Ancestry.com Updates: Plus Q & A with Crista Cowan at Rootstech 2020

[@frankhooper7871]

Great to see two of my favourite genealogy presenters together ☺

[@darlenefarmer5921]

I need to listen again as I was quilting during your interview. Thank you so much.

[@tomzito2585]

I do wish there were a way to share the "whole" tree (including images) with family members. The prize we get for our hard work and research is the "ta-da!" when we share the result-- and requiring viewers to have paid accounts to see the whole thing is a bummer. Suggestion: Offer a subscription level for members to have, say, 5 guest accounts included with their membership who have full viewing access to the member's tree. There should be a distinction between a viewer's ability to see saved records shared with them through a tree and a researcher's access to the entire catalog.

[@staceycoates1418]

Suggestion to Ancestry. Under the family we have parents (and now additional parental relationships) Siblings, Spouses and Children. Why not make a FAN option. Even if it doesn't show up in the tree it can have a list of people connected to your family. And you could have different relationships (like enslaved, religious and legal witnesses, neighbors, and maybe broach the public for other categories. And maybe those boxes would be a bit bigger so they would have the name, the dates, and then the relationship (unlike the spousal relationship where you have to go into the relationship to see what kind it is. Can we pass that on to Crista to pass on to the rest of Ancestry? :)

[@GenealogyTV]

You know, using custom tags in combination with the web links like she suggested might be an option too.

[@MrSquareart]

Nice video!!!!!

[@ValSpringer]

Awesome Q&A!

[@GenealogyTV]

Thanks

[@LanceHall]

The real question we need answered is when the heck are they going to give us a chromosome browser?

[@Rjackson986]

Still waiting on a chromosome browser

[@suelane3628]

Can't you upload your DNA data onto Ged Match?

[@alanwilliams5836]

Connie... Thank you for this. There was one other question that I was hoping would have been asked of Crista. My Sister and I are research partners. My sister gave me admin privileges to her account. As an Admin, if my sister dies, can I keep that tree going and change that account over to MY name? (Thereby keeping the subscription alive)?

[@GenealogyTV]

I believe the best way to handle that is to give her password access to your account.

[@Cigar65]

I have made the suggestions before to Ancestry to do a screen share like Apple does while you have someone on the phone talking to you. You'll be able to solve the problem in half the time. Another problem is your phone reception. Just horrible. Sounds like all the people that work there are talking through a cheap cell phone. My lines are together and I thought they were separate. I need to split them so I am told so I can get the right version relationships for me and my wife. I never had to change the Home Person before, but now to get the right relationships on my wife's side, I have to keep switching back and forth the Home person. I never had to do this. I still say someone has changed the settings in my line. How to make another tree to separate them is beyond me. No matter how long you've been at this, the frustration continues to grow.

[@ninpobudo3876]

When will ancestry add the Louisiana-German Creole community? Furthermore; Creole applies to anyone born into Louisiana Creole

[@GenealogyTV]

That’s a good question. I don’t work for Ancestry so I’m not sure. They’re always working on new records. You might try to rely on DNA research.

[@haroldhesterly2892]

A get a lot of my family genealogical finds come from Family Search. Not long ago I found a new entry regarding the first wife of my Grandfather, which I welcomed. Problem is, the info was entered in a way that it created an entirely new family. How can I correct the terrible mistake?

[@jd65556]

Always found this hard on Ancestey.com. if you have an ancestors birth name (say a women) they usually had a nickname and died with that nickname Sometimes hints won't show if you only put the birthname. Anyway is their a way to add birth and nickname in the same slot for name?

[@GenealogyTV]

You can add another name and set one to be preferred and the other as alternate. Alternatively you can use the ”also known as“ field. It is not recommended to use quotes in the regular name field, it messes up the algorithms.

[@jd65556]

@@GenealogyTV Thank you very much. This helped me out a lot.

[@GenealogyTV]

My pleasure. You might also try (when researching) for just the initials of a person... for example Jane Smith... search J Smith. That way if her nickname starts with the same letter (like Jen, or Jannie) you might find it. You may also discover that Jane (in this example) was the nickname and her formal name was Janet. Just a thought. What's really fun is when you find ancestors named Sis, or Babe, or Junior, or Bro, Doc, I could go on... you get the idea.

[@jd65556]

@@GenealogyTV Yes that sounds good too. If I add a 'also known as' name will the algorithm look for that too or is it just to keep record of the different variations of the same name?

[@twistednerve74]

I'm hoping for more accurate estimates. Ancestry honestly has nothing on 23 and Me who are far more accurate and detailed from my extensive research.

[@GenealogyTV]

I suspect that everyone's experience is different on every platform because of the truly unique DNA make-up of every person,cousin combinations and their family trees and research skills.

[@pravoslavn]

Like your videos. Please learn to speak publicly without saying "gunna." This is not a snooty comment... it would just make your presentations much more professional.

[@GenealogyTV]

Yes I know. I'm working on it. I'm aware.