In our last episode i shared how i went from disorganized procrastinator to proactive organizer after a few hard knocks. To avoid all of these problems, use the most conservative file naming conventions for digital assets. My rule is to let the computer do what computers do well and. Back in january, i blogged about reorganizing my electronic file system. Then dont change the folder or file names because then you will have to reattach the files. Naming conventions most families and many cultures have naming conventions for first and middle names. Knowledge of naming conventions can often be used to determine the names of.
I took inspiration from ben sayer of genealogy tools, creating a file structure format for each individual, organized into surname folders on my mac. Thank you for presenting an excellent article that helped me with a couple of naming convention issues. If all names are kept unique why also try to embed meaning in the file name itself. I start to run into trouble naming the individual files. Digital image and folder naming and organization stra. All characters are created by a computer code unicode telling a font family what character to express. Use a dash or underscore instead of a space, and begin dates with the year. Use only letters from the latin alphabet az, az and use only numerals 09 for numbers.
However, support for this core functionality through the user interface of operating systems like windows seems to be vanishing i might just be unaware of where theyve hidden it these days. My digital filing system for genealogy windows from are my roots showing. Patronymics is the practice of creating a surname based on the given name of the father. Descriptive file names are useful for small, welldefined projects with existing identification schemes that link the digital object to the source material. Organizing genealogy research sassy jane genealogy. There are two major parts to my digital file folder system. Im looking for a comprehensive explanation of norwegian naming conventions, specifically relating to multiple given names and middle names, etc. Faq for information about file content and naming conventions. Easy digital filenaming to organize genealogy files the family. A file naming convention is a systematic method for naming files.
My digital filing system for genealogy windows are my. For example, if you are looking for a file that contains an irr calculation, but you cant remember the file name or the year. For file naming ideas, see the family curators tips for easy digital filenaming to organize digital files. Within each surname folder the is a separate folder for census images, vital records, obituaries, photos etc. Watch the video and use this file naming system to save you from hours of headaches and panic. Organizing your research filing systems cyndis list. All the information is already in the genealogy software, easily recognised. Organising digital documents for genealogy and family history.
One area that ive struggled with for a long time is coming up with a good file naming convention for the files associated with my genealogy research as well as the several old family photos that i scan. British naming conventions genealogy familysearch wiki. My ancestor family file folders and file naming convention genealogy file and folder. Naming conventions, also called naming patterns, are the rules andor practice of that govern the naming of things or people. In todays episode im going to share a system ive developed for organizing your computer hard drive files so that you can quickly and easily. See also the what is the directory structure for the texts. Look in your my documents or documents folder and subfolders for text files, photos, downloaded files, and other genealogy documents.
My ancestor family file folders and file naming convention genealogy file and folder organization system for mac, part 1 by ben sayer of. Mar 06, 2018 besides looking at naming conventions such as starting with the surname in all caps or starting with the document date in yyyymmdd format, i want a way to visually identify items easily. For this reason, there is a trendy flood of jason, justin, or jared and a flood of zach and megan names almost unheard of 20 years ago. Now that youve scanned all your old family photos and genealogical documents oh, you havent yet.
This article documents that naming convention, explains why it is used, and deals with the existing variations by providing consistent best practices. Best practices for filenaming digital preservation. My ancestor family file folders and file naming convention. In this post i will provide you with information on how you can and should keep your digital genealogical files organized. You should be consistent and descriptive in naming and organizing files so that it is obvious where to find specific data and what the files contain. Templates is for the untouched research log and census master log. Also, longer and more complex file and folder names must be coded or aliased by most systems, which exposes the filename to possible corruption, rendering the content of the file inaccessible. Initially, people were called by their first name and did not have a surname. Best practices for file naming just like paper files, electronic files need to be wellorganized and labeled correctly so that they are identifiable and accessible by all employees.
There are as many ways to organize family history files as there are researchers. They were also used in northern jutland denmark, while bynames were used in the danish isles. Conventions for profile management on the greek branch of the world family tree wft the naming conventions outlined in this project conform to. Most of the naming conventions are approved before visual studio 2010. Adopting good file naming conventions can help ensure that files will work with different operating systems and disk formats, such as windows, linux, mac os x and unix. Dec 10, 2014 the worlds best file naming system how to archive. File naming is also an important consideration when transferring files via the internet, where it may not be evident what computer platform was used when the files were. Surnames were created to differentiate people who had the same first name. A digital file log helps simplify the process of locating a particular photograph, digitized document, or other genealogy file. How to organize your genealogical digital files we are. Loving my electronic file system organize your family. In those folder i made a folder for every major surname.
