Since the beginnings GEDCOM X, we’ve been very interested in making the project practical and useful to developers. To that end, we’ve been working hard over the last year to provide libraries and SDKs for GEDCOM X on various platforms and languages. Today, I’d like to introduce you to three of them.

All three of the SDKs being introduced here are made freely available via Apache II license.

Java SDK

Java is the primary development language here at FamilySearch, so the GEDCOM X Java SDK has always been maintained and developed along with the GEDCOM X Specification Set. So the GEDCOM X Java SDK serves as the official reference implementation for GEDCOM X.

The GEDCOM X Java SDK provides libraries for reading and writing GEDCOM X XML, GEDCOM X JSON, and the GEDCOM X File Format. The Java SDK also provides a client library that can be used to read and write genealogical data to a server that conforms to the GEDCOM X RS specification. This means that not only will the Java SDK work with the FamilySearch API, but it will also work with any genealogical data servers that conform to the RS specification.

For more information about how to use the GEDCOM X Java SDK, see the project README.

C# SDK

The GEDCOM X C# SDK has been developed for the .NET platform. The C# SDK was developed from scratch as a port of the GEDCOM X Java SDK, closely following its project structure and functionality, but in conformance to general best practices and style guidelines established by the C# community.

Like the Java SDK, the GEDCOM X C# SDK provides libraries for reading and writing GEDCOM X XML, GEDCOM X JSON, and the GEDCOM X File Format. The C# SDK also provides a client library that can be used to read and write genealogical data to a server that conforms to the GEDCOM X RS specification.

For more information about how to use the GEDCOM X C# SDK, see the project README.

PHP SDK

The GEDCOM X PHP SDK has been developed for the PHP development community. Like the Java SDK and the C# SDK, the GEDCOM X PHP SDK provides libraries for reading and writing GEDCOM X XML, GEDCOM X JSON, and the GEDCOM X File Format. The PHP SDK also provides a client library that can be used to read and write genealogical data to a server that conforms to the GEDCOM X RS specification.

For more information about how to use the GEDCOM X PHP SDK, see the project README.