Name Lists

Name Lists

…and how to manipulate them

Here is a typical Name List. Notice the upward pointing triangle in the red box. The triangle indicates a sorted field. This one is attached to the Name field. We can tell that the field is sorted into ascending order because the triangle points up. Descending sorts point down. Here I have clicked on the Adjust Columns and Sorting button. This button brings up the Name List View Column Options screen. It is divided into two halves. The top half is labeled Select the Fields you wish to view. The bottom half is labeled Select the Sort Order for the information.

The top half of the screen is divided into four columns. The left window, labeled Available Fields, shows an expandable tree containing all of the fields stored in the AQ database. Clicking on any box with a + inside will show a list of the fields and subcategories contained in that category. Clicking on a – will hide the items listed within that category. To select an item that you want to view, first find it in the list, then highlight it by clicking on it.

In the second column there are two buttons. One contains a > and the other contains a <.  The > button is used to move the selected Available Field into the Shown Fields box. The selected field will be placed below whichever item in the Shown Fields box is highlighted, so chose the position before adding the field to the box.

The item at the top of the list appears on the left of the Name List screen. As you look down the list, each item you see is placed to the right of the previous item on the screen. The order of the list can be changed by highlighting the desired item, and moving it up or down by clicking on the upward or downward pointing triangle on the left.

Any field except RIN can be removed from the Shown Fields box. Just highlight the unwanted item and remove it by clicking the < button.

The bottom half of the screen is divided into four columns. The right window is labeled Available Fields. It works in the same was as the Available Fields box in the top half of the screen.

The next column contains the > and < buttons, and they work just like the buttons above them.

The third column contains the Sort Fields box and the Sort Order radio buttons. The Sort Fields box can contain one, two or three fields. From top to bottom, they are in Major, Intermediate, Minor order. This means that when you look at the sorted list, the item which is the Major order field will be sorted first.  If the Major field is Sex, then the list will be divided into one, two or three groups. If all the names in your database were males, there would be one block of names. It wouldn’t be obvious by looking at the list that it had been sorted. If your file contained both males and females, then the list would appear in two blocks. One block would contain males and one would contain females. If you had records of people for whom you were unable to determine the gender, there would be a third block containing those records.

The order of those blocks is determined by the radio buttons. If you select Ascending, Females will be first, Males second, and Unknown last. Descending would show Unknown first, Males second, and Females last.

Go back and look at the first two illustrations. In the first illustration there is an upward pointing triangle in the Name column, so the list is sorted by Name, alphabetically from A to Z. In the second illustration, the Ascending radio button is selected, and there is an A before the field name in the Sort Fields box. Now I will change the sort order.

The Major sort field is Birth/Mar/Death Place. It is being sorted into ascending order, so there will be a block for each place found in the file.

The Intermediate sort order is Birth/Mar/Death Date, so within each place, the records will be sorted into date order. The dates are being sorted into Ascending order, so within each place, the records will be listed from earliest to most recent.

The Minor sort field is Name, so within each date, the names will be listed alphabetically. the Ascending order was chosen, so the sort will be from A to Z. At first glance, it looks like there is some type of error with the sort. The places were supposed to be in alphabetical order, so Fownhope shouldn’t come before Cheddleton. Here is what happened. In Tools -> Preferences -> Formats there is a check box item called Sort Places Small to Large on Name List View. This box has not been checked, so places are sorted by Country, State or Province, County, City. This is why it is important to store ONLY place name information in place fields. Our sort is in England, Ireland, United States order. If I had the name of a cemetery in the City position of the place field, everything would have been out of order. Since I have only three place names for my places in England and Ireland, I leave the State or Province portion blank by inserting an extra comma as a place holder in the name.

Now let’s put a check in the Sort Places Small to Large on Name List View box and see how that changes everything. Now the places are sorted by city, then county, then state or province, and lastly by country.

Just one more thing. Notice that the column headers Place, Date and Name all have upward pointing triangles. those fields are sorted into ascending order. Notice also that the triangle for Place is larger than the one for Date, and the one for Date is larger than the one for Name. This is how you can visually identify the Major (largest) through Minor (Smallest) sort order.

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• Posted in: How to...
• Tagged: Name List, Sort