This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archived Messages for 2014-2015

Families Ayd and Krug in Baltimore [20 January 2014]

Dear Family Researcher, I would like to contact you with regard to the information published by you at we relate concerning the Family Ayd in Baltimore. I have noticed that you have published there many generations of the Ayd Family, who migrated from Baden to Germany and I assume they belong to your ancestors. While Ayds do not belong to my ancestors I am particularly interested in the marriage between John Adam Ayd to Josephine Krug around 1848 in Baltimore. She belongs to a family of my ancestors, who migrated to Baltimore in 1844. I have researched this family extensively and I have found some interesting information. A brother of hers became Arch Abbott of the famous monastery of Monte Cassino from 1897-1909. He came from a catholic family in Baltimore, who by marriage was connected to the Ayd Family and the Kuper Family in Baltimore. However, several open questions remain. The first Name Josephine Krug published by you for the marriage Krug/Ayd is different from the first names Wilhelmine or Philomena, which I have found in other sources. However, the third child's first name is Boniface and without doubt the mother's brother was the god father. I am also puzzled that Josephine or Wilhelmine was only about 16 years of age when she married John Adam Ayd judging from her age stated in the census data of 1860. It would be most helpful to have the marriage entry of John Adam Ayd and Josephine Krug from around 1848. Concerning these and other questions I would like to ask your support for an exchange of our data, so that we are able to better document this marriage between the Ayd and Krug families. In order to enable the sending of annexes I suggest that we continue the exchange by E-Mail (my address is krug@gefak.de). I would be happy and grateful for your positive response. Very best regards from Germany and also best wishes for the new year Carl E. Krug--Carl Krug 20:08, 1 January 2014 (UTC)

Followup - I have sent 2 emails to the address provided and will now await your response. Regards, --Cos1776 20:38, 20 January 2014 (UTC)

hello [22 January 2014]

HELLO!--Eraldirson 17:19, 20 January 2014 (UTC)

 ?Hello? New User Eraldirson - Why did you erase all of the text from MySource:Cos1776/Mester, Siegmund Wilhelm 1856 Birth Certificate? Was it a mistake? --Cos1776 20:29, 20 January 2014 (UTC)

Yes I am sorry it seems that I miss typed the username, my apologies.--Eraldirson 14:42, 22 January 2014 (UTC)

ok - I'll fix it. Do you have an interest in the Mester family? --Cos1776 18:00, 22 January 2014 (UTC)

Death date of Daniel Streing [19 February 2014]

Hi,

Source #2 (Strangs of Westchester) says "Daniel wrote his will on 16 December 1706, and it was proved 11 February 1707 (N.Y.Co. Wills 7:288/374)." While I haven't checked the original, this would indicate that Daniel died between 16 Dec 1706 and 11 Feb 1707. What source do you have that says that he died before 16 Dec 1706 ie before writing his will?

Arthur Owen--Arthur Owen 01:59, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

You are quite right. I was distracted while editing yesterday. I apologize for the mistake and will fix it. Regards, --Cos1776 20:08, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

Naming Conventions for married women [9 March 2014]

Hi, Cos,

I've changed the "Preferred Name" of a few of your pages for women, where you have listed their married names as the preferred names. Instead of using their married names as their preferred names, I've change them to their baptismal or maiden names, while leaving the other information you entered intact. This is general practice for any genealogical listing of data, and is also consistent with WeRelate policy. (See Titles for Person pages, second item.) In addition to general practice, it's also important if you want searches for persons to work property. Hope this clarifies things a bit for you. --GayelKnott 21:23, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Hi Gayle - Yes, I see that... You changed quite a few of the pages that I am actively working on before getting in touch. Let me see if I can explain what I am doing and why it violates neither current WR policy nor standard accepted genealogical practice. The good news is that as a dynamic wiki we have more tools and flexibility than genealogists of the past when it comes to presenting and working within our collective research. As long as we are working to produce high quality and meaningful research that incorporates the best practices, we should not feel constrained here in how we present the results. This is a new medium and we are fortunate to be the ones creating the future of genealogy.

Regarding the WR policy to which you refer, please allow me to point out that the policy pertains to the "Title of the Person page". This is not the same thing as the "Preferred Name" fields that you fill out when editing the page. In this case, each of the pages that you edited was titled correctly (i.e. for women, firstname maidensurname ), so there was no policy violation there. But - I can understand how you might be getting these two things mixed up when it comes to the WR search engine, since results are displayed using whatever has been entered into the "Preferred Name" fields. But that is a good thing (more later).

