Bob, It looks like a starting place might be he
http://msdn.microsoft.com/msdnmag/is...4/05/XMLFiles/
It (apparently) provides a means of converting gedcom files to XML and that
can definitely be a start toward moving them into Excel.

I'm not sure how much it will help, or if it could read your gedcom files.
I did a little reading and it appears that the gedcom file format 'standard'
is not really a standard, and so the software you're using may have added
extensions to the fields, or types of data stored in the file, that have been
provided by whatever software package you're using to work with them now.

Google also reveals several possible importing applications designed to read
them directly into Excel (search for "gedcom+excel"). Here is a link to just
one of the possible solutions that revealed:
http://erosenbaum.netfirms.com/webtoexcel.shtml

"Bob" wrote:

does anyone know how to read gedcom files into exceland insert fomulae so
that i can make lists directly from my ancestor files in any order I want. ie
a list of the names in the first column, dates of birth in the second column
and fathers name in the third column
--
Thanks Bob