Genealogy Chat

Hi - dont give up!
In 20 or 30 Hot 'matches - Ive found at least ONE connection! It makes it all worth while. Keep persisting is all I can say.
chris

I might be thick and this may not be the right board but you all keep talking about uploading gredcom and I haven't a clue what that means. Should I be doing this too and will it help my Genes searches? Can someone explain, please.
Thanks
Glen

Why not just enter a "?" instead of "unknown". I don't know if it will definitely work, but I have not had any hot matches as ?. It also saves on typing !! Just a thought.

Miss Marple,

The removing lines tip is useful, unfortunately I don't have my tree stored as gedcom files in my own records so I cant do that, though it is a good tip for others to follow.

I also have no objection to other people contacting me with long shots if they think it may match one of mine. I do tend to reply, and agree it can be frustrating to be `ignored' and only polite to reply even if its a negative, but I have also let my membership lapse from time to time, and when not a subscriber, while you can receive messages, you cant respond.

I definitely think the way forward is to have the facility to set up some individual filters on ones own hot match box. Then those who are happy to receive masses of slight matches still would, and those who wanted only very specific ranges of matches could filter their box according to their own preferences.

I also think the specific glitch which makes matches where there are no common factors could and should be sorted. Maybe these need to be sent back to administration as queries so that can be done?

Pamela

It is true that people do reappear as contacts once they upload a new gedcom. Even the addition of one extra name to their tree (a name that happens to be on yours) shows them as a new contact.

I agree it can be frustrating to have to trawl through pages and pages of not so hot matches, but as other people have said, it is worth it when you find that one that brings a brick wall tumbling down. In the four years I have been a member here, I have had eight like this; three of them have led to discoveries that I know I would definitely not have made otherwise due to my original data being incorrect. I'm taliking about three main branches and over a hundred people here.

By the same token, I have been a good Hot Match for a few others and have been able to advance their research considerably.

As for "matches" being born in different parts of the country, or even different countries, it is important to remember that many people who enter a relation onto their tree will not know exactly where they were born. Someone in Australia may only know that a great, great grandfather was born in England; not specifically where in England.

I have one contact who enters the exact address where he knows it. This means his "James Green , born 1857, at 225 Chorley Rd, Deepdale, Preston" will not be an exact match for "James Green, 1857, Deepdale" or "James Green, 1857, Preston."

We forget as well that we usually know our own "neck of the woods" in detail. People from other regions do not. "Deepdale" means nothing to them; "Preston" might. If our family has remained in a certain area - an area where we still live and know intimately - we may be very specific about locations and add them to our tree. others who don't have that detailed knowledge will not. This means that many potential matches could be lost if the location field is not widened.

Similarly, if one branch of a family relocated to another part of the country, their descendants (having not been thorough or through not having access to census data) may assume that their family has always lived in that region. The great great granddaughter of Ellis Green, born 1853, who moved down to Stafford, may not know he was originally from Preston. Therefore, there would be no match with Ellis Green, born 1853, Deepdale, Preston. Another valuable connection not picked up on.

I have found that by restricting the names on my GR tree to the branch (es) I am currently working on, I am ablt to greatly rduce the number of Hot Matches I get. I currently only get between 5 and 10 each time.

When I move on to a new branch, I will remove these people and upload a new gedcom containing names in branch I have moved on to.

Try it. It works!

Amanda

Amen to all of the above!
BUT my pet hate are those who find Esther A Fairy in the 1881 census aged 1 and cannot be bothered looking up Free BMD to check the date of registration of the birth which was actually Dec Q 1879.
Surely if you want correct info and are hoping to get a baptism it is important to at least get registration if not the Cert?

Also if you know a 2nd forename or initial put it in the first line of the forename not the middle name line!

And please check Trying to Find regularly!
We colonials have done the backward research we're dying to meet living rellies! Over 5 years with GR and no luck yet altho I have made contact with a few through other sites!
Regards
Marlene
Sweltering in the South Pacific

Point taken,I'm still in the honeymoon phase!!!
I did get rather a lot of matches for a John Green and he was just married to a cousin so I'm not really following that line so I do understand the frustration.
Good luck anyway.

What is annoying is when you get a hot match with a really unusual name that must be a match and the person you contact doesn't reply...

