FamilySearch Releases GEDCOM Version 5.5.1
GEDCOM is an abbreviation that stands for
GEnealogy
Data
COMmunications. In short, GEDCOM is the language by which different genealogy software programs talk to one another.
GEDCOM was developed by the Family History Department of The Church
of Jesus Christ of Latterday Saints (LDS Church) to provide a flexible,
uniform format for exchanging computerized genealogical data.
GEDCOM is not a program. Instead, it is a specification of the method
that different genealogy programs should use to exchange data. The
purpose is to exchange data between dissimilar programs without having
to manually re-enter all the data on a keyboard. A GEDCOM file is a
plain text file (usually either UTF-8, ANSEL or ASCII) containing
genealogical information about individuals, and meta data linking these
records together.
All of today’s more popular genealogy programs will import and export
GEDCOM data. However, the GEDCOM standard first adopted in 1985 did not
envision today’s environment of multimedia files, such as digital
pictures, video, audio, text files using non-English alphabets
(Cyrillic, Bulgarian, Hindi, Chinese, Japanese, Hebrew, and other
languages), links to external data stored in the World Wide Web, and
many more commonly-used standards of today.
Over the years, the GEDCOM standard has been updated several times
with each update adding new functionality and significantly improving
the standard. However, because of the constantly evolving improvements
in genealogy programs, data transferred via GEDCOM often has not been
perfect. After transferring from one program to another, manual
“clean-up” has often been required to fix any data that was not
transferred properly.
Now FamilySearch has released a new update: GEDCOM 5.5.1
This is the first update in ten years. The new GEDCOM 5.5.1 standard may be found at:
https://edge.fscdn.org/assets/img/documents/ged551-5bac5e57fe88dd37df0e153d9c515335.pdf. The most important part of that document is listed in the section entitled
Modifications in Version 5.5.1 that starts on page 6 of that document.
While there are numerous changes and clarifications, perhaps the most interesting items are the new tags added in GEDCOM 5.5.1:
EMAIL electronic mailing address
FAX FAX address
FACT A fact or characteristic.
FONE Phonetic variation of a text.
ROMN Romanized variation of a text.
WWW Web Home page address.
MAP Pertaining to maps.
LATI value of a latitudinal coordinate pertaining to the place of an event
LONG value of a longitudinal coordinate pertaining to the place of an event.
What will the impact of GEDCOM 5.5.1 mean to non-programmers?
Nothing will change immediately for most users. However, the new
update does mean that the programmers who write the many genealogy
programs will need to update their products and then release new
updates. As these updated products become available, anyone using a
newly-updated genealogy product that conforms to GEDCOM 5.5.1 can
exchange data with more accuracy with anyone else who is also using a
GEDCOM 5.5.1-compatible genealogy program.
Ancestry
has collaborated with the U.S. National Archives and Records
Administration to offer temporary free access to millions of historical
records and images from the federal government. And we will continue
providing free online tutorials and video courses to help people get
started with family tree building. For more information, click here.
I
have written before about this outrageous proposal to increase fees
nearly 500%. However, it is great to see CNN pick up the story and give
the effort to stop the increase even more publicity. With millions of
readers, a story in CNN can generate a lot of publicity.
A
recent research report by Genealogy Online shows that genealogists have
a high risk of losing (parts of) their genealogical data when
transferring a GEDCOM file from their family tree program or service to
another family tree program or service. This is caused by the fact that
most family tree programs and services do not follow the GEDCOM
specification to the letter and because a lot of undocumented
“user-defined tags” are used.
Genealogists
frequently discuss the best ways to preserve family tree information so
that it can be read and perhaps updated by future generations. Some
people plan to save everything on paper so that “it won’t become
obsolete.” Of course, they forget that paper is probably the most
fragile storage medium of all, easily destroyed by water, humidity,
acids in the paper, fire, insects, and a variety of other dangers.
Genealogists
are usually told that books published prior to 1924 are in the public
domain and can be freely copied. Indeed, that is true. However, we also
have been told to be cautious about copying large amounts of data
published in books published in 1924 or later because those books might
be under copyright. However, there are millions of exceptions.
Informations from FamilySearch (by asking about 5.5.5):
“The Church of Jesus Christ has the copyright on the Gedcom Specification since 1987. There has not been a legal transfer of the rights we have to the Gedcom Specification.”
So 5.5.5 is not a legal GEDCOM version.