Become a Better Researcher

Our research problems are unique and our genealogy software, to be useful, must be flexible enough to match our respective problems and our respective methods. The Master Genealogist is that software, but power and flexibility has a down side. The more options a program has, the more decisions the user must make. This year, the Tri-Valley TMG User Group will explore those options and make some of those personal decisions. Would you like to play along with us? Do each month's assignment, and if you like, e-mail it to us at: tvtmg.chair@L-AGS.org. We'll post some of the completed assignments on this blog each month. Let's hear it for choices!

Sunday, June 29, 2014

A Newcomer's Story: Start with a Passenger List

NOTE: The TV-TMG User Group is taking a vacation in July -

No meeting until August!


Our August topic begins with a passenger list or naturalization record. Most of us have at least one in our family history; but, depending on the time period in which our families entered North America (or England, or Australia, etc., etc.), these records vary in content and availability. The following assignment questions deal with immigration into what is now the United States. Modify them as appropriate if your record of choice deals with immigration into another country.
  • Cite your source.
    • Did you use one of the TVTMG passenger list source type templates?
    • If so, what problems did you encounter?
    • If not, what template did you use - and why?
  • Did you transcribe the information found in the record?
    • If so, how did you enter that transcription in TMG?
    • Do you visualize a report in which this transcription would be printed?
  • Did you choose to abstract the information?
    • Provide a screen shot of the tag, or tags, in which the information appears.
    • How do you expect this information to appear in a report?
  • Did you create a custom tag for this record?
    • If so, provide a screen shot of that tag.
    • What are the custom sentences you created for this tag?
  • What law, or laws, governed the creation of your chosen record?
    • If you don't understand how and why a record was created, your interpretation of that record may be incorrect. The answer to this question is more important than you might think.
  • Finally, write a narrative deriving from this record.
    • Remember, this narrative doesn't need to be long - just a paragraph or two is fine.

If your ancestors all crossed the Bering land bridge thousands of years ago, please contact me for an alternate assignment. There are no border-crossing records from that time period. :-)


Remember this year's goals.

  • We want to develop the habit of analyzing each record we use, and not just enter each information bit without thinking about its meaning.
  • We want to make conscious decisions on what data we want to enter into TMG, how we enter that data, and how we will use that data in our research.
  • We want to develop the habit of writing research reports and real family histories, not just printing out pedigree charts and family group sheets.
  • We want to make TMG fit our research needs and goals. We don't want to make our research practices fit TMG.

Sunday, June 8, 2014

A Puzzle for Readers

Ever since I discovered that there was more to genealogy research than simply entering names, dates, places - and source citations - in a database, I have puzzled over how to track those background references I read, but never used in any TMG events citations. I would (usually) enter them in the TMG database, but how would I find them if I needed them for another project? How could I easily create a bibliography of all the sources used in researching a person, whether cited in TMG, cited in an article, or used only for background understanding? I came up with two possibilities, and I've used both, but I'm not sure if I'm completely satisfied with either. Do you have other ideas?

Individual Detail screen overlaid with Tag Entry screen

  • The first solution adds a non-printing note tag used simply to attach all background references, etc. to the person being studied. Note that this example also has two Research tags used to track references in which no relevant information was found, as well as those in which the information required a lot of analysis before it could be handled in TMG. This is a fine solution for one person, but it still made some of the background references difficult to find when needed for another person.

Source Definition screen - Supplemental tab

  • In the second solution, I designated Memo3 in the Source Definition's supplemental tab for keywords. Some keywords I've used include: War of 1812, privateers, Growler, Navy, pensions, spotted fever, postpartum depression, final payment, and federal land laws. This way, if I have a question about pension laws, for example, I can search for any background reference in my TMG database with the keyword pensions.
I can combine solutions one and two, and may decide to do so, but even then, creating a bibliography is not automatic. Take a look at these two bibliography possibilities from my June assignment.

