Natal Records Editor

Keep the birth data of the people you chart, with exact dates, times and places. The Natal Records Editor shows the Natal Records database in an editable grid of natal records: add a record, edit its fields, delete the records you no longer need, and save, answering any question about a birth time that fell in a daylight-saving change.

Add and Delete sit at the bottom left of the editor, and Save and Close at the bottom right. The editor's own menu bar carries a File menu (Save, Exit) and a Data menu (Import, Export).

There is no time-zone column: Compass works out each record's time zone from its latitude and longitude.

Your changes stay in the editor until you save. Saving writes the Natal Records database, which is shared with the sibling Rhythm Seven applications and read by the Natal Record row of the chart windows. Closing the editor with unsaved changes raises the Unsaved Changes prompt.

Open the Natal Records Editor

On macOS the Edit menu is in the menu bar at the top of the screen. To open the editor:

1. Open the Edit menu, as described in Open the Edit Menu.
2. Click Natal Records.

The Natal Records Editor opens with the saved natal records in its grid.

Add a Record

To add a new, empty record to the grid:

• Click Add at the bottom left of the editor.

A new row is appended to the grid and selected, with its Name cell open for typing. Pressing Tab in the last cell of the last row also adds a row and opens its first cell. A row with no name is not saved.

Edit a Record

Each record has seven fields: Name, Natal Date, Natal Time, Location Name, Latitude, Longitude and Height (ft). You click the row and then the cell, one single click each: coming from outside the grid, a first click only selects the row. To change a field:

1. Click the record's row in the grid to select it.
2. Click the row's Name, Natal Date, Natal Time, Location Name, Latitude, Longitude or Height (ft) cell to enter edit mode.
3. Type the new value: the name, the birth date into the cell's masked field in your system's short date format (its text is selected, so you can type over it), the birth time into the cell's masked field, the birthplace name, a latitude or longitude in decimal degrees, or a height above sea level in feet.
4. Press Tab to commit the value.

The cell shows the new value and the editor has unsaved changes; the value is kept once you save the editor. Changing a latitude or longitude updates the record's time zone.

Tab also moves to the next cell of the row, and from the last cell to the first cell of the next row. Press Enter instead to commit the value in place. To edit more cells of the same row, press Tab or click each cell in turn; the row stays in edit mode until you leave it.

Delete Natal Records

To remove records from the grid:

1. Click the row of the record to delete.
2. Click Delete at the bottom left of the editor.
3. Confirm the deletion in the Confirmation Request prompt, as described in Confirm a Yes/No Prompt.

tip

To delete several records at once, Shift-click or Cmd-click (Ctrl-click on Windows) more rows to extend the selection before you click Delete.

The prompt asks "Delete the selected record?", in the plural when several rows are selected. Once you confirm, the selected rows leave the grid and the next row is selected; the deletion is kept once you save the editor. Declining the prompt, as described in Decline a Yes/No Prompt, keeps the rows.

From the keyboard, pressing Delete or Backspace on the grid deletes the selected rows after the same confirmation. The keys delete rows only when pressed on the grid itself, not inside a cell you are editing.

Time Warning Signs

A warning sign (⚠) follows a record's Natal Time when the time falls where the clocks changed for daylight saving. Saving then asks about the time before the record is written:

Case	Meaning	When You Save
Ambiguous time	The time occurred twice, because the clocks were set back.	The Ambiguous Time Dialog asks which occurrence the record means.
Nonexistent time	The time never occurred, because the clocks went forward.	The Nonexistent Time prompt, described in Save a Record Whose Time Never Occurred, names the shifted time the record will be treated as and asks you to confirm keeping the time as typed.

Save Natal Records

To write the editor's records to the Natal Records database:

1. Click File on the editor's menu bar.
2. Click Save.

The Save button at the bottom right of the editor, and Cmd+S (Ctrl+S on Windows), save the same way. The named natal records are saved, sorted, to the database shared with the sibling Rhythm Seven applications, and Save is grayed until the next change. A record with no name is not saved.