Teddy,

There is no control on what people put on their sites, and I dont think anyone is asking for this, nor if people want to ignore the hot matches produced for them, but there is surely a possible means of controlling what is produced as hot matches by altering the sorting criteria, which are under administrative control.. Surely it is possible to instruct the match system to ignore entries reading `unknown' and 'error' and blanks and any other similar meaningless matches.

It would also be good if individuals could custom filter their own hot matches by being able to set in instructions like `don't show me matches with `XYZ' if they want to. This wouldn't change anything for those who are happy with the system, but would give people who want it the opportunity of a bit more control over what information they receive.

Pamela

Apart from same name and birth date, and unknowns, there is also the Errors, When you have made a mistake and put error in as you cant remove name without removing the chain.

I have had many with Error on.

Thanks for all the feedback, glad it isnt just me and other people have the same problems. It seems to me there could be some simple system solutions to these problems.
1) there is clearly a glytch with throws up complete mismatches which needs fixing.

2) It would be good if there was a way to save favourite hot matches separately from the new ones, and

3) some way of permanently tagging the deleted ones so they don't keep coming back into your hot match list afterwards.

Is this too much to hope for do yo think?

Pamela

The suggestion that a member uploading a new gedcom triggering a new set of matches, sound plausible, when you think of it. You never know, the new file might have a real match in it.

In answer to the question re discarding for good, no you can't. All you can do is to split matches into two categories. Current Hot Matches and Ignored Hot Matches.

Lesley/Suzanne

Don't give up hope yet. It took me just over 2 years to get a fantastic hot match. This person provided me with a newspaper clipping of my great grandad (with photo) and his obituary in WW1. The first time I have had anything on my own ancestors although I have had good links with people researching siblings.

I would happily wade through thousands of hot matches to get another link like that. As others have said some people don't know where an ancestor was born and others have an educated guess. I get countless Lloyds born in Wales where as my lot are from Shropshire.

I get hot matches where nothing matches at all, years, names and countries of birth all different and still thay are classed as 'hot matches'

yep its a tuf 1 and irritating however I have found great matches and contacts through hot matches so am happy to put up with it...despite being matched with myself and born on the other side of the world lol
On a serious note some places of birth may well be a guess and turn out to be a match. Who knows?
I for 1 have a reli who could of been born in England or Ireland so would want matches from both locations.
By the way is there any way to get rid of the dicarded matches for good once in the discarded list?

My problem is the hot matches given to me every time someone has an 'unknown' I have 'unknowns' in mine further back as does probably everyone. But I am not related to everyone elses 'unknowns', nor they to mine. Does anyone else get this problem. I suspect perhaps I should not have put 'unknown' where I don't know - if anyone can make sense of this, well done. I also get loads of repeats, including 'unknown' repeats - I think I'll just get a nice gin and tonic now, and go and find a 'happy place' ............
Eileen

I think it is every time someone uploads a modified Gedcom they appear as a new contact. One of my matches appears three time with differing numbers of matches.

I've just deleted 35 pages of matches. I hope that if one of them shows up as having two people common to my tree I will take a look.

I have looked through a similar number of matches before and found I had 600+ William/Elizabeth Smith and Margaret Brown born anywhere but where mine came from.

I still have half a page of matches who are definate relations. (Luckily most of my lot had unusual surnames)

Peter,

Yes I do but still they come back. I think every time someone modifies their family by adding or editing something the files go into the new records pot, and then all the old previously discarded hot matches come back as new ones and have to be discarded again. I even get as new contacts people I have been in touch with for ages that are not new at all and already on my list as well

Pamela

Pamela,

I don't have the problem you describe and once discarded, that member stays discarded unless I switch it back to current matches. Future HotMatch updates don't bring the member back to current.

When you discard a match are you saving the result by clicking on the "Discard Selection" link?

Peter,

I do find them useful that is what is so irritating, having to waste time sifting out irrelevant ones time after time. And yes there are generally completely incomprehensible ones, not occasionally.

Maybe I dont know how to operate the system successfully, but I can assure you that after I have deleted a match, there it is back again next time the hot match cycle is run, sitting there with a new label against it needing to be deleted all over again.

I would just like to maybe save the relevant ones to a separate folder, and have the discards discarded permanently. I don't think that is a too much to wish for or that it should be too complicated to achieve.

Pamela