RootsTech2020 - Day 4

The fourth day of RootsTech was another great day of learning and networking. My first class this morning was Practical Tools for Family Storytellers. This class walked you through the various steps in recording your family information and getting it together in a format that can be shared with the family.

The first step that they talked about was collecting oral histories. The most important thing to do is to just get started. Do it in small bits, don't overwhelm the person with lots of questions - this isn't the Spanish Inquisition. Make it enjoyable for them and let them share their memories. Ask questions that elicit feeling and follow up with questions to bring out the details. Avoid yes/no questions and questions that can be answered with one word.

They also discussed tools to make writing easier. Look for tools that enable idea banking, brainstorming, mind mapping, or timeline development. Idea banking is collecting your ideas as you have them. This is like a series of post-it notes that act as reminders of your ideas later on. Brainstorming should be a spontaneous thing. Write down ideas and follow that train of thought without taking the time to edit. Mind mapping is a visual representation of your thoughts showing interconnections and relationships of ideas by connecting them with lines. You start with your main idea and begin to build branches with related ideas. Timelines allow you to organize your ideas in a chronological order so you can see where gaps may exits that need to be followed up.  Each of these processes can help you organize your thoughts. Some examples of tools they discussed include WiseMapping, MindMeister, MindMup, Coggle, and Scapple. There are also several timeline applications that can help you organize your ideas. These include Twile, the Timeline on FamilySearch, and OurTimelines. The OurTimelines webpage provides historical context and events. You can also make your own timelines with Preceden and Aeon:Timeline2.

Once you get your ideas together you need to organize them. They suggested using Trello and Scrivener to help organize. Scrivener helps organize your ideas, maintains versioning of the documents, collects research notes and the report all in one dashboard, and links to other applications including Aeon Timeline and Scapple.

Now you can start writing. They suggested Blurb Book Wright and Kindle Create since they format the pages into print styles for books. Once you start writing you may need help editing your stories. Websites such as Grammarly, Pro Writing Aid, Ginger Software, and Hemmingway Editor can help you with this process. Some of these are apps which integrate into your Chrome browser and check your writing as you do it. You also need to keep on task by creating to do lists. ToDoIst is one way to do this.

Now that you have laid out the pages and created the stories you are ready for printing. Printing your stories can be done at home on your own printer, at an office supply store, or at a printer. You can also print it online at sites such as Lulu or Amazon Prints. So, what are you waiting for? Just start and see where the story goes.

The second class this morning was Family History Activities in Minutes. The activities in this class focused on the FamilyTree and Memories apps from FamilySearch. These apps have a variety of activities that can be done in 5 to 10 minutes. The FamilyTree app has a menu item "Family History Activities" with a variety of interactive activities based on the information for your ancestors in the Family Tree. One activity, Picture My Heritage, provides an ethnic breakdown based on your tree and allows you to take a selfie with the clothes of your country of choice. You can also create a fan chart of your family from the pedigree view on your phone. Go to settings and turn on the Fan Chart function. Once you see the fan chart go to the bottom of the page and click on the green slider bar button to change the way the fan chart looks. Another activity is Relatives Around Me. This can be found under the pull down menu. It searches for others who have the app turned on and lists their relationship to you based on the FamilyTree. These apps can help introduce family history in a fun way that is not intimidating.

The rest of the day was spent in the Expo Hall talking to the various vendors. I hope to have a series of blogs in the next couple weeks discussing the companies that I talked to. Many of them have some extraordinary ideas that could change the way we look at family history.

Now that RootsTech is over for another year (unless you're going to London on November 5-6) I will be trying out the new ideas that I have learned. Many of the ideas are fun while others are more technical or business related. That is what is so great about RootsTech, there are classes for everyone of all experience levels and interests. If you are interested in attending future RootsTech events remember that the 2021 conference is scheduled for February 3-6, 2021 in Salt Lake City. Begin making your plans now.

Ancestral Quest Releases Major Upgrade ver. 15

Ancestral Quest (AQ) has been my go to genealogy software for many years. Their software originated from PAF and has always maintained a close connection to FamilySearch. Their latest update provides more great enhancements.

TreeTips: AQ has always been able to search other genealogy websites for hints. Previous versions have even allowed you to write your own code to search your favorite websites. But now it searches as you view your ancestor's name and tells you when hints have been found for MyHeritage, FamilySearch and FindMyPast. That's a potential 10 billion records! Each of their icons show up next to your ancestor's name indicating new hints have been found.

