Answering the Questions from Sharing Record Hints and Sources: Part Three

At the start of the series, I listed a number of questions that are commonly posed by patrons as I volunteer at the Brigham Young University Family History Library and elsewhere. I am afraid I wandered pretty far from the subject of record hints and sources but ultimately, as all my topics are ultimately related, it might fit together. It might also be helpful to know that the answers to the questions are my own personal opinions.

Here are the next questions:

If I am concerned about changes made to the FamilySearch.org Family Tree, do I maintain a separate, personal family tree on another program?

Online family tree programs infrequently provide personal backup copies of your data. The websites are obviously backed up to their own servers. This is especially true of the FamilySearch.org Family Tree. But in the case of the Family Tree, if anyone changes the data in your portion of the Family Tree, then, the backup preserves the changes. However, many users are concerned about reversing the changes that are made to reflect their own personal data. Hence, the apparent necessity for a separate copy of a personal genealogical database.

The FamilySearch.org Family Tree already provides a detailed list of every change made to the data in the program. There is a link on every person or detail page showing every change back to the time when the data was first entered. In almost all cases, by showing the list of all the changes and clicking on the "Reference" link you can see exactly what was done in reverse any changes made.

This screenshot shows the first and most recent entry in the All Changes list and the arrows indicate the Reference and Show Relationship links. Essentially, all of the information needed to reverse this change is available right here in the program. However, if you only infrequently view the program you may not know whether or not the change is valid or invalid. Having your own program with your own version of the data does not necessarily mean that the information you have is correct and that the information added or changed on the Family Tree is incorrect. Your information may be incorrect. The information changed or added may be incorrect. Both your information and the information added or changed may be incorrect. The problem of a change may not be easily rectified by simply referring to your own inaccurate information. Whether or not you have your own separate copy on another program may simply mean you need to go out and do some research. From my perspective, in almost all cases, referring back to some previous copy of the data on a separate program is not needed or necessary.

By the way, very few people actually believe my explanation. I think the real issues involve the time and effort of maintaining a separate database apart from the Family Tree. The underlying issue of the changes in the Family Tree involves working with your relatives to develop a consensus concerning the content of the record. In other words, because of the unified nature of the Family Tree, you are essentially forced to collaborate with anyone else out there in the universe who is concerned about your particular entries. In some cases, this may be almost no one but in other cases, such as my own, there are likely thousands of people who are potentially in a position to make changes. It is an overly simplistic view of life and the Family Tree to assume that you do not have to deal with all of these relatives. Retreating back to your own personal and in many cases, unverified database on a separate program is a panacea, not the solution.

All that said, if you want to have your own personal database on any program either online or on your desktop that is your own personal decision to make. But I do strongly suggest that you reconsider imposing your own limited view of the reliability of your own database before imposing your opinions and that of your own traditions when new data is entered into the Family Tree.

Should I use an online program, such as Ancestry.com or one of the other partner programs or a separate desktop based program?

 Rather than the complicated explanation of the first question above, the answer to this question is extremely simple. The answer is: it depends. If you're comfortable working online is an online program if you're more comfortable working on a desktop program, use a desktop program. That's the answer. If you have a question about which program to use I would suggest, as I always do, referring to GenSoftReview.com for up-to-date review information on genealogical programs.

Here art the links to the original post with all of the questions listed and the subsequent posts with my answers.

http://rejoiceandbeexceedingglad.blogspot.com/2017/09/answering-questions-from-sharing-record.html
http://rejoiceandbeexceedingglad.blogspot.com/2017/09/sharing-record-hints-and-sources-part.html

Technology and Genealogy

https://www.familysearch.org/blog/en/technology-family-history-spiritual-work/?cid=email-MC_TFHC_0917_CTA1

Considering the number of people I talk to who complain about technology, Kathryn Grant's article "Even with Technology, Family History is "a Spiritual Work" is timely and right on the spot. This article brings to my mind a quote from 2 Nephi 25:23:

23 For we labor diligently to write, to persuade our children, and also our brethren, to believe in Christ, and to be reconciled to God; for we know that it is by grace that we are saved, after all we can do.

This particular scripture is usually applied to missionary work for the living, but I would expand it to apply to the missionary work we call family history or genealogy for that dead. My point is that we must "labor diligently" in whatever endeavor we undertake that involves our own personal salvation or that of others. Read the article and think about your own personal attitude towards technology.

Answering the Questions from Sharing Record Hints and Sources: Part Two

I recently posed a series of questions in a blog post entitled, " Sharing Record Hints and Sources." Some of the questions involved complex issues regarding the FamilySearch.org Family Tree. I was little bit surprised that I did not get any more comments or questions after posting such a long list. But if you've ever attended one of my classes, you will probably remember that I asked for questions at the beginning of each class. Not surprisingly, I get very very very few questions and the questions that I do get fall into narrow categories. So, because I get so few questions in my classes and as result of posting my blog, I decided to make up my own list of questions. So here we go.