Fortunately, our WR search engine is quite robust. (You indicated otherwise, perhaps you can explain?) Basically, if Data has been entered into any of the fields on the page, it can be searched. This is why it is so important to populate those fields. It is the scarcity of information that hampers a search engine, not the abundance of it. For women, I do always try to be very careful to populate the Name Fields for both Birth/Baptismal Names and Married Names, so these ladies were well covered. A WR search performed on any of these Names, especially in conjunction with a Place or Date, would have no problem in returning their pages.

This brings us to the "Preferred Name" Fields. As long as the important information is being entered into the Data Fields on the page, so that it can be accessed by both humans and the WR search engine, the format used in the "Preferred Name" fields is irrelevant. You can think of it as a "Display Name" for that person as defined by the last wiki editor. Of course, interested researchers can have a different opinion about what that preferred name should be. What is so powerful is that it presents us with a unique tool that many other genealogy mediums do not possess, namely the ability to provide dynamic descriptors to help us distinguish between individuals at a quick glance. We see these in evidence on men's pages all the time (i.e. "Dr." or "Gov." or "of Hall's Creek" etc.).

Given the technology that we are using, there does not seem to be a good reason why the same types of descriptors could not be used for women's pages as well, as long as maiden names were included in their data set, both to comply with good genealogical practice and to give the search engine data to mine. After all, most married women of yore were known and recorded by their married names for many more years of their lives than they were known or recorded by their maiden names.

So - does this format look a bit different than what you might be used to? Sure, a wiki is a relatively new format in itself. Is this format against WR policy or good genealogical practice? No. Does it compromise the data or harm the page? No. Is it helpful to users? Yes, I believe so. So I decided to try it out with a Smith family that did not previously exist on WR and was in the process of creating/sourcing/linking and testing these pages when you came along. --Cos1776 03:32, 23 February 2014 (UTC)

WR's Help:Style guide provides additional detail into the policy that Gayel is referencing. It is general practice on WR to include a woman's maiden name in the preferred surname field (and blank or Unknown if the surname was not known). --Jennifer (JBS66) 11:20, 23 February 2014 (UTC)

Thanks, Jennifer. Cos, yes, you are right, the WR Search engine is quite sturdy. My apologies if the changes upset an experiment you were conducting. One of the things I really like about WR is the flexibility it provides to try different ways of presenting your information. There are still some conventions, though. I've had to grit my teeth and bite my tongue on a few.--GayelKnott 15:40, 23 February 2014 (UTC)

Happy Monday! I read through the Help:Style guide again. It struck me, both from the heading of the page itself and the comments on the Talk page, that there was disagreement among the contributors at the time as to whether that was meant to be a "Guide" or a precursor to a set of rules that would eventually become policy. It does not appear to have been resolved before work ceased on the page in 2011. In any case, you can see that it also does not specify to use a woman's maiden name as her Preferred surname, just not to "use a prior married surname in place of a woman's maiden name" (emphasis mine). Once again, I believe the bulk of those data entry guides for Name fields arose out of a desire to prevent problems in the creation of Page Titles. Some of the them evolved into general practice, and some did not, but I do agree with both of you that most active WR users have incorporated the convention of using "maiden surname as Preferred surname" when it comes to pages for women. I usually adhere to it myself. Thank you for your patience while I conduct this little experiment. I will report back what I find. --Cos1776 19:30, 24 February 2014 (UTC)

Changes to Smith Family (again) [10 March 2014]

Hi Gayle - I am getting tons of notifications this evening that you are editing the Smith pages again that we spoke of before. Looks like you are renaming pages, such as this one, where you changed the Page Title from "John Smith and Sarah Unknown" to "John Smith and Sarah Smith" but did not provide any evidence to support that Sarah's maiden name was Smith. Is the evidence forthcoming? Are you actively researching these pages now? --Cos1776 01:05, 10 March 2014 (UTC)

Cos -- I've copied your query here because it is part of a previous discussion. I changed one page, not tons, merging it with a duplicate page that you apparently had created. This is one of the things I do as a volunteer on WeRelate. Then I simply clicked the automatic rename message at the top of the page. If you persist in not following the conventions regarding page names, I'm afraid this is likely to happen again -- one of the consequences of not following conventions. Several of your other pages also have the automatic rename message on them as well, and, given the changes in naming convention that you seem to be pursuing, it is also likely that more of your pages will end up on the Duplicates List.

Speaking of conventions, on a collaborative site, one of them is to respond to messages. It's been three months since I left a message on the talk page for Family:Unknown Smith and Hannah Unknown (2) regarding the existence of potential duplicates. If you don't want the pages merged, I suggest you mark them with the "Do Not Merge" template. Otherwise, the next time I go through the Duplicates List, which could be next week, I will merge them, as they are currently cluttering up the list.

