Importing from Ancestry.com
Introduction
This article is a quick guide to transferring your Family Tree from Ancestry.com / .co.uk for users with
Assumptions
- Your Family Tree is currently hosted on Ancestry.com or .co.uk (It will probably work on other regional domains as they are all driven by the same engine but I have not tested it anywhere else)
- Your Tree has photos that you want to transfer
- Your TNG installation is on a privately hosted NAS drive. (This overall process will work with hosted installations via FTP but this article does not cover that as I have no knowledge in that area)
- Your TNG instance has no current content
Issue
The only way to achieve the transfer is using a GEDCOM file export / import. GEDCOM files do not include media, only links to that media.
However, a GEDCOM export from Ancestry provides links back to the Ancestry installation, links which even the tree owner cannot access.
Solution
The only solution to this is to use an intermediary program Family Tree Maker (FTM) to sync with the Ancestry site, and to produce the GEDCOM file from FTM.
Note2
- Unless you know an FTM user who is willing to perform this transfer for you you will have to buy a copy. At the time of writing the cost was £79. This was cost justified in my case because it will allow me to cancel my Ancestry subscription, and will pay for itself in a few months.
- At the time of writing FTM was due for a major update from FTM 2014.1 to FTM 2017. This is mostly driven by Ancestry's decision to end support for the existing Tree Sync capability. This takes place 29th Mar 2017. Before then, FTM 2014.1 will handle the sync process. After that date you will need FTM 2017. If you purchase 2014.1 before then you will be entitled to a free upgrade to 2017
Process
Download and install a copy of FTM
Synchronise your Ancestry Family Tree with FTM following the prompts given by the app
Wait while FTM downloads photos from FTM (2,000 images took approx 15 minutes for me)
Verify that images are appearing correctly in FTM
Identify the folder location in which photos have been stored by FTM. By default (and non changeable) FTM uses the location
Windows
<My Documents>\Software MacKiev\Family Tree Maker\<Ancestry Tree Name>
Copy the folders and files from that subdirectory to your TNG instance's "photos" folder on your NAS device.
In TNG Admin got to Setup > Configuration > Import Settings and locate the field "Local Photo Path(s)"
Enter the path to your NAS device folder where the photos are located. Note, this path does not use UNC path names. If you have mapped a path to the web server folder then all you need is the drive letter designation and the folder path. In my case this is:
T:\genealogy\photos
where "T:" is mapped to "\\<nas name\web\"
In TNG Admin go to Import/Export > GEDCOM import and navigate to the location of your GEDCOM file
Click Add New Tree and follow the prompts
Check the "Import media if present" option
Press Import Data and wait while the import takes place
