Splitting GEDCOMs With GRAMPS

Profile manager: Elaine Martzen [send private message]

This how-to was written by WikiTreer Dave Ebaugh; he passed away in 2021. I hope you find this useful, and feel free to leave comments.Weatherall-96 05:13, 3 August 2023 (UTC)

Getting GRAMPS

GRAMPS is available for Linux, Windows, and Mac at https://gramps-project.org/blog/.

Importing your GEDCOM into GRAMPS

A very simple process that has a step that isn't that intuitive. I wrote a guide to importing your GEDCOM into GRAMPS that walks you through it, step-by-step, with screen grabs and everything.

(A note on the screenshots: I use Kubuntu Linux. The appearance of buttons and other user interface elements will probably look slightly different on your computer.)

Filtering people and exporting a new GEDCOM

How to do that which we must needs do. A general guide to using filters in GRAMPS. With screen grabs and whatnot.

Splitting your GEDCOM before submission: two approaches

For American and Canadian users, the first approach is best with family lines that go back to or further than the 18th century, the second may work best with lines that terminate in 19th century immigrants. I really don't know enough about other regions to say when one may be preferable to the other.

Approach 1: Precision, targeted submission to the GEDCOMpare process

The approach I use most of the time. It involves figuring out what is already on WikiTree and using that knowledge to crerate a series of very small GEDCOMs to GEDCOMPARE. This guide to the targeted approach will answer all your questions, and many more!

Approach 2: Submit 'em all, let GEDCOMpare sort it out

Upon further review, my filters for this strategy don't actually work as intended. I have a fix in mind, it will take a little while to test, though. This isn't a plot to get you to use the targeted approach, it's a failure on my part to test with an appropriate data set.

Even though this is often the first idea that comes to mind for new WikiTreers, it's an approach best used sparingly. It involves carving up a GEDCOM into smaller bits and submitting those bits without examining what is already on WikiTree.