Ancestor report

ancestor-report

Overview

Generates a categorized markdown report of direct ancestors. Walks the tree using Ahnentafel (Sosa-Stradonitz) numbering, optionally applies parent overrides for FAMC conflicts, and emits:

1. Per-generation listing of every ancestor with name, dates, birth place, and death place. Each ancestor is numbered (#N) using their Sosa-Stradonitz position; the same number always points to the same person and tree slot.
2. Alternate Family Tree sections — one per FAMC entry the user did NOT choose, but only for children explicitly named with --alternate. Numbered with letter prefixes (A1, A2, …, B1, …).
3. Optional FAMC Conflicts list showing every ancestor in scope with multiple recorded parent families.
4. Immigrants section with per-region subsections (German and Scandinavian, Dutch, French, Spanish and Portuguese, Italian, Irish, Scottish, Welsh, English by default — fully configurable). Only ancestors who died in the US/colonies are listed.
5. Optional Colonial Ancestors section (default: included; suppress with --no-colonial for non-US-focused reports) with three subsections:
   • Colonial Immigrants — born outside the colonies, died in the colonies before 1776.
   • Ancestors Born in the Colonies — born in the US/colonies before 1776.
   • Early US Immigrants — born outside the colonies before 1776, died in the US after 1776.

When to use

• "Generate an ancestor report for @I1@ going back 7 generations." → invoke with --root @I1@ --depth 7.
• "Build a markdown report of John Smith's family tree." → use search-gedcom to find the xref, then run this skill.
• "Show me all immigrants in my family tree by region." → run the skill and use the Immigrants section.
• "List my colonial ancestors." → run the skill and use the Colonial Ancestors section.

Do not use when:

• The user wants a flat list of ancestors with no categorization → use search-gedcom --ancestors-of directly.
• The user wants to query specific facts → use search-gedcom.
• The user wants to edit GEDCOM data → use update-gedcom.

How to invoke

This skill is a thin wrapper around the gedcom-ancestor-report console script published by gedcom-reports. Run it via uvx:

uvx --from gedcom-reports gedcom-ancestor-report FILE --root @I1@ --depth 10 [options]

If gedcom-reports is already installed (pip install gedcom-reports), invoke gedcom-ancestor-report directly.

Quick reference

--root @I1@                   Root individual xref. (required)
--depth N                     Generations to walk (default: 7).
--override "@C@=@F@,@M@"      Pick parents @F@ and @M@ for child @C@. Repeatable.
                              Either parent may be empty: "@C@=@F@," (no mother).
--alternate @C@               Render an Alternate Family Tree section for child @C@
                              from any FAMC entries that weren't chosen. Repeatable.
                              Without this flag, the un-chosen FAMC is silently dropped.
--regions PATH                Path to regions.yaml or regions.json (default: bundled).
--colonial / --no-colonial    Include or suppress the Colonial Ancestors section
                              (default: included). Pass --no-colonial for
                              non-US-focused reports.
--alt-depth N                 Cap depth of alternate family trees (default: --depth).
--show-conflicts              Include a FAMC Conflicts section before the tables.
--print-default-regions       Print the path to the bundled regions.yaml and exit.
                              Handy as a starting point for `--regions` overrides.
--output PATH                 Write to a file (default: stdout).

FAMC default behavior

By default, the script follows only the first FAMC of each individual (matching gedcom-search --primary-famc-only). This keeps the main tree unambiguous. To choose a different FAMC for an individual, use --override.

--override is silent by default — the parent set you didn't pick is dropped. To explicitly render the un-chosen FAMC entries as an Alternate Family Tree section, pass --alternate @C@ for the child whose alt tree you want shown.

This split lets you handle two distinct cases cleanly:

• Reconciling a data-entry error (e.g., a person whose mother and father were entered as two separate FAMC families that should have been one) — use --override alone to merge them silently.
• Documenting an unresolved parentage question (e.g., when sources disagree on which couple are someone's biological parents) — use --override and --alternate so both the chosen and rejected parent sets are visible in the report.

If you want to see which ancestors have multiple FAMC entries before deciding on overrides, use --show-conflicts.

Region classification

A YAML/JSON config file controls how birth places are bucketed. The default config ships inside the gedcom-reports package and includes these buckets:

• German and Scandinavian Settlers — Germany, Austria, Prussia, Switzerland, Alsace, Denmark, Norway, Sweden.
• Dutch Settlers — Netherlands.
• French Settlers — France (excluding Alsace).
• Spanish and Portuguese Settlers — Iberia.
• Italian Settlers — Italy.
• Irish Settlers — Ireland and Northern Ireland.
• Scottish Settlers — Scotland.
• Welsh Settlers — Wales.
• English Settlers — England (and generic UK / Great Britain entries).

The classification is two-pass:

1. If any US keyword appears in the place string, the place is US and the person is excluded from the immigrant tables.
2. Otherwise, regions are tested in config order; first match wins.

To customize, copy the bundled regions.yaml (find its path with gedcom-ancestor-report --print-default-regions), edit it, and pass --regions path/to/your.yaml. To handle ambiguous tokens (e.g., "Middlesex" exists in both England and New Jersey), avoid bare keywords — include disambiguating context like middlesex, england, or rely on the country-level keyword (england, united kingdom) being present.

Examples

# Basic 7-generation report
uvx --from gedcom-reports gedcom-ancestor-report \
  tree.ged --root @I1@ --depth 7 --output report.md

# Show every FAMC conflict so you can decide on overrides
uvx --from gedcom-reports gedcom-ancestor-report \
  tree.ged --root @I1@ --show-conflicts > conflicts.md

# Override two ambiguous FAMC entries and walk 10 generations, surfacing
# the un-chosen parent sets as alternate trees
uvx --from gedcom-reports gedcom-ancestor-report tree.ged \
  --root @I322367362260@ --depth 10 \
  --override "@I322367362470@=@I322367362647@,@I322367362648@" \
  --override "@I322367362647@=@I322410457996@,@I322548366731@" \
  --alternate @I322367362470@ \
  --alternate @I322367362647@ \
  --output report.md

# Silently fix a split-FAMC data-entry error (no alternate tree wanted)
uvx --from gedcom-reports gedcom-ancestor-report tree.ged \
  --root @I1@ --depth 7 \
  --override "@I322404467221@=@I322471147822@,@I322404467237@" \
  --output report.md

# Suppress the Colonial Ancestors section for a non-US-focused report
uvx --from gedcom-reports gedcom-ancestor-report tree.ged \
  --root @I1@ --depth 10 --no-colonial --output report.md

# Use a custom region config that adds an "Asian Settlers" bucket
uvx --from gedcom-reports gedcom-ancestor-report tree.ged \
  --root @I1@ --depth 7 --regions ./my_regions.yaml --output report.md

Output contract

• Single markdown document. UTF-8.
• Sections in order: subject header, generation listings (Gen 1..N), zero or more Alternate Family Tree sections, optional FAMC Conflicts section, Immigrants section (with per-region subsections), optional Colonial Ancestors section (with three subsections), summary footer.
• Each ancestor in the generation listings carries an Ahnentafel number prefix (e.g., **#42**); alternate-tree entries use a letter prefix (**#A1**).
• Region subsections that have no entries are omitted.

Reference

• gedcom-reports — the package providing the gedcom-ancestor-report console script and its bundled regions.yaml.
• See gedcom-ancestor-report --help for the authoritative flag reference.