This is the same thing I see.
Hello everyone,
@Familyvisser: I’m sorry you feel the same way. On the other hand, it confirms that the fault is not with me / the user and the technology, but with the technical requirements of the software.
Geocoordination in particular is never unproblematic in many software. It becomes easy wherever it is possible to name the location yourself via an interface.
Specifically with RM, this would be an example: To display the location via the coordinates in the map window at the top right, but to determine it via the OpenStreetMap and / or Google Maps interface and thus adopt the coordinates. Other providers do better in this regard. Why RM takes this more difficult route in programming than via a direct interface, of course I cannot understand.
I haven’t been able to solve the problem yet. I tried the following solutions yesterday:
→ RM8 completely uninstalled.
→ Where leftovers were deleted by hand. Also in the AppData folder
→ Run CCleaner several times, also clean the registry and use the “regedit” command to check whether there are still file caches to be removed. I had just recently read in a Gedcom file and had not yet processed it in RM. So it wasn’t a problem that the file was no longer there.
→ Then, following Microsoft’s instructions, I had a comprehensive check to see if there were any errors in the Windows system files. That was not the case. Updates were all available.
→ PC restart and reinstallation of RM. Here I did not use my second drive (D.//…), as with all other software, but as an exception the system drive C: // …).
→ Comprehensive malware and virus check.
None of that helped. The fact that I cannot enter geocoordination myself is very unsatisfactory with all the other advantages.
So far, the support has not contacted me either. It would certainly be helpful if other users with the same problem as Familyvisser submit a support request so that this real problem is taken seriously and not dismissed as an individual case.
Otherwise I will work without geo-coordinating the location for the time being - or use a second different software.
Best regards from the Hamburg region
Tom
Hi Tom,
From what I understand, you and I have the same problem. It is a small comfort to see that I am not the only one. I am in contact with support, but so far they have been unable to replicate the problem and therefore don’t know what to do. I am trying to set up a digital meeting with them to show them the problem. I can keep you updated on the progress here, unless you have already solve the issue?
PS! using MacBook Pro, Monterey OS and RM 8.1.00
I think this is a problem with RM that has always existed and that is it does not respect or accept Regional settings other than those that use “.” as the decimal symbol and “,” as the digit grouping symbol. The response you are likely going to get from RM Inc is to switch your Regional Settings to “English (United States)”. That probably won’t help you with your existing GEDCOM but will with data entry. Assuming your other software can export GEDCOM according to the new Regional setting, then a fresh GEDCOM from it should fare better on import.
The developers have had decades to get this right (at least one, anyway) so I wouldn’t hold my breath that it will be fixed in RM8.
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Thanks, my regional setting is Norwegian, so that may explain it then.
I won’t hold my breath, but will take the meeting with them if they offer.
I changed my language setting from Norwegian to English (US) and I can finally manually enter the Latitude and Longitude. Thank you so much. It took you 1 min to sort out something that it sounds like RM support have never heard about. Makes me wonder.
This should not be hard to fix, if they wanted to.
Thank again, at least now I have a workaround.
Appreciate your help
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Hello everyone, that with the language settings is new to me. I installed it like this and imported my Gedcom files. They come from Ancestry Germany. Where I might change the settings, as named by TomH and successfully done by Olav, I just couldn’t find that.
After all: At least I found the settings for FamilySearch, Ancestry Germany and MyHeritage.
Tom, it is a windows system setting that can be found by clicking on the task bar magnifying glass and typing language.
TY all!!! So it works!!!
Wish RM will work on those settings. Now my Keybord is on US. But if i will work with RM …it|s an solution. GREAT!
I am pleased you have found a resolution to the problem of decimal points, comma separators and regional settings. It appears to be 17 days since your first comment on this post so you have had a long wait to get it sorted. However, I may be wrong but I wouldn’t hold my breath waiting for RM to introduce any regional settings options. RM Inc. has never made any pretence that the program was anything but an English language program and, rightly or wrongly, expects everybody to be using settings that match common usage in English speaking countries. If it is easy to have such options then I agree they could do something but I don’t expect it is at the top of their agenda as the majority of users don’t need it. My Regional setting is “English (United Kingdom)” so it works fine.
There appears to be many places like that, where the spelling and place information is all the same but for some reason the 2 just don’t get matched up. At this point I simply open the Gazetteer and type in the place name and I select the place from there and Done. Hope this helps.
Hello All,
I have the same issue as mentioned here. When I include the lat & long manual into the field then it will not work. Solving by using the Gazetteer is also not working. I also see that he take not the coordinates from my Gedcom file which I have exported from Familytree.
I see this as an important issue and wondering why this is not working properly. Not every location can be found on Gazetteer. Si it could not be a final solution. Also switch between the languages on Windows is not working fro me and coudl not be thr final solution for that.
