Print Scrapbook Report of Actual Media including Source Media for a Person or Family

#1 · 2025-05-20, 8:44 am

Perhaps this has been asked before, but I don't see it. Is there a way to print any kind of report of the actual media attached to a person or family that includes the images linked to each source?

I feel as though no matter what I print, I never get the whole enchilada. So many of my family members will never open my RM database and see all of the newspaper clippings, school yearbook pages, even census records that I have painstakingly attached to all of the sources I have gathered. I would like to be able to print a complete and comprehensive report of everyone I choose to include with all their facts and automatically print the media associated with each fact and source.

If RM via SQL cannot do this, are there any other genealogy programs that have this capability built in?

Or am I asking for too much?

#2 · 2025-05-20, 10:12 am

What one could do with SQLite is to tag all citation media to the event, person or couple to which the citation itself is linked. That could result in the Scrapbook for a Person to include the citation media. However, I find the Scrapbook report to be pretty crappy as it applies a one-size-for-all layout. You'll want a full page landscape for one image versus 4-to-a-page portrait for others. Mixing and matching is not on. I think I would look for some other solution.

One might be to publish your tree so that your family members see it through some better presentation than having to use RM itself. An Ancestry Tree is one way. Another might be John Cardinal's GEDsite website or his GEDpublisher ePub writer - @thejerrybryan is a great fan of GEDsite.

Jaime Teas has reacted to this post.

#3 · 2025-05-20, 10:29 am

Thanks for the suggestion. You're right, there would be problems with size display of various media, but I had figured I could resize manually in the final published report.

I have a private Ancestry tree, but it's a mess of duplicated and outdated info. It's more of a repository for my own use. I guess I could upload to a new private tree and invite family to view it. But I really want something I can print. I guess as a Baby Boomer, I'm just old enough to feel better if I have a paper version just in case technology lets me down! Ha ha!

~~I think I have an old version of the GEDSite program, but it's been a long time and I didn't know there was an online publisher. I'll check it out.~~

I was wrong. GEDSite is completely new to me. Looks fascinating!

Thanks so much!

#4 · 2025-05-20, 11:54 am

Quote from thejerrybryan on 2025-05-20, 11:54 am
Yes, I am a big fan of GedSite, but it only makes Web pages. So you would be stuck with making a Web site that you publish on the Web, or else that you "publish" to a CD or to a USB thumb drive or some such. The Web pages created by GedSite work just fine if they are on a local disk instead of on a Web site. You could distribute the CD's or USB thumb drives to family members, but my experience is that many modern PC's do not come with a CD drive, so USB thumb drives might be your best bet.
The companion to GedSite for publishing books is called Gedcom Publisher. But it only makes e-books. So you would have to create a computer file that your readers would access via a Kindle or other e-book reader. I don't remember the details, but I'm pretty sure that Gedcom Publisher supports all the leading e-book formats
I tried making printed books from GedSite Publisher by using tricks such as exporting to a PDF and printing the PDF. But the results were really not satisfactory. You really need to be in the e-book environment to read a book created by GedSite Publisher.
The author of both products is John Cardinal. He is super sharp and super helpful, but he has very specific visions of what he wants his products to do and to look like. For example, I had a long conversation with him about a "Gedcom Publisher on paper" product. My sense was not just that he had no interest, but that he was generally opposed to the idea. In any case, he said that such a product would be extremely difficult to implement and that he had no plans to implement such a product.
But back to GedSite for just a moment. Even if you don't use it to publish anything for family and friends, it's a great way to get a deep view into your RM data for yourself. Indeed, that's one of the selling points and I often use it that way myself. I traditionally have run a one generation RM Descendant Narrative report on people after editing them. I can often see problems easier in such reports than I can see the same problems on RM's Edit Person screen. The RM8/9/10 report viewer is terrible, so my workaround is always to save any report I generate to a temporary PDF file. I use the same file name over and over again, namely t.pdf. It works great to view RM's reports.
But that doesn't get me the media files. So I often also export a one generation GEDCOM to GedSite and look at my RM data that way. I can see all the media for each person and for their facts and their citations.
You can see a sample of what my my GedSite stuff looks like at http://jerrybryan.com/gedsite_folder/jerry_bryan-o/up/index.htm If you want to skip going through my index of names, a good sample person can be found at http://jerrybryan.com/gedsite_folder/jerry_bryan-o/g1/p133.htm#i3316 The images are thumbnails, and you click on the little blue box to see them full size.
GedSite is not rocket science, but I think it does have a pretty steep learning curve. Just to get it to work is pretty easy. Getting the Web pages to look exactly they way you want them to look takes a little longer. Such a discussion surely belongs in a forum other than this one.

