Family Historian User Group

Good afternoon everyone,

After a bit of a break I am trying to get back to some family history research and make the most of the hundreds, if not thousands of Internet Data Matches from FindMyPast that have appeared on my Family Historian family tree. Despite trawling through the FHUG Forums and Knowledge Base and the Family Historian web site I cannot find any information about how to actually make the best use of the matches. I seem to be limited to either accepting or rejecting them but feel that I should be able to do much more. For example, to attach the transcript and image (where there is one) and obtain a proper citation without having to actually download the record and manually attach it. However, if this facility exists it has, so far, eluded me. Apologies if I have missed something here and perhaps someone would be kind enough to please point me in the right direction.

Regards,

Gerry

You are expecting too much Gerry.
The 'hints' only offer a shortcut to discovering the records.
They do not provide any automatic download or citation of records.

Did you try searching for Internet Data Matches in the Knowledge Base?
That reveals how_to:internet_data_matches|> Internet Data Matches and that offers a cross-ref to Automatic Internet Data Matching on the FH web site that explains the process.

However, the how_to:copy_paste_and_drag_drop|> Copy & Paste and Drag & Drop techniques described there will work with FH but not so well with AS if that is your preferred data entry tool.

Also, the 'hints' take no account of Source Citations you already have recorded.
So you may find you are simply rejecting the majority of 'hints' because you already have the records.
In that case the two Plugins mentioned in the how_to:internet_data_matches|> Internet Data Matches may be a better option and they support more than FindMyPast and MyHeritage. However, the download and citation process is still manual.

Thanks for your quick response, Mike.

Yes, I suspected that I was expecting too much although, interestingly, your reference to the Drag & Drop guide may have been what I vaguely recall and thinking that a whole record could be simply dragged to a person's record.

I did read the KB article on Internet Data Matches and have now also read the page on the FH site. However, for someone who has a different expectation of what can actually be achieved, the page is less than helpful:

When you a view a match, you need to decide if it is a correct match or not. If it is correct, and if the record contains details that you don’t already have, you will want to copy this data into Family Historian. When updating your records from data provider web pages, you can use copy-and-paste (press Ctrl-C to copy and Ctrl-V to paste). Or you can use drag-and-drop from the Web Search window, to drag the text into fields in the person’s record in the Property Box. Either way you can update your records without having to do any typing.

Perhaps Calico Pie might wish to review this page and make it clear that you cannot simply drag all "the text" in one action into multiple "fields", which is what I suspect many users hope is possible. The same comments apply to the next section about Automatic Source Citation and that section should, logically, be placed before the instructions for Drag and Drop in relation to the actual data.

So you may find you are simply rejecting the majority of 'hints' because you already have the records.

That isn't the way I work. If the hint matches what I already have then I accept it as correct rather than reject it because I already have that record, which is, I think, what Calico Pie imply is the preferred method.

Yes, I think you now have the gist of what is on offer.

OK, whether you Accept or Reject the 'hints' you already have recorded is not the point.
It is that existing Source Citations are not considered when raising 'hints' so you may waste a lot of time.
Also you have to bring people into the Focus Window to initiate their 'hints'.

Whereas, the two Plugins do take Source Citations into account, and you choose who to investigate, and which websites to search.

... the two Plugins do take Source Citations into account, and you choose who to investigate, and which websites to search.

I'll have a look at them.

Many thanks.