A named record whose birth time occurred twice raises the Ambiguous Time Dialog first. A named record whose birth time never occurred raises the Nonexistent Time prompt, described in the next section.

Save a Record Whose Time Never Occurred

When a named record's Natal Time carries the warning sign for a time that never occurred, saving asks you to confirm that time. To save the records and keep the time:

1. Click File on the editor's menu bar.
2. Click Save.
3. Confirm keeping the time in the Nonexistent Time prompt, as described in Confirm a Yes/No Prompt.

The Nonexistent Time prompt names the hour the clocks skipped and the shifted time the record will be treated as. Once you confirm, the time is kept as typed and the records are saved. Declining the prompt, as described in Decline a Yes/No Prompt, stops the save and selects the record so you can correct its time.

Close the Natal Records Editor

You can close the editor from File → Exit, from the Close button at the bottom right of the editor, or from its title-bar close button. When the editor has unsaved changes, it raises the Unsaved Changes prompt first. Text you have typed into a cell but not yet committed is committed before the prompt appears.

Close the Editor with No Unsaved Changes

To close the editor when there is nothing to save:

1. Click File on the editor's menu bar.
2. Click Exit.

The editor window closes.

Save Changes as You Close

To close the editor and keep the changes made in it:

1. Click File on the editor's menu bar.
2. Click Exit.
3. Choose to save the changes, as described in Save Changes from the Unsaved Changes Prompt.

The changes are saved to the shared database and the editor closes. If the save does not complete, the editor stays open.

Discard Changes as You Close

To close the editor without keeping the changes made since the last save:

1. Click File on the editor's menu bar.
2. Click Exit.
3. Choose to discard the changes, as described in Discard Changes from the Unsaved Changes Prompt.

The editor closes and the database keeps its last saved natal records.

Cancel the Close

To back out of closing the editor after it asks about its unsaved changes:

1. Click File on the editor's menu bar.
2. Click Exit.
3. Cancel the close, as described in Cancel Closing from the Unsaved Changes Prompt.

The editor stays open with its unsaved changes in place, and nothing is saved.

Natal Records Grid

The grid lists one natal record per row, in seven fixed columns. The columns cannot be sorted.

Column	Description
Name	The record's name, which identifies it. A record with no name is skipped when the editor is saved or exported.
Natal Date	The date of birth, shown in your system's short date format.
Natal Time	The local time of birth. A warning sign (⚠) follows the time when it falls in a daylight-saving hour that occurred twice or never occurred, as described under Time Warning Signs above.
Location Name	A descriptive name for the birthplace. It does not affect the coordinates.
Latitude	Birthplace latitude in decimal degrees, from -90 (south) to +90 (north). Changing it updates the record's time zone.
Longitude	Birthplace longitude in decimal degrees, from -180 (west) to +180 (east). Changing it updates the record's time zone.
Height (ft)	Birthplace elevation above sea level, in feet. It does not affect the time zone.

Editor Menus

The editor's menu bar, inside the editor window, carries two menus of its own.

File Menu

The File menu saves the editor and closes it.

Command	Description
Save	Saves the editor's records to the Natal Records database, as described in Save Natal Records above.
Exit	Closes the editor, asking first about any unsaved changes.

Data Menu

The Data menu moves natal records in and out as CSV files.

Command	Description	Details
Import	Adds the records in a CSV file to the grid.	Import Natal Records
Export	Writes the grid's named records to a CSV file.	Export Natal Records

Related Topics

• Import Natal Records: add the records in a CSV file to the grid.
• Export Natal Records: write the named records to a CSV file.
• Ambiguous Time Dialog: choose which occurrence of a repeated birth time a record means.
• Natal Chart Configuration: the Natal Record row that offers these records to a chart.
• Locations Editor: keep the places you cast charts for, and answer the confirmation prompts and messages both editors show.
• Menu Bar: the Edit menu that opens the editor.