By the way, my name is Gayel, not Gayle. --GayelKnott 01:31, 10 March 2014 (UTC)

I am sorry for misspelling your name. No disrespect intended, just a mistake on my part. As to your message on Family:Unknown Smith and Hannah Unknown (2) - I do not specifically recall seeing it, but we were traveling right then before Christmas, so it may have gotten lost in the shuffle. My short answer is that I have no idea if it is a duplicate or not. IMHO, neither page contains enough info to determine that they might be the same family, so they should remain separate pages until someone comes along with some evidence to indicate otherwise. I thought that the "No Merge Template" was supposed to be used in cases where you have evidence to support it - but maybe you are using it differently (?)

As to the Smiths - I did not say that you had changed "tons of pages" - just that I was receiving "tons of notifications" which as you know happens as a result of the propagation of the changes on one page to surrounding pages. Considering that we had just had a dialogue about the pages in question, I could not understand what was going on. I figured that you must have come across a great source for Sarah's maiden name, but when I investigated, that wasn't the case. Nonetheless, I do think that it would be good for us both to understand how this came about.

• You say that you merged Family:John Smith and Sarah Unknown (5) with a duplicate page that I had previously created. When I look at the history page, I am not able to see that. I can only see that the page was renamed. That seems strange to me because usually the history shows when a page was merged. Do you have any insight into this?
• You said "Several of your other pages also have the automatic rename message" and it sounds like you think this is a problem. I'm not sure why that would be so. Can you explain and provide me with an example of a page, so I can take a look? Do you know what triggers that message to appear? I thought it was just another reminder to Title the pages correctly, especially when Unknown surnames can be replaced. I haven't seen it before on a page other than an Unknown - have you?
• Can you tell me how you are generating your Duplicate List? I would like to see how the pages appear there, so that I can better understand why this is causing you problems.

Best Wishes (and I do mean that)! --Cos1776 04:28, 10 March 2014 (UTC)

Cos, I'll admit that learning all the ins and outs of WeRelate can take some time (and I'm not sure the process is ever complete), so in order to provide some explanation of what is happening, I'm going to take your questions out of order.

First, I don't generatate a Duplicate list -- I can't think of a more boring or pointless waste of my time. However, the computer for WeRelate does generate a Duplicates list. As you know, we are not supposed to be creating duplicate pages for people or individuals, yet it happens. You can see the list here. When the administration for WeRelate switched over to predominantly Volunteer Administration, people were encouraged to help out by volunteering (you can see the statement on the Home Page.) I, along with several others, volunteered for the Duplicate Patrol pages. (You can see the volunteer opportunities here, the Duplicate pages patrol here). In addition to those people listed as volunteers, there are several other people who have also made heavy time commitments to try to clean up a backlog of the Duplicate pages, and the list of Duplicate pages is now much shorter than it used to be. Of course, if you don't want any of your pages to appear on the Duplicates List, you can always check "Show Duplicates" under the "MyRelate" menu at the top of the page when you are signed in and clean them up yourself.

When a Family Page appears on a Duplicates List, all you have to do is click on that name, and the computer will automatically take you to a Compare Pages page. (You can also compare pages of individuals, or of other Family pages by using the Admin Menu at the top of almost any page.) The options for Compare Pages are Merge, or Not a Match. When you click on Not a Match, the No Merge Template is automatically placed on one of the pages, and the computer then automatically removes the two pages from the Duplicates List. The No Merge Template does not prevent the pages from being merged, but it does remove the pages from the Duplicates List and stand as a warning to other users that there may be reasons for not merging the two pages. Thus, if you are not sure, it's better to put the No Merge Template on one of the pages, first to stand as a warning to other users -- who hopefully will contact you before merging the pages; and second, to remove the pages from the Duplicate Lists, including yours. I'm not sure why you thought the No Merge Template should only be used in cases of documented differences, as there are no such instructions on the Template page, nor on it's associated Talk page. Perhaps you were thinking of the Speculative Templates??? (Not that people do necessarily add explanations when they use the templates.)

When comparing pages, sometimes it's not clear whether the pages are actually duplicates or not, which is why I try to refer the question back to one of the people who created the pages. Most active users are fairly responsive in answering. When it's not clear to them, then the convention is to put a No Merge template on one of the pages, usually the one with the explanation on the talk page as to why -- i.e., that there is not enough information to decide. If, at a later date, more information becomes available, the template can always be removed. In the meantime, there is considerably less clutter in the system.