TreeTips Provides Helpful Hints

Memories Manager: FamilySearch has a gallery where people can upload their memories (photos, documents, audio clips, etc.) for their ancestors. AQ has a scrapbook where you can link your records to your ancestors. Now, with Memories Manager, you can sync these records between your FamilySearch account and AQ. You can even download and link records that others have uploaded. You are able to see the records from FamilySearch and AQ side-by-side and sync those files between the two.

Memories Manager

Enhanced Child View and Pedigree View: This new upgrade allows you to see even more information in the standard views. The Child View provides symbols to the left of the names that indicate if the person was married, had children, or doesn't have any information. The Pedigree View now provides up to 7 generations on the same screen. Previously the default view was 5 generations.

Enhanced Child View

Enganced Pedigree View - 6 Generations Shown

The enhancements provided in AQ15 make your research quicker by finding more hints and making syncing between FamilySearch and your files easier. For more information visit AQ's website and read more about the updates.

FamilySearch Apps - Kinpoint

I hope everyone has had a great weekend. I have been working with our local Family History Consultants trying to bring them up to speed on all of the information that I learned at RootsTech. That could take a few weeks since there was so much to learn there. I am continuing to research the many apps that are available on FamilySearch and this time I decided to write about Kinpoint.

Kinpoint has a free version and a paid version and has been described as a "fan chart on steroids" by some. The site searches the information from FamilySearch, providing you some clues on what to search for next and where you have missing information. When you log in it starts the display with you and then moves out from there. However, you can change that by double clicking on someone in your chart or by searching for a specific ancestor by name or PID# from FamilySearch.

There are several views that you can use to display the information from your tree. The Explore View shows a fan chart of your family. The free version displays a color coded fan chart which helps you see family relationships with grey areas indicating where there is missing information. For me, all of the grey areas indicated missing marriage information.

Exlpore View for Kinpoint (5 generations)

The paid version also gives you hints on problems, sources and matches. Problems are things such as timeline discrepancies, potential duplicates, etc, which you can clean up. Sources mark those items which have not been verified by an attached source. And the Matches information tells you how many record hints are available on FamilySearch for you to add to your research. The view I have above shows 5 generations however you can zoom to between 3 and 8 generations in a view or you can switch to a descendants view with 3 generations. The zoom, ancestral view, and descendant view controls are located in the upper left corner of the fan chart frame.

The left side of the screen shows the vital information for the selected person. There are also icons to bookmark, refresh, and edit the person in FamilySearch under the person's name. The right side area displays a summary of information from the chart, including countries of origin, family size, age, work and military service. Most of the items on the right, except the country of origin, are only available in the paid version.

The Family View shows a detailed view of three generations, the selected person and their spouse, their children, and the selected person's parents and siblings. This view includes the photographs from each person's Memories on FamilySearch. In this view you can select any of the listed people and see their details. The yellow dots below the person's name indicate items which need your attention. Also, if you notice the blue box in the upper right corner, you can add people directly to FamilySearch from this screen. When you click on the blue box that says Add Person the screen changes to ask where you want to add the person. You can add siblings, step siblings, spouses, parents, children, etc. Once you select where in the family the new person goes, the site walks you through adding the information. For some people, this might be a more understandable way to add family to their FamilyTree.

Family View for Kinpoint

The third screen view is the Memories View. This screen pulls all of the items that are attached to the person's Memories tab on FamilySearch. You can easily move between people and see what information has been attached to their Memories tab. Kinpoint even indicates how many items you expect to see before you visit the page. Selecting any of the photographs or documents results in a full screen view of that item.

Memories View for Kinpoint

The fourth screen view from Kinpoint is the Timeline View. This view provides a timeline, including important events in the person's life, along the right side of the screen. Events such as birth, marriage and death of members of the family are included in the timeline. Additionally, an interactive map is displayed with icons indicating each event. Icons are color coded for sex and there are different icons for each type of event.

Timeline View for Kinpoint

So, what do I think of this site? The basic free version provides you another way to visualize your research and indicates where you need to focus your research. It also allows you to add new family members and edit existing people in FamilySearch. The paid version ($4.99/month or $49.90/year) provides even more functionality by indicating where duplicates may exist, where sources are available, and a more detailed list of problems with the information in your tree. This interface may be easier for some people to understand and could easily replace their FamilySearch interface. One important note: the paid version can be accessed for free at your local Family History Center. All-in-all, I would recommend trying it out to see how it could help you improve your research.

I hope everyone has a good week and I will try to return soon with my next post.