GEDCOM 101 - What is a GEDCOM and How Do I Use It?

GEDCOM 101 - What is a GEDCOM and How Do I Use It?:

"One of the biggest advantages to using the Internet for genealogy research is the ability it provides to exchange information with other researchers. One of the most common methods used for this information exchange is the GEDCOM, an acronym for GEnealogical Data COMmunication. In simple terms it is a method of formatting your family tree data into a text file which can be easily read and converted by any genealogy software program.

The GEDCOM specification was originally developed in 1985 and is owned and managed by the Family History Department of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. The current version of the GEDCOM specification is 5.5 (as of November 1, 2000) but the LDS Church will soon be releasing version 6.0XML."

This link points to several very well written pages about GEDCOM. If you want to learn more about this topic I think you will find that this is a good place to start.