As for losing messages, I agree that it is easy to do when you are travelling if you only check your Watchlist for changes, which seems to be set for changes within the last three days by default. However, if you check Dashboard, under the MyRelate menu, it will show the number of unchecked changes on your Watchlist, no matter how far back. If you have been travelling for an extensive period of time, you may have to go back quite a few pages in order to fine them all.

As for the "This page can be renamed" message, it will appear on any page where the page Title and the name(s) of the person(s) on the page are different. Go to any of the pages where you have chosen to not follow the conventions in filling in an individual's name, and you will see the message. It is a message that is automatically generated by the computer, and it does indicate that yes, there is a problem with the page. Often, the first response of someone seeing that message is to simply click the message and let the computer automatically rename the page in accordance with the stated naming conventions. As long as you insist on idiosyncratic names, you should probably expect this to happen. It was, as you say, "just a mistake", as I hadn't checked to see who had created the page before clicking the message, nor do I think I should necessarily be expected to. Working with a large number of pages, created by a large number of people, I can't always carry around a list of the idiosyncrasies of every individual who wants to do things differently. Obviously, I didn't bother with other of your pages, although they do carry the notice that the page needs to be renamed.

As an aside, you might want to keep in mind that, for now, as long as no one else is researching that particular line, the biggest problem with your idiosyncratic naming is that you are simply creating a bit of clutter in the system, and courting the kinds of automatic changes that you have been getting. However, if anyone else does start researching those people, they will be in the right in wanting to change the names of the individuals on the pages, which could create a lot of work for you.

As for the merging of duplicate pages, it would appear that among the many pages I worked on last night, what I did was add a NoMerge Template to Family talk:John Smith and Sarah Unknown (5), rather than merge it. You can see the template on the Talk Page. That there is a message on the Talk Page is noted under the page Title, just under the message that the page can be renamed (because the page title and the information on the page are different).

Hope this helps explain why there are problems with your pages. As I said before, WeRelate probably allows for more creativity and individuality than any other site that I'm aware of. The few conventions that are in place help to reduce the kinds of chaos that also occurs on so many of them. --GayelKnott 17:13, 10 March 2014 (UTC)

Marking potential living people for Speedy Delete [28 February 2014]

When you add the Speedy Delete template to a page where the person may be living, please include the date that you added the template. This makes it easier for admins to ensure each page has been through the 2 week warning. An example of the template we use can be found here. Thank you, --Jennifer (JBS66) 17:28, 28 February 2014 (UTC)

Sorry that I used the wrong template. Was following the instructions to use ({{Speedy Delete|Living}}) as per Help:FAQ. Do you want to update that page or should I? --Cos1776 17:45, 28 February 2014 (UTC)

That's ok! It's the same template, it's just that an additional parameter was added. I can update the help page to reflect this. --Jennifer (JBS66) 17:48, 28 February 2014 (UTC)

May I respectfully offer that a waiting period isn't appropriate if the person who contributed the page hasn't been active in a year or more? There are just so many of them - and they're already empty. Since most are associated with the bad old GEDCOM upload days - you could even make the activity limit four or five years. But visiting them all twice? Ick... --jrm03063 19:21, 28 February 2014 (UTC)

I know that it is extra work, but this is following the policy outlined on WeRelate:Speedy delete. For those pages without any dates and where the name field shows Living - those are deleted by admins on sight. Honestly, I believe these should be deleted via bot - and it's a request that I've expressed a few times... --Jennifer (JBS66) 19:30, 28 February 2014 (UTC)

wiliam h pollock [23 September 2014]

dear cos1776

Hiits a great thing that you are doing. whp I guess would be my gg uncle. my name is joan pollock gass. i have been to st lukes cemetary three times the first two w/no success. the third was a success. i found him . i understand that st anns church burials were in the same graveyard but were just connected and st lukes took over. his stone is right in front of the Blossom burials that has a wrought iron fence around it. there is a big tree right there in front of and before the wrought iron fence. it distinctly a stone that lists w.h.p. and date and a saying "Home at Last". maybe he was on the border and was actually in st annes, but it is the same burial yard (st annes and st lukes) do you think you can get a pcture of it, I would be forever so grateful. the caroline pollock was his wife.

thank you again for your great work. if I still lived in new york i would be able to do this my self, i live in florida now and cant go to new y york.--Pearlharbor777 14:16, 17 May 2014 (UTC)

Hello and thank you for writing. Please see Person talk:William Pollock (19) for my response.--Cos1776 14:41, 17 May 2014 (UTC)