Yes, I am a big fan of GedSite, but it only makes Web pages. So you would be stuck with making a Web site that you publish on the Web, or else that you "publish" to a CD or to a USB thumb drive or some such. The Web pages created by GedSite work just fine if they are on a local disk instead of on a Web site. You could distribute the CD's or USB thumb drives to family members, but my experience is that many modern PC's do not come with a CD drive, so USB thumb drives might be your best bet.

The companion to GedSite for publishing books is called Gedcom Publisher. But it only makes e-books. So you would have to create a computer file that your readers would access via a Kindle or other e-book reader. I don't remember the details, but I'm pretty sure that Gedcom Publisher supports all the leading e-book formats

I tried making printed books from GedSite Publisher by using tricks such as exporting to a PDF and printing the PDF. But the results were really not satisfactory. You really need to be in the e-book environment to read a book created by GedSite Publisher.

The author of both products is John Cardinal. He is super sharp and super helpful, but he has very specific visions of what he wants his products to do and to look like. For example, I had a long conversation with him about a "Gedcom Publisher on paper" product. My sense was not just that he had no interest, but that he was generally opposed to the idea. In any case, he said that such a product would be extremely difficult to implement and that he had no plans to implement such a product.

But back to GedSite for just a moment. Even if you don't use it to publish anything for family and friends, it's a great way to get a deep view into your RM data for yourself. Indeed, that's one of the selling points and I often use it that way myself. I traditionally have run a one generation RM Descendant Narrative report on people after editing them. I can often see problems easier in such reports than I can see the same problems on RM's Edit Person screen. The RM8/9/10 report viewer is terrible, so my workaround is always to save any report I generate to a temporary PDF file. I use the same file name over and over again, namely t.pdf. It works great to view RM's reports.

But that doesn't get me the media files. So I often also export a one generation GEDCOM to GedSite and look at my RM data that way. I can see all the media for each person and for their facts and their citations.

You can see a sample of what my my GedSite stuff looks like at http://jerrybryan.com/gedsite_folder/jerry_bryan-o/up/index.htm If you want to skip going through my index of names, a good sample person can be found at http://jerrybryan.com/gedsite_folder/jerry_bryan-o/g1/p133.htm#i3316 The images are thumbnails, and you click on the little blue box to see them full size.

GedSite is not rocket science, but I think it does have a pretty steep learning curve. Just to get it to work is pretty easy. Getting the Web pages to look exactly they way you want them to look takes a little longer. Such a discussion surely belongs in a forum other than this one.

Jaime Teas has reacted to this post.

#5 · 2025-05-20, 2:47 pm

Jerry. I wish I could give you a hug! Your sample person page is EXACTLY what I would like my family to see. Clicking on a thumbnail is no big deal and totally logical because they can see that it’s there to view. I can’t thank you enough for your brilliant insight and explanations. I think our brains work very much the same way!

Yes, CD’s are outdated. I had to buy an external drive for the few times I have needed one. Flash drives are the way to go, at least for NOW.

I am sure I will have some questions for you once I get underway, but am pretty sure I have your email address and will use that method I its ok with you My family reunion is in a month. I don’t need to have anything too slick for my first attempt and it’s just for my mom, me and siblings, our children, and our grandchildren (most who are not old enough to read yet!) so they will not be harsh critics!

Jaime