Gedcompare is not finding anything to import from Family Historian gedcoms

Question

I am exporting gedcom files from the latest version of Family Historian in gedcom 5.5.1 format using various formats; ANSI, UTF-8, UTF-16, and Unicode.  They all fail to produce a Gedcompare file yet if I look at the "Raw" data, there is clearly gedcom information in the file.

I am not finding advice for what WikiTree is looking for in terms of gedcom versions an formats.  Surely it has to be buried somewhere in the myriad documents.

Comments

I've sucessfully imported a very small gedcom from Family Historian though it was some years ago and I have no idea what format I used. (I decided it was better to add manually and write what I wanted from the start)

For anyone who can help but is  not familiar with the program  here are the instructions from the manual

https://www.family-historian.co.uk/help/fh7/exportgedcomfile.html

And export file format https://www.family-historian.co.uk/help/fh7/exportformatdialog.html

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I have successfully exported several gedcoms from Family Historian and used GedCompare to integrate new persons into Wikitree, but it is no longer working for me.

I've read the docs and am using the Default format and UTF-8 encoding as you show in the help files, but Wikitree still sees nothing to import.

Examining the Raw file on Wikitree there are three odd characters before Head that I cannot account for.  They are not in the gedcom file.

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Thank you Helen.  I have read through Family Historian's gedcom Help file and know that it can export a great number of formats and encoded multiple ways.

When I export a gedcom using the gedcom 5.5 standard, and UTF-8 that WikiTree wants, I get a perfectly normal looking gedcom file that I can edit with Notepad++.  The file is formed properly with no odd characters at the start of the file, but after uploading it to WikiTree, using the view Raw data option, there are two odd characters at the start.  I believe  this is the cause of the problem and they are not in the original file.  Only after uploading to WikiTree.

I don't see a way to upload a local image to show the odd characters, but you may be able to see them if you go to Gedcompare File and click on Click here to view the "raw" file.

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Only you can see that, Mark. Others get "You did not upload that GEDCOM data."

The "two odd characters" may be a Byte Order Mark, possibly invisible to Notepad++. See

https://www.tamurajones.net/GEDCOMAndTheUnicodeByteOrderMark.xhtml

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Hello Mark,

Choose to export your GEDCOM from Family Historian without BOM

or less preferable use Notepad ++ to convert to a file type without the BOM.

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Thank you Jim and Allan!

Mike Tate, the most prolific poster at Family Historian User's Group came up with the answer in the form of his question:

"That GEDCOM file prefix ÿþ is the UTF-16 BOM which is rarely supported by other products.

It should be the prefix ï»¿ UTF-8 BOM or nothing at all.

I wonder if you have set Tools > Preferences > File Load/Save to Save in UTF-16 file format (see the Help).
That setting seems to apply to both the Project GEDCOM and Export > GEDCOM File... command."

I unchecked Save as 16 bit and have successfully uploaded a GEDCOM file again.

Answer 1

The gedcom file is plain text with the file name ending in .ged

Don't know anything about the program you are using, but I have never needed to specify the character set when creating a file.