Hi, so glad you wrote, back thank you. im not sure if his civil war papers are attached to him. on this site. but he was co.176. his wifes name was caroline stanfield and had 4 children, William h jr.,maude, grace and alice I think. they also lived in yonkers ny between 1850 and 1871 += , stayed in Natick mass. for a few years . he was born in new milford ct.. his fathers name was Thomas Pollock b 1801 in Canada, and his mothers name was laura rush b 1812 in Natick mass.(who im having a hard time finding both of their graves) they were probably members of st johns episcaple church in yonkers ny along with some of their children. Williams brothers were Robert A, George A. and Thomas e., sisters were Mary and Martha twins, Rebecca A, Ellen m., and Emily they were all born in new milford, ct(bridgewater ct section)except for Thomas jr, he was born in mass. 1852. Robert married a susan Simmonds lived in fishkill ny, George married a maria adams lived in fishkill, ny, Thomas e married a susan pullis and lived in yonkers, Rebecca married a Rowland albert Roberts lived in greenburgh ny, ellen m married a john w. ledyard, mary a married a Charles Conklin lived in ny,ct.,nc.and mass. Martha married a alexander joyce sr. from great barrington mass. their births,(kids) were born between 1834 and 1852. laura died in 1871, no stone but on cemetery records? we don't know where Thomas e sr. isburied, he is not listed. he was a hatter for the most part as was his sons and dghtrs. , oops Emily was married to a james Beasley/baisley/basley. also spelled the same on all his civil war papers.he was in the Duryea zouves in the civil war, as well as Robert a..

have a nice day joan Pollock gass--Pearlharbor777 15:02, 16 September 2014 (UTC)

 : Hello again. Thank you for sharing the info. I will log your message on his Talk page. All of these WeRelate pages are created by volunteer users, so I encourage you to feel free to jump in to create pages for his family and to add your information and sources if you'd like. I am happy to help you get started or to enter it for you, if you'd prefer. BTW - I noticed that a headstone photo has now been added to his FindAGrave page. Best Wishes. --Cos1776 15:45, 16 September 2014 (UTC)

--Pearlharbor777 23:16, 22 September 2014 (UTC)[[

Link title

]]hi, i think your just great what does btw mean> i cant seem to find any of thomas's and lauras church records or mother and fathers names, from a relative of alexander joyce who was searching for martha pollock, who alexander was married to, and she told me that martha was speaking french? one of the censuses from rebecca says her father was born in fresssssscanada. .alexander was born in 1828 in fairfield ct. i believe. one of the censuses say laura was born in ny, another says ct. and another says vermont. the other says natick mass. i don't know. although i did find a thomas pollock and laura in haverhill mass. that seemed to be right. but cant find them on any other list in that area., also great barrington mass. where the joyces lived.rebecca lived in philadelphia pa and is buried in arlington . cant find where rebecca a pollock died either, dont know what happend to her, she did live with her son rodman roberts till 1910 in the bronx ny, after that i dont know, rodman moved to camden nj. have to dig out some old records , thannks so much for helping. i wish i could send these records to ancestry FAMILY TREE....HAVE A GREAT DAY

JOAN POLLOCK GASS

please see my response here. --Cos1776 14:34, 23 September 2014 (UTC)

need definition of abreviation [5 August 2014]

Hi, I have read your input on Person:Richard Hall (61) where you say "source = OLT, needs verification". Sorry for my ignorance here, but what does OLT stand for? I just haven't run onto that before. --janiejac 19:06, 4 August 2014 (UTC)

OLT stands for Online Tree. I use it to indicate that the information is being widely published online without a source or without a source that I have seen yet - hence the "needs verification" phrase. I want to communicate to others and remind myself where the WR info is coming from and that a more organic source of the information has yet to be presented on the WR page. I must admit that the complete phrase now appears quickly on my personal drop down menu, and I am frequently working alone in these family groups, so that is why you will see it on many of my "watched" pages. You bring up a good point, however. Perhaps I should change it to read "Source = online tree, needs verification". --Cos1776 16:40, 5 August 2014 (UTC)

the 'Other' Jacob Whisler and Sarah' [16 September 2014]

Hi! Thanks for fixing the Jacob and Sarah Waltz Wissler pages and motivating me to work on the other Jacob and Sarah! I know you're watching the page but just thought I'd mention that I've done what I could with the other Jacob. I also emailed the authors of the Find-a-Grave pgs that mixed these folks up and I see that Sarah Jackson's page is fixed now. Also, a note from Janeen Proctor red'd Sept 12, 2014: "I did find a marriage record for Sarah Waltz to Jacob Whisler in Wayne Co., Indiana on Jan. 1, 1838 in the Indiana database of marriages to 1850. Janeen" --janiejac 22:35, 15 September 2014 (UTC)