The windows api provides special naming conventions to allow very long unicode names in blocks of 255 characters. If you are not certain about the naming practice in the area you are researching, check to see if the farm name is used in parish registers and other documents in conjunction with the names of people. Download a tree from ancestry if you have been creating your tree in, you can easily download it to family tree maker and work on it with family tree makers powerful set of tools. Cyndis list organizing your research filing systems. Even with this facility for avoiding duplication, though, there is still no ideal. Strategies and solutions for every researcher is available on amazon in both paperback and kindle. Organizing and sharing your digital images legacy news.
Ive also struggled with how to organize my files into folders on my hard drive. Computer operating and file systems vary in the file and folder naming conventions that they support. Windows, mac, linux has various criteria for filenames, so compatibility with these various systems can be an issue. I didnt want to confuse the issue as far as naming files, but the census records are the only files that i put the date first and then the surname. Easy digital filenaming to organize genealogy files the. Jul 21, 2016 this article will introduce you to file naming conventions.
The english had actually embraced the more familiar last name, naming convention earlier than the 16th and 17th centuries. This article introduces key filing principles that can be adapted to a wide variety of situations as your experience grows. Once done i used just the windows file explorer to search my entire genealogy folder for, say williams and i moved all those files into the williams folder and on i went with every surname until they had all been moved into the relevant surname folder. You should be consistent and descriptive in naming and organizing files so that it is obvious where to find specific data and what the files. In england and wales, patronymics using the first name as a surname, was a culturally accepted naming convention up until the 16th and 17th centuries, although you will still find some use of it in wales today. If you have already created a family tree in a different genealogy program, you can import that file directly into family tree maker. If so, assume that the farm name is part of the name. Two important starting points for your file naming strategy are. This contrasts with making physical duplicates of the file itself. By using good naming conventions you spare people the frustration of going on a scavenger hunt. When you create a long file name, windows may also create a short 8. My documents genealogysurnamescook for examplethen files for event, i. Decide on a file naming style or convention and be consistent. Three tips for organizing genealogy research files sassy jane.
File naming convention for digital photos, scans, and documents. If you encounter a problem with a file name that is too long, try this prefix on the file name and path. I recently took the folder marker product for a test drive using my genealogy files in dropbox, and it does the trick for me. If there is a second family on the same page, i duplicate the copy and name according to my system. Genealogy naming conventions, whats in a name and how were. Use the table feature in your word processing program or a spreadsheet program such as microsoft excel to create a log for your genealogy files. You will see more specific naming conventions for particular cultures and time periods. The mrin filing system is a genealogy filing system based on marriage record identification numbers.
While genealogy software programs and online family tree hubs usually have their own rules for entering names and formatting a treesome may have specific fields for nicknames, alternate names, suffixes, maiden names, and moremany practices are standard. Genealogists create lots of digital files in the course of their research. A file name is a principal identifier of a file good file names provide useful clues to the content, status and version of a file, uniquely identify a file and help in classifying and sorting files. I hope you will agree now that organization doesnt have to come naturally. Windows file name restrictions why a file name can be. File naming conventions for genealogists genealogys star. File naming dos and donts the operating system you are using i. Database systems gramps is a database system for genealogy can store a huge. Thus two johns in a village were identified by calling one john the blacksmith and the other john williams son. The work in progress folder will have individual folders for each person within a group that im researching.
Loving my electronic file system organize your family history. Funny you should ask and i suppose i should update this blog post at some point because ive completely redone my file naming convention since the genealogy doover. Common operating systems such as microsoft windows, macintosh os, and linuxunix support different file systems. For file naming ideas, see the family curators tips for easy digital file naming to organize digital files. The resources folder is for the digital books ive downloaded. This is especially important for government offices in order to comply with legal requirements to ensure the availability, integrity, accessibility, and, if. Organizing genealogy research using archival principles is a 39page pdf download and has four sections. For tips on organizing paper files and how to start transitioning to digital files, check out my interview with professional organizer janine adams.
Match a persons name on digital file names to the preferred name in uses in your family tree software. Do you remember coming to the family history library or the joseph smith memorial building and looking at rows and rows of black binders filled with family. Some are downloads, some are scans of paper records in our research collections. When i name an actual file, if it pertains to a specific person, i give it a very detailed name. The following naming conventions are general guidelines for the world family tree on geni, and especially for the medieval period roughly 5001500 ad or ce. My file structure is similar to what you and carolina girl are describing. File names can be either descriptive or nondescriptive. You may use underscores, dashes or spaces between the items. My requirements for a good standard are as follows. Coalition for the standardization of geni naming conventions naming conventions wiki the intention is to minimize data conflicts and optimise consistency in the geni matching merging technology. Aug 22, 2017 adopting good file naming conventions can help ensure that files will work with different operating systems and disk formats, such as windows, linux, mac os x and unix. Aug 25, 2014 organize your scanned genealogy photos and documents on your computer based on a fourcolor file system.
