ROOTS TECH NOTES 2017 - JUST FOR YOU!

We are in Salt Lake City this week, enjoying learning more things to get out to our Ward and Stake Families and friends who would like to know more about where their people came from.

The new technologies will make it easier and more fun for you to document your family history and that of your friends around you who wish help.

Consultant Blog

https://familysearch.org/blog/en/consultants/


What is new in Family Search?

https://familysearch.org/blog/en/whats-familysearchjanuary-2016/

What is new in Ancestry.com - OH MY GOSH!!!!
Did you get a DNA test and get the results?  For no additional cost - look what they are going to do for us!!!  All happening in March 2017

Each beautiful color represents a genetic community.

 Ancestry will now not only show you what genetic community you belong in, they will show you the migratory pattern of your people.  Can I get a What? What!

There was a contest of APP inventions to make things easier for our searching.....

New Innovations in Software and Apps

Twile is free to anyone!  
twile.com

Twile makes your family history more visual and engaging. Pull together all of your family's memories, photos and stories in the same place.

Import your family history to automatically create a visual timeline and then share it privately with the rest of your family.

Had fun meeting Jennie and Levi at Roots Tech.  Make sure you check out Jennie Merkley's site JOYFLIPS - The app is functional, easy and fun that you can do right on your phone.  No more pictures hanging around where you don't know what the information was on the back side!

http://www.joyflips.com/

KINDEX.ORG

I kind of loved this lady.  Her first slide said, "I AM A HOARDER".  Every Genealogist can relate to piles of papers and pictures and trying to sort and make sense of it all.

 Though she didn't do a super professional presentation, she still won the People's Choice Award for I think 14,000? or more!  Basically the takes boxes of love letters and documents, and you scan, tag and archive pictures and stories.  You import pictures to match the stories.  She wasn't really clear about the transposition from handwriting to printing so I can't really tell you more than that - but check out Kindex.org

QROMA.net

This one won the BIG award - upwards of 45,000.00 for developing an app.  That is my goal and I am nudging Ted to help me because he knows coding so much better than I do.  Ha - I can make it pretty; he can make it functional -great team.  Ok let's talk about Qromatag

If you design websites you are always wanting the search engines to pick up on your META TAGS i.e., searchable words, keywords, title, content, etc.,
This program uses more of the industry standards and does a better job of capturing the searchable data.

HERE ARE SOME SCREEN SHOTS THAT SHOW YOU CAN RECORD A LOVED ONE'S STORY, ATTACH META TAGS AND DISTRIBUTE TO FAMILY, OR OTHER GROUPS AS YOU DESIRE.

 

OLD NEWS USA
Using Newspapers as a database, it will probably be a free service
The IOS app will be out later - Android is ready now at revgenea.com

I have an account with Newspapers.com and though it is very helpful, I think this winner is really going places.  This is the first newspaper database which is able to download as an (IOS app version coming out very soon)  and the Android app is now available

Search Revgenea.com for more valuable information

If you have ever tried to search a Newspaper it is very difficult because Newspapers are scanned in via OCR - kind of what you see is what you get and the words they pick up are dicey and don't always correlate.  

For instance you want information on John Smith in Idaho 1948

It will pick up a newspaper and grab random words that don't correlate

JOHN Johnson of Rexburg........ The IDAHO state fair is coming....

Susan SMITH won the pie contest.....Miss IDAHO of 1948 was Ellen Goodman.

Revgenea.com is working to make this a much more correlated search and not random hit and miss.

EMBERALL

This did not win any awards but the concept is very trendy and a great idea.  She takes photos and records information onto the files.  It's worth a look.  Any archive is better than storing your precious memories in a damp garage or attic.

DOUBLEMATCHTRIANGULATOR.COM

 The story here is that he did the test on his 93 year old Great Uncle. Before the test came back he died. But that triangulation showed over 7,000 possibles and one definite. He was able to get info from that distant cousin to help further his research. The doublematchtriangulation.com tool is free  i CAN'T WAIT TO TRY THIS ONE!!!!

Just go to Ancestry and download the DATA - (letters and numbers) nothing pretty.  Then when you get another test, upload both to this tool.  Report back and let us know what you found!!!!






Levar Burton, Actor, Writer, Director, Storyteller was our Keynote Speaker one day....

If you saw Roots on Jan 1, 1977 - over 40 million people tuned into see the story of Kunta Kinte and his journey, as told by writer Alex Haley.

If you haven't seen it, rent it.  All 8 nights.  It was one of the first mini series on television and the most influential in so many peoples' lives and the the lives of Family History Consultants world over.  We watched a clip today and I was in tears through most of it.  Since then, upon doing my own research, I found that at least one of my ancestors was a Slave Owner.  I feel tremendous guilt over this and I hope that all this work we do will somehow in some very small part pay part of the debt my family owes to those people who were enslaved.

I know there were many "owners" who treated their people like family and were not mean.  I  also know that we hear too many times of the suffering and indignity that others endured at the hands of the nefarious greed of some owners.  I would like to believe that because I have so much compassion, maybe my ancestors were kind.  That's the only way I can live with this knowledge.

To quote Levar today:  "The only limitations you will ever have are the ones you place on yourself"

Finally - We were really impressed with the idea of recording our Ancestors voices and pictures before they pass and are lost until we see them again one day.

This idea of recording keeps them a little closer to your heart.

 We have lots  more but wanted you to know we are always thinking of things that will make Genealogy and Family Search more fun.  The best one we have found that really gets kids and young adults excited about this is called Storycorps.  Check it out!
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=storycorps

Shameless plug!
My novel just came out on Amazon.com- I hope you check it out. It's a fun and thrilling read.

Under Cover
Premise:
It’s 1990 and tensions between the United States and the Russian Government are high.. America needs to keep her guard up and this graduation will be the largest class in the history of the FBI. Two FBI agents struggle to get along with one another during attendance at the FBI Academy. They respect each other for their strengths, but they do not like each other and would never volunteer to work together. Upon Graduation, The Academy Director assigns them to work together to stop a Russian spy ring in California at Northrup. They know there is a leak, but are not clear on how the secrets are leaving the building. Plans for the newest Stealth Bomber are at risk. Not only do they have to work together, they need to be a newlywed couple in love...and Mormon because that is something the spies would never suspect. Andie winces when the Director says, "This is the Book of Mormon. Read it, Learn it, know it, Live it. That is all". They are to meet at the Dulles International Airport in the morning for their flight to California. This is their chance to prove their worth to their Country, crack the case and become heroes. A thrilling adventure awaits.