Yes - those pages and those surrounding them were tangled up, so I have been slowly trying to sort them out. I can see how the mistakes were made with the two families as they share so much similar info. I still need to go back and put some NoMerge templates on them to hopefully prevent the same problem from happening in the future, so thank you for reminding me about that. Regards, --Cos1776 15:50, 16 September 2014 (UTC)

sakers genealogy [24 September 2014]

Hello my name is brends sakers ober and i found your genealogy page, my grandparents were robert forrest sakers and dorothy baxter and my father was robert forrest sakers and anna boeckem sakers. I was wondering how we might be related and thanks for all the information that you have collected I just started my search of the sakers's name and you have given me the best start. Please feel free to contact me at my personal email address ober24@aol.com. Thanks brenda sakers ober--Ober24 19:14, 23 September 2014 (UTC)

Hi Brenda - please see my response on your Talk page here. Thanks. --Cos1776 11:26, 24 September 2014 (UTC)

Irene Bullock KIng [12 January 2015]

Hi Cos,

I decided to google my great-grandmother tonight and found that you have info on her on Ancestry. I saw that I could also find you on here, so thought I'd take a chance and see if you could help me out.

I'm interested in the info you have on Irene Bullock King. I hadn't found much on her family back when I was actively searching.

Thanks a bunch - Brooke--Webster bl 03:33, 24 September 2014 (UTC)

Hi Brooke - please see my response on your Talk page here. Thanks, --Cos1776 11:43, 24 September 2014 (UTC)

Hi Cos, I hope the new year is finding you well. I'm wondering if are able to share the info you have connected to Irene Bullock King. Is it easier to connect via email? Thanks - Brooke--Webster bl 02:50, 5 January 2015 (UTC)

Hello again Brooke - Happy New Year to you as well. Irene's info is still on my ToDo list which I did not do a very good job of working through toward the end of the year as my workload increased. Thank you for reminding me, and I apologize for not getting back to you sooner. Let me see what I can do to get the information flow going again. Best Wishes. --Cos1776 13:18, 12 January 2015 (UTC)

[25 September 2014]

Thank you for response i have a question or two to ask just wondering who is your husband and if your local to the philly area. how long have you been doing genealogy and there is another person that i am in contact with that also doing the sakers genealogy, she is away on the west coast till the end of this week and she will email what she has.--Ober24 13:48, 25 September 2014 (UTC)

I have replied to you off site via email. Thanks. --Cos1776 14:15, 25 September 2014 (UTC)

Ephraim Cooke [8 October 2014]

Hi, I see you sourced Ephraim's birth & death dates with Barbour's Connecticut Vital Records, Birth (Wallingford) Death (Cheshire). You might want to separate the two records and somewhere place "Wallingford Vital Records" & "Cheshire Vital Records" in either the text section; or in the Name box. I like to put this in the Name box, but I don't think that there are any strict rules that apply, but it does help others researching Ephraim Cooke or the Cooke family cite their own research. Just a friendly suggestion...--SkippyG 17:40, 8 October 2014 (UTC)

Yes, I do agree. Please look for my response in a few moments on Ephraim Cook's Talk page. --Cos1776 18:13, 8 October 2014 (UTC)

Bartsimpson [14 February 2015]

Thanks for keeping my tree in the site. I am the source of the photo of Sarah Krom from Ancestry.com, where I also have an account. Bartsimpson 17:59, 11 January 2015 (UTC)

Hello. I am always happy to see sourced images on WR pages, so thank you for taking the time to add yours. Best Wishes! --Cos1776 12:49, 12 January 2015 (UTC)

Married surnames for women [14 February 2015]

Hi Markus3. Recently you have moved the married surname from the married surname field to the married given name field, leaving the married surname field blank, on several of the pages I watch. Can you explain why you are doing this and how you decide which pages to do it to? It doesn't make sense to me, and it removes a data point from the page which affects searches. Regards, --Cos1776 13:33, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

Hello, Cos1776 ! Please, at first excuse my very bad english. You seem to be not the only contributor who has a different opinion and experience with this use. See the "revert" of Jaques1724 ---> http://www.werelate.org/w/index.php?title=Person%3AAbiah_Hitchcock_%281%29&diff=21602835&oldid=21602718

I really don't understand why what I changed ... "affects searches". Can you explain and give examples ? I believe instead that my changes are absolutely necessary because otherwise the "count tool" always give an exaggerated number of persons (it's the same problem with Geni and WikiTree) ---> see this page - Amicalement - Marc ROUSSEL - --Markus3 14:03, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

I agree with Jaques1724. When you remove data from a page, you remove the ability to search on it. You may have noticed that the "Surname in place" search no longer appears on the left side of the page for the married surname of these women. Regarding your analysis program - if your "count tool" is not working properly, then you should fix the "count tool" itself, not change the data until you get the results to come out the way you want them to. I can not analyze your code from the link you provided. Does your program know to exclude data from the Married Surname Field if you do not want to count married women? --Cos1776 22:15, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

Next step: Review your GEDCOM [15 March 2015]

You're not done yet!

