Exhibits Section

Overview

The Exhibits Section includes properties related to images and other external documents attached to records in the GEDCOM file. Your genealogy program may refer to exhibits as "media items" or other terms to describe images or other external documents.

General Properties

Alternate Folder

If Alternate Folder is set to the path to a folder, Gedcom Publisher searches the folder for Gedcom Publisher-specific versions of exhibit files. If you want to use one version of an image with your genealogy program, and a different version with Gedcom Publisher, put a file with the same name as the original in this folder.

This feature is intended for the case where you have a high-resolution image that works well with printed output, but doesn't look good on a web page because it's too large and also takes a long time to download. Put a web optimized version of the exhibit in the Alternate Folder and Gedcom Publisher will use the alternate.

Gedcom Publisher will search the Alternate Folder for a file with the same filename and filetype. If that file is not found, it will search for a file with the same name and one of the common web image types (JPG, GIF, PNG). This feature allows you to substitute a JPG file for a TIF, for example.

Steps

1. In MS Windows, create a folder where you will put the alternate image files.
2. In Gedcom Publisher, use the [Alternate Folder...] button to select the folder created in step 1. Save the Gedcom Publisher file.
3. In an image editor, make smaller copies of one or more large image files. Be careful not to alter the original file. Here's an approach I recommend:
   1. Use MS Windows to make an exact copy of an image file, and place the copy in the Alternate Folder.
   2. Use an image editor to reduce the size of the image file that is in the Alternate Folder.

   That approach avoids ever opening the original file in an image editor, and that makes it unlikely you'll mistakenly save the smaller version over the original.

After following the steps above, when you make the book, Gedcom Publisher will use the alternate image files in place of the associated exhibits.

Pressing the [Reset] button will clear the current Alternate Folder path value.

Embed Position (Tag)

When Embed Position (Tag) is set to After text, which is the default, embedded exhibits attached to tags (events or name) are inserted after the text for the tag. This is the appropriate choice if you want embedded exhibits to follow after the tag text. The text of subsequent tags will flow to the left or right of the exhibit.

When Embed Position (Tag) is set to Before text, embedded exhibits are inserted before the text of the tag. This is the appropriate choice if you want the tag text to flow to the left or right of the exhibit.

Linked exhibits are not affected by the Embed Position (Tag) property. Linked Exhibits are always inserted after the text associated with the parent record.

Embed Position (Citation)

When Embed Position (Citation) is set to After text, which is the default, embedded exhibits attached to citations are inserted after the text for the citation. This is the appropriate choice if you want embedded exhibits to follow after and beneath the citation.

When Embed Position (Citation) is set to Before text, embedded exhibits are inserted before the text of the citation. This is the appropriate choice if you want the citation text to flow to the left or right of embedded exhibits.

Linked exhibits are not affected by the Embed Position (Citation) property. Linked Exhibits are always inserted after the text associated with the parent record.

Exhibit Groups

The remaining properties are divided into groups by exhibit type: images and text. For each of those types, there are a set of pull-down menu properties for controlling whether exhibits of that type are Ignored, Linked, or Embedded.

• The Primary Person group is for exhibits that are attached to a person record and are the primary exhibit. The Primary Person exhibit is used when there are multiple exhibits but the output requires one exhibit to be given precedence. Primary Person exhibits appear in the Person Entry. They appear ahead of any Person exhibits.
• The Person group is for exhibits that are attached to a person record and but are not the primary exhibit. Person exhibits appear in the Person Entry. They appear after the Primary Person exhibits, if any.
• The Event group is for exhibits that are attached to an event. Event exhibits appear with the event in a Tag Set in the Person Entry.
• The Family group is for exhibits that are attached to a family.

  Family events appear in the Parent Section in the Person Entry if they are attached to the family that contains the parents of the current person.

  Family events appear in the Family Section in the Person Entry if they are attached to a family where the current person is a parent.

• The Source group is for exhibits that are attached to a source. Source exhibits appear after the source text on a source page.
• The Citation group is for exhibits that are attached to a citation. Citation exhibits appear after the citation text in the citation list in a Person Entry.
• The Place group is for exhibits that are attached to a place. Place exhibits appear on a place information page. See the Places Section for more information about Place Information pages.

Some exhibit types also have other properties.

Exhibit Group Options

For each of the exhibit groups, you can choose one of the following three options:

Image Properties

In addition to the Ignore, Link, or Embed properties described above, there are several other image-related properties.

By default, Gedcom Publisher follows a convervative approach to image alignment because some older e-book readers do not honor CSS float. CSS float is required for the left and right image alignment options where text flows to the right or the left, respectively, of the embedded image.

Person Image Alignment

The Person Image Alignment property controls the alignment of embedded image exhibits attached to people. The default is "inline". That avoids using the CSS float property. Some older e-book readers do not honor CSS float.

Other Image Alignment

The Other Image Alignment property controls the alignment of embedded image exhibits except exhibits attached to people. The default is "inline". That avoids using the CSS float property. Some older e-book readers do not honor CSS float.

Resize Embedded Images

If Resize Embedded Images is checked, the Resized Width and Resized Height properties are enabled and Gedcom Publisher will enforce a maximum size on embedded image exhibits using those values. If an image exceeds the Embedded Width or Embedded Height, Gedcom Publisher will resize the image to fit within those limits before embedding the image on the page. The user can click the image or the lightbox icon (if available) to open the full size version.

When Gedcom Publisher resizes the image, it retains the aspect ratio of the original image.

