Starting over...

[spiritree]

So I just posted my side of the family's web page and am happy with it. I have about 200 names in it. So I'm just past the beginner stage working with Reunion 8.

Now I have my husband's lineage to work with and he has over 3000 names, most of them downloaded from LDS gedcoms. Some reliable, some questionable. But I made the beginners mistake of importing them all to the same file and my database grew exponentially with many repeats. It was suggested I go through it deleting and merging but now I find many names have dissapeared and others are repeated again and, well, it's a mess.

So what to do? Start over with importing one gedcom at a time and cleaning it up OR backtracking up through my husband's line and marking those I know are good and deleting those that aren't? With a flag or something? Or what to do? I don't mind starting over again, I have all the files to do that and it's good practice (?!) but what is the best way to go about "cleaning up the database?

Thanks,

bejam

[kyuck]

Snip...So what to do? Start over with importing one gedcom at a time ...Snip
FWIW, I would start over on your husband's side, taking the gedcoms in the order oldest to newest if you are familiar with their data and age.
It's my personal preference to keep both sides of the family in one data base. The reasons have been covered many times in other Reunion threads. However, if you wish to keep them separate, and wish to have the same style in both, then make a clone of the database containing your half of the family. From that point, the same steps apply.
1. Backup your main (or clone) database.
2. Make a copy of your database and name it whatever you wish but have the name start with a 1.
3. Import the oldest gedcom into the copy.
4. Match and Merge (I like to do one name at a time) and arrange this data until you are happy with the result.
5. Make a copy of database (1) and name it whatever but this time starting with a 2.
6. Repeat steps 3, 4 and 5 but each time making a copy and renaming the new database with the next higher number. e.g. 3, 4, 5 ...
This way, if disaster strikes, you can always go back one database and restart. You will also have a chronological database record of what you did.
Hope this helps.
Kevan

[spiritree]

That does help, thank you Kevan,

But why start with the odest Gedcoms first, and do you mean oldest information, 1700's then 1800's, then 1900's, etc?

bejam

[kyuck]

Snip... But why start with the odest Gedcoms first...Snip?
bejam
I suppose you could start wherever it seems most logical to you but personally, I prefer to start with the gedcom that has the oldest data e.g. 1700 then 1800 etc. because it flows from oldest ancestor on downwards.

[Tim Powys-Lybbe]

So I just posted my side of the family's web page and am happy with it. I have about 200 names in it. So I'm just past the beginner stage working with Reunion 8.

Now I have my husband's lineage to work with and he has over 3000 names, most of them downloaded from LDS gedcoms. Some reliable, some questionable. But I made the beginners mistake of importing them all to the same file and my database grew exponentially with many repeats. It was suggested I go through it deleting and merging but now I find many names have dissapeared and others are repeated again and, well, it's a mess.

So what to do? Start over with importing one gedcom at a time and cleaning it up OR backtracking up through my husband's line and marking those I know are good and deleting those that aren't? With a flag or something? Or what to do? I don't mind starting over again, I have all the files to do that and it's good practice (?!) but what is the best way to go about "cleaning up the database?

Thanks,

bejam
I can give you a very different point of view. I have always entered every person singly, by hand, one at a time. This is because I always want to be sure I have got the right data from the source(s) I am using. Further if any of that source's info looks dodgy or incomplete, I write something about that in the Notes section. And finally of course, I include the sources in the entry for each person. I have done this now for over 21,000 people so it is perfectly possible, even if it takes a while to do.

So I have never allowed any GEDCOM to get anywhere near my Master database. But I have loaded them, on their own, to a separate Reunion database. This way I could see what was there and copy (by hand) into my master database whatever was reasonably sourced.

[spiritree]

Thank you Tim also for your imput. I understand now the importance of safeguarding the masterfile. I'm not looking forward to the task but I do think I should redo the whole thing in order to get it right.

thanks