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SDGW Basic Questions


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All - I am toying with the idea of buying the SDGW CD. Does anyone know if it is possible to;

1. Enter a date (say 21st Aug 1915) and get the software to list ALL the men who died on that date?

2. If it does do 1. above, is it delivered in a format that can be cut-and-pasted into an excel spreadsheet and sorted?

3. Can it do 1. above AND filter by unit. i.e. can it show me all KIA fore say 9th Bn Sherwood Foresters on 21st Aug 1915?

I need this functionality as I am researching casualty figures for certain battles on certain dates.

Apologies if these are dumb questions. The website on SDGW are not clear on this and I need to know before I stump up the money. ......Thanks in anticipation.... MG

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Take out an Ancestry subscripton. SDGW is available on there, and the info can be cut and pasted

Neil

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Martin

It's possible that your local history library will have a copy of SDGW. Worth going to have a play before coughing up the money for your own copy.

John

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Another point to consider when puchasing something this expensive - will it run on your operating system? If you've got XP (or earlier) you're OK, but Vista & Windows 7 makes it as useful as a frisbee or beer coaster. However there is a thread in "About This Website" that gives suggestions to a "fix". I tried it and it worked.

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Chris Neil John

Many thanks for your prompt responses. The expense is not the issue. It costs what it costs but I don't want to pay for anything that doesn't do what I need. (if that make sense)

Neil - I do have Ancestry.co.uk... but I don't think it works in the way I want it to. I need large chunks of info (casulaties for separate Bns) each result for a separate individual on a separate line that I can cut out and paste. My experiences with Ancestry are not great. It is extremely cumbersome for anyone researching more than one person at a time and I have to drill into every separate result to see if it is not a wildcard. I have a little experience of this as I have built a database of 1,500 men in one Regiment and it was a painstaking long process to say the least. ... any thoughts? Unless of course it is user error.....

Q. If the SDGW does 1 and 3 of my original question, how do people lift the info?.. is it not possible to highlight and then copy and paste? Or do we have to manually transcribe the info?

Thanks MG

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Another point to consider when puchasing something this expensive - will it run on your operating system? If you've got XP (or earlier) you're OK, but Vista & Windows 7 makes it as useful as a frisbee or beer coaster. However there is a thread in "About This Website" that gives suggestions to a "fix". I tried it and it worked.

Les. Good point. I have 2 computers - one with Vista and one with Windows 7. Both are SOny Vaios which also (I think) adds to the problems. Possibly the worst combination of computer and software. I had similar problems with the Trench Map CD which was designed for 32 bit computers which went out with the Ark. Or that should be Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrk. It never worked despite attempts at doing the workaround. Complete waste of money for anyone in the 21st century.

Drat. Looks like hard copies.

Q. Does anyone know if the Hard copies of SDGW segregate men by Bns? i.e. if I looked at say the Sherwood Foresters does it show which Bn they were in when they died? I only have the hard copy for the Cavalry and ist does segregate the Life Guards into 1st LG and 2nd LG, similarly KIng Edward's Horse is segregated into 2, but the Scottish Horse is consolidated - the 1st/1st, the 1st/2nd and the 1st/3rd are in one mass which is not very helpful. No annotation as to which Bn the men fought in.

MG

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  • Admin

An alternative is 'Geoffs unobfuscated Search Engine' which gives greater functionality to the CWGC database

1. Yes

2. Yes - can cut and paste results into a WP/ email program

3. Yes - where Bn is listed on database

http://www.hut-six.co.uk/cgi-bin/search1421.php

If money is no object sure the worthwhile charity Geoff suppports will appreciate itwhistle.png

No connection - just a huge fan and grateful for all the hours I've saved, might be worth giving it a try before you spend out especially if you subscribe to Ancestry I find the combination more than adequate

Ken

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Q. Does anyone know if the Hard copies of SDGW segregate men by Bns? i.e. if I looked at say the Sherwood Foresters does it show which Bn they were in when they died? I only have the hard copy for the Cavalry and ist does segregate the Life Guards into 1st LG and 2nd LG, similarly KIng Edward's Horse is segregated into 2, but the Scottish Horse is consolidated - the 1st/1st, the 1st/2nd and the 1st/3rd are in one mass which is not very helpful. No annotation as to which Bn the men fought in.

MG

Yes the men in the hard copy are listed by Bn.

I have disk and hard copy SDGW but I rely on Geoff's search engine far more.

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Dear All - thanks for the valuable feedback. Looks like Geoff's website is the place to go. To be sure, can I just search by Bn (i.e. with no individual's name in the name box?) MG

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Why don't you buy a CWGC download from Maidenhead for just every Sherwood Forester and you would get all their data as you see in a normal search? It comes as a spreadsheet per modern country,

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Why don't you buy a CWGC download from Maidenhead for just every Sherwood Forester and you would get all their data as you see in a normal search? It comes as a spreadsheet per modern country,

How do I do that. I have put in multuple requests to CWGC with little response.....am I missing something? MG

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You don't need to do that, the info is easily accessible on Geoff's search engine, with the benefit that you don't need to trawl through 11722 names, you can pick and choose any search you want.

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I found Ancestry not helpful when I tried it to list men of a certain unit between 2 dates. It doesn't seem to be configured for that sort of search (unless I missed something). Luckily the local library have the 'real' disk and that did just what I wanted.

Bernard

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