Caption Preference

GEDCOM files include a TITL record which is typically the caption for an image. Image files may also include caption text.

If Caption Preference is set to Favor Exhibit, Gedcom Publisher will use the GEDCOM TITL record value as the image caption. If there is no TITL record value, Gedcom Publisher will use the caption from the image file. Favor Exhibit is the default value.

If Caption Preference is set to Favor Image File, Gedcom Publisher will use the caption from the image file as the image caption. If there is no caption in the image file, Gedcom Publisher will use the GEDCOM TITL record value.

Include Note

If Include Note is checked, and an image has a note, the note text will be included beneath the caption when the image is embedded on a page. If Include Note is unchecked, which is the default, the note text will not be included when the image is embedded on a page.

Image notes are always shown on the image page when an image exhibit is linked.

Optimize Image Files

If Optimize Image Files is checked, Gedcom Publisher will reduce the dimensions of image exhibits and reduce the length of image exhibit files. All image exhibit dimensions will be reduced to the maximum width and height, and the image quality will be reduced until the file length is below the value in the Target File Length property.

The Optimized Width and Optimized Height properties define the maximum pixel dimension in the given direction. When Gedcom Publisher resizes the image, it makes a copy where the larger dimension is determined by either the width or height value you supply, and the other value is set such that the copy retains the aspect ratio of the original. It's usually best to have the Optimized Width be the more restrictive of the two so that a very long image will not be unreasonably thin.

Target File Length is expressed in kilobytes, so entering "200" means 200 times 1024, or 204,800 bytes.

Optimizing images may dramatically increase the execution time of the Make Book command. However, many e-book readers have limited capacities and it's best to reduce the size of the EPUB file by reducing the size of images.

To eliminate the performance impact of using Optimize Image Files, you can manually optimize image files and store the optimized copies in the Alternate Folder.

Cached Images Folder

When Optimize Image Files is checked and you make the book, Gedcom Publisher saves a copy of the optimized image files in the Cached Images folder. When you subsequently make the book again, Gedcom Publisher will re-use the cached files. That reduces the performance impact of using Optimized Image Files because the image files do not have to be optimized, only copied.

Text Properties

There are no properties related to text exhibits except for the Ignore, Link, or Embed properties described above.

File Location

If the file location specified in the GEDCOM file is a relative path, Gedcom Publisher assumes the path is relative to the location of the GEDCOM file.

File Names

Gedcom Publisher modifies file names when adding exhibit files to the book. The original file name is not changed. Gedcom Publisher changes the name of the copy of the file that is made for the book:

• ... to make sure the file name does not violate the file naming rules of the web server, which may be different from the Windows PC where the files originate, and
• ... to avoid characters that require special handling when used in URLs.

File names are modified as follows:

• These characters are allowed: 0-9 A-Z a-z . , _
• Alphabetic characters with diacritic marks are converted to a similar character. For example, "À" is converted to "A".
• Any other characters--including spaces--are converted to "-" (dash).

Sort

Gedcom Publisher sorts exhibits by date when a date is available. The date is taken from one of three places:

1. A date that is included somewhere in the filename, if that date is in the format "yyyy-mm-dd", "yyyy.mm.dd", or "yyyy_mm_dd".

   The date must be all numeric except for the delimiter characters. The date should be separated from other text in the filename by a space, a comma, a dash, or parentheses. You may not use "/" or "\" as the delimiter because those characters are not allowed in Windows filenames.

   Dates may appear at the start, in the middle, or at the end of the filename.

   Gedcom Publisher will detect the dates in all the following example filenames. These are only examples; other variations will also work.

   • Start of filename, separated by dashes:
     1878-04-28 James Jones.jpg
   • End of filename, separated by underscores:
     James Jones 1878_04_28.jpg
   • Middle of filename, surrounded by spaces:
     James Jones 1894-06-09 Graduation.jpg
   • Middle of filename, surrounded by parentheses:
     James Jones (1894-06-09) Graduation.jpg
   • Start of filename, separated by dashes, year and month only:
     1902-11-00-Smith,Doe Wedding.jpg
   • Start of filename, separated by dashes, year only:
     1964-00-00-Jane Doe Will.jpg

   As shown in two of the examples, you may use partial dates (dates missing a day, or day and month), but missing parts should be entered as "00".

2. The date stored within the metadata for the image file, if any.

   Gedcom Publisher will use the the first of these metadata fields that has a date:

   • IPTC: DateCreated
   • EXIF: IFD0 ImageDateTime
   • XMP: CreateDate
3. The date stored with the GEDCOM record for the exhibit, if any. The "Change Date" for an exhibit (CHAN.DATE) is ignored; in most programs, that represents the last time the exhibit / media object was edited in the program, not the date of the item itself.

If a date is found in more than one of the locations listed above, the date from #1 above takes precedence over #2, and if #1 is not present, #2 takes precedence over #3.

If no date is available, the sort sequence is determined by the exhibit record sequence in the data file.

Exhibit Codes

Gedcom Publisher supports codes you can assign to exhibits to modify exhibit processing. The codes are described below. Some of the codes override the behavior specified in the associated Exhibit Group for the exhibit.

The mechanism for assigning an Exhibit Code to an exhibit varies according to the application that wrote the exhibit file, and unfortunately, most applications do not provide a means to assign an exhibit code. See the entry for the application you use on the Application Compatibility help page for more information.

Note: If the associated Exhibit Group option is set to Ignore, using the codes listed above will have no effect. You can use the codes to override Embed or Link, but you can not use them to override Ignore.