Also Gazetteer only works for me in people wworksheet…but not on locations themself.
Is rootmagic working on this issue ?
Nu zijn we een jaar verder en de Amerikaanse makers van RM8 weten nog steeds niet dat er meer is dan "Engels (Vereningde Staten) binnen regionale settings in Windows. Jammer en een minachting van klanten in de rest van de wereld.
Machine translation:
"Now we are a year later and the American makers of RM8 still don’t know that there is more than “English (United States) within regional settings in Windows. Too bad and a contempt from customers in the rest of the world.”
Living in Germany and using macOS I came across the exact same issues regarding the input of geographical coordinates for places. It seems to me that the majority of RM users are US citizens and therefore (serious) issues the few “foreign” users have still are not a priority to the developers. As you can imagine I’m very unhappy with this. I am a RM newbie and still considering what software to use as my main database since GEDCOM exchange always goes along with data loss. I like a lot of aspects of RM but this could be a dealbreaker to me. At the moment for places that cannot automatically be geocoded I use a kind of workaround by adding a web tag with the url to a set of bing coordinates. So if I want to see a correct map info I simply use that link. - Not satisfying at all.
Maybe I’m doing something wrong, but changing the language for the RootsMagic application in the system setting does not work for me, maybe a Mac thing?
So please, please consider offering a “switch” in the RM settings for usage of “continental-european” decimal system, thank you.
You don’t need to change the language setting. Just change the format when you need to use mapping or geocoding.
Steps to change between period or comma:
1. Windows search for “Control Panel”
2. Click "Change date, time, or number formats under “Clock and Region”
3. Click “Additional settings”
Change the decimal separator from comma to period without changing the country. You don’t need to restart the computer. Just run RM.
Hm, I don’t know if I am doing it wrong. I’m working on a Mac and in my understanding the equivalent to the steps in windows should be (I’m german, I hope my translation German-English is correct):
1.) System Settings
2.) “General”
3.) “Language and Region”
4.) “numbers format (?)”: → change “1.234.567,89” to “1,234,567.89”
(in addition I tried to change “system of units” from “metric” to “USA” under “Language and Region”)
My lat / long entries in RM behave always the same: getting red right after insertion and then change to 0,0000000000… and 5,0000000000000, sending the place to nirvana.
If they were entered with comma’s those won’t change within the program. You will need to manually change those.
I suspect there is no Lat-Long data stored in a RM database having comma as a decimal separator because the program traps it out on entry into either field as a Lat,Long separator and puts the appropriate part into the other field if it is not empty leaving the remaining part in its field, both translated into the decimal stored format “[-]iddddddd” where the optional “-” means W for longitude, S for latitude, “i” represents the 1-3 character wide integer value ahead of the decimal place and “ddddddd” represents the fixed width (7) characters to the right of the decimal place. Note that there is no decimal symbol stored therein. This behaviour for enetering Lat, Long pairs is not described in Help as best as I can see but is apparently there to facilitate data entry for the majority user base.
If @KeySmith sees 5,0000000 E as a Longitude value somewhere in RM, then it appears that RM is aware of the Regional Setting and honours it for display but not for data entry. However, I suspect he does not but the RM10 behaviour is screwed up on Windows 10 when the Decimal symbol is “,” and the Digit grouping symbol is “.”. Geocode a place still uses the decimal point, not the comma but now RM flags it as invalid (red):
Yet, checking it as OK, results in a valid display in the Places List:
Every Place that has been Geocoded is in red in the Edit Place form because it shows the values with the decimal point. Attempting to correct it by replacing the decimal point with the comma gives unusable results.
Clearly, there is room for improvement in RM’s support for regional settings.
I am afraid my English and my maths are not good enough to completely understand you, @TomH , but thank you for your efforts!
@rzamor1 : I do not know what I’m doing wrong. Further down you’ll see some screenshots of the whole process. I double-checked that the changed system settings are working properly by using an excel sheet: Yes: “.” as decimal symbol is active. The problem not only exists for the already geocoded places but new ones either. What I tested:
- Created a new and empty fictional “Test-City”
- Entered “50.7753455” latitude both manually and by copy and paste. The moment I did so, the letters were framed in red
- Hit enter and set the cursor in the longitude field. At that moment the previously entered “50.7753455” in the latitude field turned instantly to zero and went red
- Entered “6.0838868” longitude and the exact same thing happened as desribed for lat.
- I ticked the checkbox in the upper right corner of the screen and both fields, lat and long went completely empty.
My conclusion: It does not work even with changed system settings. Maybe it’s a Mac thing since it DID work for some windows users?
Thank you for your help!