WeRelate is different from most family tree websites. By contributing to WeRelate you are helping to create Pando for genealogy, a free, unified family tree that combines the best information from all contributors.

Now that you have uploaded Project Warner.ged, your next step is to review what your pages will look like, review any potential warnings, and combine (merge) people in your GEDCOM with matching people already on WeRelate. You need to review your GEDCOM before it can finish importing. We will keep your GEDCOM in the queue for two weeks to give you time to review it.

Note: if your gedcom contains many errors or multiple families, we’d ask that you resolve and correct the errors, delete this gedcom and re-submit it without the errors before merging it with families already on WeRelate. If the gedcom is very large, we’d suggest breaking it up into separate files (or families) and importing them one at a time, which makes the review and correction process easier.

Click here to review your GEDCOM

Once you have finished your review and marked your GEDCOM Ready to import, one of our administrators will review your GEDCOM and finalize the import. This usually happens within 24 hours. You will receive a message here when the pages have been created.

--WeRelate agent 01:24, 16 March 2015 (UTC)

Project Warner.ged Imported Successfully [16 March 2015]

The pages from your GEDCOM have been generated successfully. You may now:

• launch the Family Tree Explorer to navigate your tree
• view your network -- If you matched families in your GEDCOM to existing families, find out to which other WeRelate users you are related.
• view related pages not in your tree -- If you matched families in your GEDCOM to existing families, find out which people you are now related to that you can add to your tree (takes awhile to display for large trees).
• view a searchable list of the pages in your tree -- The searchable list will be available about an hour after your tree has been imported.

For questions or problems, leave a message for Dallan or send an email to dallan@WeRelate.org.

--WeRelate agent 14:59, 16 March 2015 (UTC)

Thank you [28 March 2015]

Thank you cos1776. My GEDCOM is just in the review stage. When I said delete, technically I meant: hit 'remove this GEDCOM'.

I have been having a tussle with the editing/reviewing! The GEDCOM of over 200 people is from Genes Reunited via a free trial of Family Tree Heritage -- which I would now describe as truly dreadful software. It had no Occupation field, and that's how occupations have ended up being misidentified as Places on WeRelate! It claims to correct errors; what it actually did was strip out correct years wherever I had written them in what it deemed to be non-standard format, and mostly it substituted '2015' !!!!! This created total chaos, with heaps of people being born after their parents died, or reaching ridiculous ages!

My sources info is as it is due to the characteristic of Genes Reunited, where you only have one line for sources combined with a very restrictive character limit.

Which free software would help me here? -- I will see if I can create a new tree on G.R. and strip all troublesome clutter out of it before export.

Thanks again--Helen-HWMT 16:39, 28 March 2015 (UTC)

That minor opposition [28 March 2015]

You: "Wondering if this is happening as a result of the relatively minor, yet very vocal, opposition to joining forces with, dare I say it, the blissfully ad-free world of the Wikimedia Foundation? -". As I was the main person (though far from the only) opposing that, let me state for the record that I have nothing to do with ads, and only support them as a necessary evil. Dallan doesn't consult with me; he ran ads before I was even registered here. A few users were enthusiastic about the idea but mostly it was a mixed reception, and even more so on the wikipedia side since WR is basically all original research. A couple of users here didn't like how wikipedia displays families (yes, they have their own, different, method). I don't sit on any board of directors for WR, however, and if Dallan really wanted to he could have easily overruled me, but it wasn't just me. Several other admins and long term users had misgivings about it. Some of them believe, as I do, that much of the good we do here would not be possible operating under their set of rules But I also think that, eventually, going ad-free here is the ideal. I hope that it would solidify our alliance with the Allen County Public Library, and make us as serious magnet for researchers in time (another reason I wanted to avoid Wikipedia that didn't come - 'Wikipedia' anything has a not undeserved bad reputation among academics).--Daniel Maxwell 18:56, 28 March 2015 (UTC)

Alden Freeman of East Orange NJ [29 April 2015]

