Add a new individual to your database without importing a GEDCOM file.

Find an existing person, then choose to edit or delete that individual, or choose to view the information as the public would see it.

Search for: Enter all or part of the name or ID number of an individual.

Look in: A list of searchable sections of the person record, plus other search options. Place a check in the box next to each section (or field) to search. To limit results to living individuals or exact matches only, check the appropriate boxes.

Locate the line in the table that describes the person you wish to modify. Next, click on one of the possible actions listed at the left of that line. To change some or all of the information regarding this person, choose Edit. To see how this person's page will look to visitors, choose Test. To permanently remove the record of this person, choose Delete. NOTE: Choosing Delete will also unlink this individual from all marriages and parent-child relationships.

Delete selected To delete multiple people at once, check the boxes next to the people to be deleted, then click the "Delete selected" button at the bottom of the screen.

Required fields: The only required fields are Person ID and Sex, although it is highly recommended that you enter at least part of the name and as much other information as possible. Fields left blank will not show up when the individual record is displayed for public viewing.

Person ID: The Person ID must be unique and should consist of an upper case "I" followed by a number (no more than 9 digits). An available, unique ID will be supplied when the page is first displayed and whenever a different tree is selected, but you may enter your own ID if desired. To check if the ID you have entered is unique, click Check. A small pop-up window will tell you if the ID is in use or not. To automatically generate a new unique ID, click Generate. This will locate the highest number in your database and add 1. A small window may briefly appear and disappear. To ensure that the displayed ID is not claimed by another user before you can save your record, click Lock. NOTE: If you are using this software in conjunction with a PC/Mac-based genealogy program which also creates IDs for new individuals, it is HIGHLY RECOMMENDED that keep all IDs in sync between the two programs at all times. Failure to do this may result in collisions and may also cause your photo, history and headstone links to become unusable. If your desktop program creates IDs that do not conform to traditional standards (for example, the "I" is at the end, not the beginning), you can edit the "prefixes.php" file that came with TNG to change the convention TNG uses to match this.

Branch: If Branches exist and you are not assigned to a particular branch, you may elect to assign this individual to one or more of the existing branches. This will limit access to this person's data to users with sufficient permissions.

Names: Enter the individual's first and/or last name. If you have elected to support surname prefixes as a separate entity (so the prefixes are ignored during sorting), enter the prefix portion in the box labeled Surname Prefix. If this box is not visible, go to the Setup/General Settings and check the option to use surname prefixes.

General Individual: To add notes or sources to the individual in general, click the buttons next to this label.

Living: If this person is alive, and if you wish to restrict access to this person's data to users who are logged in with sufficient privileges, check this box.

Dates: When the full date is known, always enter it in the standard genealogical format, DD MMM YYYY (for example, 18 Feb 2003).

Places: List place information from local to general, separating each locality by a comma (for example, "Boston, Suffolk, Massachusetts, USA"), or select an existing place name by clicking Find.

More: Additional information may be entered for many events. Where more information for an event already exists, this is indicated by an asterisk (*).

Notes: Notes may be linked to individual events (existing records only). Multiple notes can be associated with any given event. To create a note for an event, click on the Notes button next to the event. Existing notes are indicated by an asterisk (*). For further information, see the Help link on the Notes page.

Sources: Sources may be linked to individual events (existing records only) by creating citations. Multiple citations can be associated with any given event. To create a citation for a source and link it to an event, click on the Sources button next to the event. Existing citations are indicated by an asterisk (*). For further information, see the Help link on the Citations page.

Other Events: Use the buttons below the Other Events box to add, edit or delete non-standard events. The order in which the events are displayed is determined by date (if applicable), and by the event types' assigned priority. This priority may be changed when editing the event types. NOTES: Changes made here are written to the database as they are made, meaning that they are already saved before you save the rest of the Existing Person information.

