Organize Your Research Using Your Data Management Program- Legacy, Roots Magic,

Ancestral Quest

Marilyn Thomsen July 25, 2012

All Data Management Programs are designed to help organize all the pieces of information that bring a family together. They have important tools that are not part of new.familysearch/FamilyTree.

Some tools are:

– To Do List/ research Log – Notes/Sources with your analysis that can be shared– Documents linked to all pertinent people – Organizes and labels your digital documents– Personal contact information for living people– Index of people in your database, living and dead– Links to maps– Timelines– DNA information storage– Organizes temple work and easily adds information to and

from FamilySearch.

• OBJECTIVE: Students improve research skills by using additional tools in their data management program that help organize their research. By having organized, shareable, portable information, student’s research will not be lost and will be foundation on which the next generations of researchers can build.

Example marriage of Couey and Dempsey

Case example:

• The Coueys and the Dempseys– No marriage date for Elizabeth Couey and Eli

Dempsey.– Children were born in Floyd county, but did I

already look there?– Would research be filed in the Couey research log

or Dempsey research log?

Legacy, Ancestral Quest and Roots Magic let you put a ToDo results on multiple individuals

Now we can even do a general item.

• Checking indexes for all Coueys in the cemetery records or All Dempsey marriages in Floyd county lets us attach a attach a note to everyone in our data base---if their surname wasn’t in the Index you don’t have to go back.

• When we add new family members with the same surname, then “You weren’t there” is not in the new Research items. We will know to go back to our digital photo.

• We will have recorded the folder where we filed our images.

A filtered list can add by relationship or by name

Now we know these Coueys aren’t in the book.

Organizing digital documents

• Hyperlinks – Documents directory links don’t transfer when

sharing databases. • Create folders in your DOCUMENT section of

the computer.– For automatic backups.– Quicker organization

Refer to the folder and group of digital numbers created by

your camera.

Folders store many types of documents

Label folders in the folders

• Become consistent– CAPITAL Surname– Personal name– Record type– Location– Date

• BUSBY Cemeteries AL• BUSBY Charles Death Cert GA• BUSBY Wade Census 1850 GA

Computer programs can printout lists by repository

• By checking online you can determine is a film or book is at BYU and then print research TO-DO lists.

Find the film number in the library catalog

http://www.lib.byu.edu/sites/familyhistory/

Film Numbers Queryhttp://web.lib.byu.edu/cgi-bin/FHL/FamilyHistoryFilms.pl?filmnum=27323&query=SearchScreen clipping taken: 10/7/2009, 7:40 PM

Roots Magic example of printing a list

Roots Magic example of printed list

Sync with FamilySearch

• Each program allows you to import/export information.

• Legacy had a temple card tracking system• Legacy adds a source when you import

information

Webinars and Videos

Working with others

• A problem with a data management program is SILO storage. You have information, but you don’t share it with others. Create a system where you regularly upload and share information in an online tree. What if your not sure? Appeal to others to help verify.

• Ancestral Quest provides an online tree where family members can reserve an ancestor they are researching, and then update that information for others to see.

• GEDCOM are changing, but currently you cannot share the document links.