What Has Changed on the FamilySearch Family Tree? Part One

At RootsTech 2019, I attended two presentations by Ron Tanner, the Director of Product Management at FamilySearch. He outlined a number of recent changes to the FamilySearch.org website and particularly to the Family Tree. I decided to dig into the website and see some of the changes for myself and, of course, write about them. I am sure I will miss some and find some older changes that I just didn't know about before writing. Because I use the Family Tree and the rest of the website almost daily if I haven't seen something, you might not have seen it also. So bear with me if I am being a slow observer. Also, this exploration effort will probably take a while so there will be a series.

Some of the new features may only be visible to those users who are members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Since I am a registered user I tried turning off the link to LDS Resources in the settings menu to see what happened. But I found that it still presented everything the same except features having to do with the Temples were not visible. If you are not a member, just bear in mind that some of the things I talk about may not be visible.

One thing I can say about the subject of changes to the FamilySearch.org website is that many of the changes are unannounced and not obvious. There is a FamilySearch blog page about "What's New at FamilySearch" but those articles don't list everything. So expect some digging and some old and new features.

https://www.familysearch.org/blog/en/category/about-familysearch/whats-new-at-familysearch/

Here it goes... (in no particular order)

New Discovery Experiences

These featured experiences are based on the Family Discovery Center activities located in certain Family History Centers including a new one in Lehi, Utah and the one at the main Family History Library in Salt Lake City, Utah. Here is a screenshot from the website.

https://www.familysearch.org/discovery/

If you register and sign in, the Family History Activities are personalized to show your own family history. Presently, when you do sign in, your personalized startup page has a link to the activities. You may wish to try out each one.

New Temple and Family History Consultant Training

https://www.familysearch.org/ask/planner/calling

This page has actually been online for a while. It is part of the Helper Resources that are on the page renamed from the Consultant Planner. That page has also been redone. Here is a screenshot of the new Helper Resources page:

https://www.familysearch.org/help/helper

This page is still accessed from a pull-down menu link on the Help Center in the far upper right-hand side of each page. What happened to the fan chart? It was incorporated into the fan chart view on every detail page for the Family Tree. The fan chart can also be extended out to seven generations.

The view options are in the box on the upper left.

Tune in again for more of the new features of the FamilySearch.org website.