Parents: Edit the family where the current individual is listed as a child by clicking on the family ID link associated with any set of parents. To edit the individual information for either parent, click on the parent's name. Indicate a relationship between the individual and this set of parents by choosing from the dropdown list (optional). To change the order in which multiple parent sets are displayed, enter numbers in the appropriate boxes. To remove the current individual as a child in this family, check the box next to Unlink current individual as child.

Spouses: Edit the family where the current individual is listed as a spouse by clicking on the family ID link associated with that spouse. To edit the individual information for a spouse, click on the spouse's name. To change the order in which multiple marriages are displayed, enter numbers in the appropriate boxes. To remove the current individual as a spouse in this family, check the box next to Unlink current individual as spouse.

Review tentative edits made by other users. You will decide whether to keep or delete these proposed changes. Choose to review by tree, by user or both.

Select Event and Action
Locate the line in the table that describes the event you wish to review or delete. Next, click on one of the possible actions listed at the left of that line. To review and possibly incorporate the changes, choose Review. To discard the proposed change, choose Delete.

Review
On the Review screen, make any additional changes, including any to notes or sources you find necessary, then click "Save and Delete" to make the changes permanent and remove the tentative record. You may also choose to remove the tentative record without saving, or postpone the decision until later.

Review and merge duplicate records. You will decide whether two records are the same or not.

Find Matches
First, select a tree. You cannot merge individuals from different trees, so only one tree can be selected. After that, you have the option of selecting an individual as the starting point for your search (Person 1), or letting TNG find the first match for you. If you'd rather let TNG find all matches, leave the Person ID 1 field blank

If you selected an individual as Person 1, you may also decide to manually select Person ID 2. If you'd rather let TNG find duplicates for Person 1, leave Person ID 2 blank.

Match the following fields. These are the criteria TNG will use in determining possible matches. By default, First Name and Last Name are selected, meaning that those fields must match in order for two records to be considered a possible match. If you also select Birth Date, Birth Place, Death Date, and/or Death Place, those fields must also match.

Other Options. Ignore Blanks means that blank fields will not be considered. For example, someone with a Last Name but no First Name will not match any other records if First Name is among the selected criteria. Use Soundex means that the MySQL Soundex function will be used when comparing names. In this case, "Blakely" could be considered a match for "Blackley". Combine Notes & Citations means that notes and citations from Person 2 will be added to the notes and citations from Person 1 for all merged fields. If this option is not selected and a field from Person 2 is checked, the notes and citations from Person 2 for that field will overwrite those for the corresponding field from Person 1. Combine Photos & Histories means that photos and histories from Person 2 will be kept and added to those already existing for Person 1 if the two are merged. If this option is not selected, all photo, history & headstone links for Person 2 will be deleted after the merge.

Warning! Once a merge has taken place, it cannot be undone! Please consider backing up your database tables before performing any merge operations, just in case you merge two individuals unintentionally.

Next Match. Find the next possible match that does not involve Person 1. TNG traverses the list of possible individuals as ordered by Person ID in string format. This means that "10" comes after "1" but before "2".

Next Duplicate. Find the next possible duplicate for Person 1. If this results in no record being displayed for Person 2, it means that a duplicate was not found.

Compare/Refresh. Compare Person 1 and Person 2. If that comparison is already displayed, clicking this button will cause the page to refresh.

Switch. Person 1 becomes Person 2 and vice versa.

Merge. Person 2 is merged into Person 1. The ID for Person 1 will be retained, as will all other data for Person 1 unless the corresponding box(es) for are checked for Person 2. For example, if the box next to Birth Date is checked for Person 2, this data in this field will be copied from Person 2's record to Person 1's record during the merge. Corresponding data for Person 1 will then be deleted. Boxes for Person 2 are checked automatically when no corresponding data exists for Person 1. If a data field is not displayed for either Person 1 or Person 2, then no data exists in that field for either individual.

Edit. Edit the individual record for that individual in a new window. If changes are made, you must click Compare/Refresh in order to see the changes in on the Merge screen.