates this person in your direct line of descent (e.g., Grandfather).
   Imported Text	Specify the name of an external text file or web page that GED-GEN will insert into the family page (e.g., history22.html).
   Individual Image or Group Image	Specify the name of an image file containing a picture of this individual or family group (e.g., grandpa.jpg). Do not include a folder because it is specified within GED-GEN. You may optionally specify a caption for your image. It will appear centered directly under the image on the family page. For example you could specify the date of the picture. Use HTML syntax. To specify a caption, type a semicolon (;) character immediately after the name of your image file. Any text you type after the semicolon will be interpreted as the caption, for example, grandpa.jpg;About 1922.

8. Define other custom feature facts for this individual and/or family as desired. If you just created a biography fact, you could create a relationship fact, and so on.

9. Navigate to other individuals and families in your family file and continue to add facts for each as desired.

10. When you are done, export your family data to a GEDCOM file as you would normally.

11. Run GED-GEN and click the Options button.

12. Be sure to specify your input GEDCOM file and a destination folder on the Files tab.

13. Click the Custom tab.

14. Step 14

    Method tab and verify the following fields specify the "fact" tags you used in your favorite genealogy program (from Step 2 above):
    • Biography Link
    • Relationship Text
    • Individual Image
    • Narrative Link
    • Imported Text
    • Group Image

    
    

15. Step 15

    Enable the custom features you wish by placing a check in any or all of the these fields:

    
    

    Tab	Option
    Biography Links	Include links to biography web pages
    Relationship Text	Include relationship text
    Individual Images	Include images of individuals
    Narrative Links	Include links to narrative web pages
    Imported Text	Include imported text
    Group Images	Include group images

    
    

16. Step 16

    Also on the above tabs, specify the path for the folders that contain your web pages and image files. Click Browse to more easily specify these paths.

    
    

    Following the sample folder structure, these options would be set as:

    Tab	Option	Contents
    Biography Links	Relative folder path for biography files	..\bio
    Individual Images	Relative folder path for image files	images
    Narrative Links	Relative folder path for narrative files	..\nar
    Imported Text	Full folder path for external files	C:\genealogy\imports
    Group Images	Relative folder path for image files	images