Do I keep all my information in one or all of the four partner programs?

This particular question comes up quite frequently. You will recall, that FamilySearch.org has a number of "Partner Programs" that are either linked or associated with the Family Tree. Each of the three other Partner Programs also host individual family trees. One of the most important benefits of each of the four programs, including FamilySearch.org, is the fact that they provide automated record hints. These record hints are invaluable in doing research in the last 200 years or so of our history. The only way to get a benefit from all of these record hints is to have your family tree in each of the four programs.

However, the question that I posed asks whether or not we keep all of our information in all of the programs. Because presently there is no practical way to adequately share information between all of the four programs, unless you have a very small pedigree, maintaining all four programs would be an insurmountable problem. I do suggest putting a copy of your basic, verified family tree in each of the programs. This way you can take advantage of the record hints. I further suggest that you focus on your own personal research goals and not be driven by the huge number of record hints you are likely to receive. If you focus on your own research goals, you will probably be assisted by looking at those portions of your family tree on each of the four programs for record hints. That way, you can maintain those portions of your existing family information on all four programs without the overwhelming need to update those sections of your family tree that you are not presently working on.

If I choose to have four copies of my family tree, how do I keep the copies synchronized?

This is another fairly common question. Unfortunately, the answer is neither simple nor easy. Of course, you can manually update each of the four websites. However, this is a monumental waste of time. There are a number of options however each of the options involve some manual copying, editing or even correcting. Answering this issue also usually involves anticipating the next question in this series of questions. If you follow my suggestion in answer to the previous question, then the changes you need to make for "synchronization" should be quite limited.

To get started, I suggest that you choose one program, either one of the four websites or another desktop program, as your main information repository. This particular program should contain all of your information, sources, photos, memories, etc. Anticipating other questions which will be addressed in the future, it is my suggestion that you transfer all of your information to the FamilySearch.org Family Tree at some point, possibly sooner than later. I will expand on this particular statement in response to future questions.

From a practical standpoint, in addition to manual updates, some of the programs do share information. Presently, FamilySearch.org and Ancestry.com can be linked by those who are members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and who have an LDS account. Information can be shared between the two websites individual by individual. Some of us view our Ancestry.com family tree as a "backup" to the information we maintain in the FamilySearch.org Family Tree. There is also a way to bring sources from MyHeritage.com into the Family Tree. Recently, RootsMagic has expanded their program to synchronize between a RootsMagic database and a family tree on Ancestry.com. Additionally, both the RootsMagic and Ancestral Quest programs link to each of the four Partner Programs to show outstanding record hints in each program. Unfortunately, most of these methods of sharing information are still uncomfortably complicated.

It looks like in some cases, I will only be able to answer one or two questions at a time. Stay tuned.

Here is a link to the original post with all of the questions listed.

http://rejoiceandbeexceedingglad.blogspot.com/2017/09/sharing-record-hints-and-sources-part.html

USA vs. United States: Standardization?

When I was in high school, back before the war, there was a lot of discussion about converting from the "English System" of measurements to the metric system. My contemporaries and I thought that the metric system was harder to understand than the "foot, pound" units we were accustomed to. By the way, the United States is now the only industrialized country in the world that does not use the metric system as its predominant system of measurement. Most of the children now in school are taught to use the metric system. My introduction came when I lived outside of the United States for many years.

Now, what does this have to do with genealogy? Presently and for some time now, FamilySearch.org has implemented a system of "Standardization" for the dates and places in the Family Tree. More recently, FamilySearch started to mark the "non-standard" dates and places with red error icons.

As a result, my portion of the Family Tree program is now well decorated with red icons. However, how standard is the FamilySearch standard? You don't have to look very far to discover that it is not a standard outside of the FamilySearch.org website. Here is an example from Ancestry.com from the same family.

First of all, Ancestry.com accepts the entry of "Harrison County" and also "standardizes" its entries to "USA" instead of "United States." Granted, both entries in both programs are "messed up" and likely inaccurate. This example happens to come from a part of my own pedigree that has yet been researched fully and corrected. It is not too hard to find these examples because there are perhaps thousands of them (millions?).

In another example, rather than take sides in this "standardization" issue, programs such as RootsMagic provide a way to standardize on either "United States" or "USA" depending on personal preference. One effect of this issue is that every time I migrate a date or time from Ancestry.com to FamilySearch.org, the date and place are automatically marked as non-standard. All my entries in my family tree on Ancestry.com are "standardized" to "USA."

What about MyHeritage.com?

MyHeritage.com accepts both USA and United States and also accept "Co." for the county. By the way, I realize that Kentucky is misspelled. Actually, the entry in the Family Tree on FamilySearch.org for Thomas Hamilton is more than messed up. For example, look at the birthplace and the christening place.