Digital organization and file naming conventions posted on september 16, 2014 by dawn bingaman last week i returned from a genealogical research trip to the family history library in. Since i use a genealogy software program, legacy, i can enter the census record one time, copy it to the legacy clipboard and then paste into each. Your heirs will not need special software, special operating systems. Best practices for filenaming just like paper files, electronic files need to be wellorganized and labeled correctly so that they are identifiable and accessible by all employees. Organize your genealogy files, part 1 hard drive organization is one of the great challenges that quickly faces new genealogistsand often continues to plague experienced researchers.
At the time when you create the file you may not care but as soon as anyone needs to access the file. What i name individual documents within a folder is fairly loose, but the folder naming structure has been standardized. Nov 17, 2009 my genealogy file on my computer is labeled genealogy master. All visual studio versions before 2010 have their inteli sense filter with something like starts with instead of contains. How to organize your genealogical digital files we are cousins. In this guide, we will see a few file organizing tips and ways to change the look of our windows folders.
Using this naming system, my computer automatically sorts. I was going to write this post later in this series but instead i moved it up to the front since n. Filefolder structure naming conventions as a nontrained but pretty good it guy for a medical practice i have need to make relatively deep changes in some of the 3rd party programs programming, most of which are accessed through windows explorer. Ancestor files documents relating to my ancestral families. This is the ninth article in our series going digital with genealogy. Family history episode 32 organize your genealogy files, part 1. After all, the single copy of that census sheet is servicing multiple persons.
Jul 04, 20 back in january, i blogged about reorganizing my electronic file system. In august of 1995 windows 95 introduced long file names. Your file naming convention will always be your most powerful and easy method for organising and retrieving your documents. Thats why a lot of people architects leaders decided it will be a better idea to type txt and inteli sense will filter all textboxes for you. Naming and organizing digital files for quick retrieval, file folder structure, and linking paper and digital records are all ways to find your documents when you need them. Use a simple file name beginning with the name, date, and event. Genealogy file naming conventions family genealogy. When recording your genealogical data in charts, there are a few conventions to follow concerning names, dates, and places. Files that can be imported are but not limited to, family tree maker ver 5 or greater, gedcom, personal ancestral file paf, legacy family tree, the master genealogist 3. I have settled on a file naming convention for the records ive downloaded. Many genealogy applications follow the same identifier naming convention for gedcom identifiers, with minor variations. Jan 07, 2015 im still stumped with how to handle a naming convention for census records. All about digital photos genealogy creating filenames.
In such case, i just enter the family last name no first name. How to organize your digitized genealogy photos pictures. It is worth asking family members if they know of any naming conventions in the family. Ideally the filename should be less than 64 characters a cd limitation which includes the folder names. File naming conventions for digitallystored images metadata at wikipedia. Thanks to my 3 rules for naming and storing digital genealogy files, i can. Develop your convention, practice with it a bit, tweak it to suit your purposes, and then adopt it and use it for all of your downloaded and scanned records and photographs, and for any genealogy reports or books you create. Another one to add to the list catholics and maybe other religions have a specific naming convention in baptism registries using marie or mary as the first name for females and joseph as the first name of males followed by a middle name.
Filefolder structure naming conventions microsoft community. But all of them need consistent processing if future search results are going to be useful. You want to get this right the first time, so it is important to invest enough time to. Windows explorer, finder to search for documents using keywords such as surnames, record types, etc.
For many of us, the default state of our windows desktop and files is chaos. I really like the idea of going into a folder and being able to see, by the naming convention, all the records listed for a given person, but to make 12 copies of one digital file for a large family seems ridiculous. A long file name is considered to be any file name that exceeds the short msdos also called 8. Best practices for file naming menu how you organize and name your files will have a big impact on your ability to find those files later and to understand what they contain. Three tips for organizing genealogy research files sassy. Modern habits for naming children often focus on what sounds good to the new parents, and what sounds good is heavily influenced by popular culture. Please note this is not an exhaustive treatise on filenaming conventions its just my personal methodology and it is. File naming minnesota state archives, minnesota historical society march 1, 2012, version 5 page 1 file naming summary a file name is the chief identifier for a record.
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