  • This screen shows the "List of Sources" report associated with the Growler events entered in my TMG database. Ho, hum.


  • This screen shows the bibliography created when I combined all sources associated with my Growler "person" and all sources with "privateer" in my source keyword field. Those highlighted in blue were used only as background references. They were not cited in TMG, nor were they cited in the report I wrote for the June assignment. It's a much more complete bibliography!
It's not totally complete, though. Several other sources were used to write my article, but those sources didn't have keywords in my database, and they weren't listed as citations for my Growler person. Oh, well. Nothing's perfect. New ideas are always appreciated!

Remember this year's goals.

  • We want to develop the habit of analyzing each record we use, and not just enter each information bit without thinking about its meaning.
  • We want to make conscious decisions on what data we want to enter into TMG, how we enter that data, and how we will use that data in our research.
  • We want to develop the habit of writing research reports and real family histories, not just printing out pedigree charts and family group sheets.
  • We want to make TMG fit our research needs and goals. We don't want to make our research practices fit TMG.

Reviewing Exhibits

At our May meeting, we reviewed TMG's Exhibits feature, discussing various pros and cons, as well as the procedure of attaching exhibits to a person, an event, or a citation. Several members asked for a review of the procedure. Rather than reinventing the wheel, I would like to refer everyone to Terry Reigel's article on TMG and exhibits.
This article was posted on 28 May 2014, so it's very up-to-date. For those of you most interested in the process, go to the section titled "Creating Exhibits."

Internal exhibit or external exhibits? That question always comes up in any TMG exhibits discussion. Terry discusses that in the section titled "Where to Store the Files."

In general, I agree with most of Terry's thoughts on TMG exhibits. I do differ in one point, however. All my exhibits, regardless of file type, are stored externally, and I can easily find them in my file tree. Still, I do link many of them, including research reports and other files that will not be included in any TMG report, to the relevant people in my TMG database. I find that a convenient way to track all exhibits, regardless of type, that are associated with a person, a source, or a repository. Note also that I seldom include exhibits in my TMG reports. I prefer to add them manually, if desired. The only exceptions are family group sheets, pedigree charts, and VCF reports, but since those reports only include the primary person image, they're simple to create.

How do I name my files and set up my exhibit file tree? I've been adding exhibits to TMG since the old DOS days when file names were limited in length to the 8.3 format, so I wouldn't look too closely at the way my early files were named. Still, I can find files easily with this hierarchy.

  1. My TMG exhibit files are stored in the C: drive, since that means that the exhibit location is consistent from computer to computer - and because that was the only option when I began using TMG.
  2. All the exhibits are stored in a folder called "tmg_images". I probably should have named this "TMG_Exhibits," but when I named it, I was only saving images.
  3. My "tmg_images" folder is subdivided according to major record types. Photographs of people are put in one of four folders named with the surnames of my children's four grandparents. The "documents" subfolder is heavily divided again, and includes a subfolder for all research reports.
  4. The "tombstones" subfolder is divided into folders for individual cemeteries. I should have called this folder "Cemeteries," but I didn't. You are looking at thumbnails of files included in the folder "beckley_20130612." The number is the date I visited the cemetery and photographed the grave markers.
  5. Not all files are image files. This is an Excel file that includes each tombstone's information. This is linked as an Other exhibit to the cemetery's Source Definition screen. That way, I have quick and easy access to a file listing all the relevant burials and photographs I have from that cemetery. This spreadsheet does not print in any TMG report.
Source Definition screen overlaid with linked Exhibits

Reminder!

There is no one right way to do something in TMG. Use Terry's and my ideas as suggestions only. Our ideas may not work for you, but they may spark something better in your mind.

Remember this year's goals.