It would seem to me that a missing standardized birthplace is pretty trivial when the birthplace is listed in Massachusetts and the Christening is shown as occurring in "Butterton Par.Ch, Hulme End, Staffs." However, FamilySearch does not mark christening dates and places as non-standard, even when they are probably impossible, such as being born in America and being christened in England. It could have happened by not likely in the 1700s. Of course, the example above of a birthdate in 1720 in "Kentuckey" is also impossible because Kentucky did not exist as a state until 1792 and the first settlement in what is now called Kentucky took place in 1774 at Fort Harrod, one year before Boonesboro.

It seems to me that "standardization" should go a little deeper than merely satisfying some engineering issues with search engines.

Comment: Will I now try to fix the mess with the Hamiltons in the Family Tree? Probably not for a while because I don't think that this line is even correct and I may just have to cut off the line and leave it out there for someone else to deal with.

A Records Preservation Mission Call

My wife and I have recently been called to serve as full-time missionaries in the Washington, D.C. North Mission of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints as record preservation specialists. We will serve for one year. We enter the Mission Training Center (MTC) on December 4, 2017.

As many of our friends and acquaintances know, we have both been serving as part-time Church Service missionaries for many years, first at the Mesa FamilySearch Library and then, most recently, at the Brigham Young University Family History Library on the campus. But since this mission is a full-time calling, we will have to spend whatever time is necessary to fulfill our callings and likely I will have to take an extended vacation from regular blogging.

Since we have been doing genealogical research for our own families and for those of many others, we feel this is an opportunity to contribute directly to the information available to genealogists and family historians around the world. Here is another link that explains what we will likely be doing.

FamilySearch Records Preservation Missionaries

Sharing Record Hints and Sources: Part One: An Overview

The reality of today's family history research for those who are members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is that FamilySearch.org involves partner programs with Ancestry.com, Findmypast.com, and MyHeritage.com, all of which, including FamilySearch, provide a constant stream of record hints. Many of these record hints translate directly into sources supporting events in the lives of our ancestors.

If you have a lot of ancestors and relatives in the United States going back generations, you will probably have hundreds of record hints from all four programs. Of course, this depends on whether or not you have a family tree in each of the four programs. Conceptually, having four different copies of your pedigree, i.e. family tree, in four different programs can seem to be overwhelming. The FamilySearch Family Tree creates another conceptual problem by being a shared family tree program where registered users can make changes to any of the entries. I have written about the subject many times recently and done YouTube videos for the BYU Family History Library YouTube Channel.

So there are several questions that come about because of this situation such as the following:

• Do I keep all my information in one or all of the four partner programs?
• If I choose to have four copies of my family tree, how do I keep the copies synchronized?
• If I am concerned about changes made to the FamilySearch.org Family Tree, do I maintain a separate, personal family tree on another program?
• Should I use an online program, such as Ancestry.com or one of the other partner programs or a separate desktop based program?
• How do I handle suggested record hints that are duplicates of existing record hints?
• Do I have all the record hints from all the programs to the FamilySearch.org Family Tree?
• How do I know whether or not a suggested record is actually valid?
• What if I find two record hints for the same person but they disagree?
• How do I handle an excessive number of record hints?
• What if I am getting conflicting opinions from different people concerning record hints, sources, and multiple family trees?
• Isn't adding record hints to people whose temple ordinances have already been done, really just busy work?
• How do I move sources from one of the online programs to another?
• Should I add sources from two different programs that are essentially the same source?
• If I spend my time adding record hints to existing people how will I ever have enough time to do research to add people to my family tree?
• What do I do with record hints to other user's family trees?
• How do I tell if a record hint actually refers to my ancestor?
• How many sources are enough?
• Should I subscribe to all four partner programs?

There are probably quite a few more questions similar to these that I have heard recently. You might notice that this is part one with series. What I intend to do is answer each of those questions. It might take a few blog posts to do so. So cheer up, I'll keep writing as fast as I can. If you can think of any other questions you would like to have added to the list, you can make comments to this post.

Update on the DescendancyExplorer

The DescendancyExplorer has now been running on my computer for approximately seven hours and as you can see above it has processed through 3501 records of the total of 13,422 records and has still yet to find one available ordinance. However, as I mentioned in my initial post on the subject, the search would take a long time. Unless you have spent as much time working on your portion of the Family Tree, and am certain that you will find more opportunities that are available in my family lines. So matter of fact, by doing some research and working through the merges, we have found hundreds of names of people who are not already in the Family Tree.

Note: I let the program continue to run until well into the evening and finally had to quit without finding any available ordinances. This is likely an affirmation of my efforts and those of my family and finding all of the available ordinances in our particular part of the Family Tree.