Hi Cos1776, I am the newest of newbies both to genealogy and this website. I am interested in Alden Freeman of East Orange, NJ, and his activities in Santa Barbara and Miami Beach. You've entered some edits to a page on Alden and I'm hoping you have a direct interest in him too. I see that you're involved with a large number of pages. I'm not a genealogist [except in the sense that - here I am, working on a family's genealogy] but have collected a great deal of information about and by Alden Freeman that I hope to add to his page. Much of it is printed source material - as opposed to internet links - and much of that from Freeman, himself [he was an avid genealogist]. I've read some of the general posts about the site but haven't viewed the videos. That's next. I just want to add material into the public discussion about Alden Freeman that won't screw things up for searchers. Also, selfishly, I'm hoping you have a specific interest in this Freeman that could add to what I already have. Thanks.--Montarioso 18:22, 29 April 2015 (UTC)

Original form [18 June 2015]

You are misusing the word recorded when you apply it to a newspaper. On the Watercooler there is a link to a web page by Elizabeth Shown Mills that somebody posted where she discusses the genealogical meaning of the word record. --Jrich 15:35, 18 June 2015 (UTC)

Millers, Beverleys [31 July 2015]

Nice work on the Millers that connect to the Beverleys. Neal --SkippyG 01:58, 1 August 2015 (UTC)

Thank you for noticing! I appreciate the compliment. :) Have a great evening. --Cos1776 02:38, 1 August 2015 (UTC)

Guestbook [21 August 2015]

Thank you for your reply re---Guestbook. The site I have created is my Grandfathers days in WW1-(Herbert Edward Scarborough). Most of the people that would check out the site---would be relatives etc- and I doubt that any of them would have an account. That is why I thought that the easiest way would be a Guest Book that they could also put comments in. It has been awhile since I entered anything to this site--so would appreciate someone talking me through/providing the steps to set up a usable Guestbook. Thanks for your help Colleen--Cleonard 20:45, 8 August 2015 (UTC)

Somehow I missed your comment here, Colleen. My apologies. I will respond further on your Talk Page. Regards, --Cos1776 19:52, 21 August 2015 (UTC)

Census sort keys [31 October 2015]

Hey there,

I noticed while on source patrol that you just removed a dozen sort keys from census pages. There are at least two or three people going through and adding them, and several more that now add them as a matter of course. Removing them is just working at cross purposes :-) I speak as the one who wrote the original protocols, but I've been beaten down that sorting is the better practice. Thanks,--Amelia 05:59, 21 August 2015 (UTC)

Yes, I did remove the sort keys. In this particular case, they had only been applied to approx 10-20% of the Source Pages in each of the Census-by-Date/State Categories, so their use was in the minority and was forcing the pages out of alphabetical order. I assume that is not preferable.

I was unaware of a previous decision to use them in this way or to go back and apply them to existing pages. Perhaps such a plan was put in place before there was a good understanding of how Categories and sort keys and search engines work. If so, perhaps we could revisit the logic behind that decision to see if the best solution is still in place.

Likewise, perhaps we could open a discussion on the present day usefulness of many of the Categories that were created in the past. The Census-by-Date/State Categories are a good example of an idea whose time has probably come and gone. A simple Search can produce a more accurate list of what's available at WR and does not require ongoing Category management.

Example: Category:1860 South Carolina census vs WR Search Expanded

or if you really do want to mimic the Category - WR Search Refined

I welcome feedback. Regards, --Cos1776 19:19, 21 August 2015 (UTC)

Duplicates [31 October 2015]

Duplicates [30 October 2015] (copied from User talk:GayelKnott

Hi Gayel. Thank you for merging a couple of duplicates that I guess I had recently created. Something has been slowing down my WR interface to a snail's pace for about the last week or so, and I think that might be why the duplicates are happening. My guess is that I am getting impatient waiting for the server to return and hitting "Enter" more than once (because it looks like nothing is happening). The strange thing is that on my end, I am not seeing duplicates in the usual way, so I am not even aware that they are being created. I'm beginning to think my computer is haunted :) Anyway - thank you again, and hopefully I'll be able to figure out what in the world is going on and fix this issue soon. Best Spooky Wishes! --Cos1776 14:25, 30 October 2015 (UTC)

Hi, Cos. I figured something like that was happening -- you aren't the only one who has a similar problem. As for how slow the computer has been responding -- I've been tempted several times to post on the Water Cooler and ask what's going on. It's very frustrating, I agree. The only clue is that a couple of times I've gotten flashes that Dallen is working on something, so I guess that's what is happening. I think, among other things, he's making changes to the place names and how they show up in the entry field on a person's page. Talk about slow! But hopefully it will be better when he's done??  :-) --GayelKnott 16:50, 31 October 2015 (UTC)

P.S. -- sorry about the mis-posting. Think I need a cup of coffee.--GayelKnott 16:53, 31 October 2015 (UTC)