  • We want to develop the habit of analyzing each record we use, and not just enter each information bit without thinking about its meaning.
  • We want to make conscious decisions on what data we want to enter into TMG, how we enter that data, and how we will use that data in our research.
  • We want to develop the habit of writing research reports and real family histories, not just printing out pedigree charts and family group sheets.
  • We want to make TMG fit our research needs and goals. We don't want to make our research practices fit TMG.

My June Assignment: Latitude and Longitude

I don't usually enter anything in TMG's Latitude/Longitude tag, but when describing a ship's location, that's the only relevant field. The published extracts from the Growler's log contain four dates in which her latitude and longitude is given. When I started to enter that information, I discovered - or rediscovered - that TMG does not see latitude and longitude as degree-minutes-seconds-compass values; TMG sees it as decimal values. Here are some visual pointers when entering latitude and longitude.
Tag Entry screen overlaid with TMG Help file

Individual Detail screen overlaid with Place preference window
My new favorite toy, BatchGeo, allowed me to map the Growler's location at various times on this first voyage. You will need to zoom out to see the various points.

Do you use the Latitude/Longitude place field? This is the first time I've used it in an Individual Detail screen, but I do enter it for cemeteries in the Master Place list. I've discovered that it's much easier to find a cemetery when my GPS has the cemetery's latitude and longitude!


Remember this year's goals.

  • We want to develop the habit of analyzing each record we use, and not just enter each information bit without thinking about its meaning.
  • We want to make conscious decisions on what data we want to enter into TMG, how we enter that data, and how we will use that data in our research.
  • We want to develop the habit of writing research reports and real family histories, not just printing out pedigree charts and family group sheets.
  • We want to make TMG fit our research needs and goals. We don't want to make our research practices fit TMG.

Wednesday, June 4, 2014

My June Assignment - with a Few TMG Screenshots


As most of you know, military records are my absolute favorite documents. The Civil War is probably my favorite period, but the War of 1812 is now running a close second. I adopted a privateer from that war a couple of years ago, thinking I might want to do some more in-depth research on it, and this month's assignment is my start on that project: "The First Voyage of the Schooner Growler: Salem Privateer in the War of 1812." Here are my answers to this month's questions.
  • Choose a military record that intrigues you. Here are a few examples: a draft registration or its associated documents; an affidavit from a pension application; an enlistment or discharge paper; a final payment; a medical record; a military tombstone application. This is just a tiny fraction of the possibilities in the world of military records.
  • Enter the information derived from the record in your TMG database.
    • Did you abstract or transcribe the document? Both. I transcribed the information in the two Document tags; I extracted or abstracted information in the two types of Event tags; and the Comment tag is used for my own narrative.
      Individual Detail Screen
    • Did you add a scanned image of the document as an exhibit? Yes, I attached scanned images of the focus document to the tag that includes its transcription in the Memo.
      Tag Screen with Exhibit Screen
    • Did you need to create a custom tag? No, although some of the ones I used are custom tags I created some time ago.
  • Don't forget your source citation!
    • What source type template did you use? I used a custom template called "National Archives Film/Fiche (Online)." We don't have anything exactly like it in our template book, but one could modify our NARA microfilm template by adding the online website information.
    • Did you have any problems citing the source? No.
Source Definition Screen
  • Write a narrative at least two paragraphs in length.
    • In what type of article would your narrative be appropriate: family history, research report, or proof argument? This project, when I finish it, would be more appropriate for a journal article.
I learned something new (to me) while I was working on this. I'll add a separate post on that - and, since some of the members have asked for a review of the add-an-exhibit process, I'll add something on that process, too. Any questions? Comments?

Remember this year's goals.

  • We want to develop the habit of analyzing each record we use, and not just enter each information bit without thinking about its meaning.
  • We want to make conscious decisions on what data we want to enter into TMG, how we enter that data, and how we will use that data in our research.
  • We want to develop the habit of writing research reports and real family histories, not just printing out pedigree charts and family group sheets.
  • We want to make TMG fit our research needs and goals. We don't want to make our research practices fit TMG.