* Ancestry, Find My Past or My Heritage?

[GeneSniper]

Hi All,

I am not at the stage in my re-do of the tree that I need some inspiration, but it won't be too long. My question to you is, are any of the above sites (or any others for that matter) worth paying a subscription for? I did have a subscription for Ancestry many years ago when I had FTM, but I presume things have moved on since then. The hints on Ancestry were great help at times, but I never added anything from them to my tree if I couldn't prove it. Please also take into account that most of my family are Scottish/Irish, as I know that some sites were not so hot with those records a few years ago and most of my hints on ancestry came from other peoples tree's which were rather sketchy to say the least.

Another question about this I have is, what is the best way if I do take a subscription to upload information. I know how to do it, I mean just put the basic information BMD or add complete tree (sources, images). This is more an Ancestry/any other question as the hints from MH and FMP are already on Family Historian.

WF

[tatewise]

There have been discussions along similar lines before in Find my Past... or Ancestry ? (15275) and Internet Data Match hints from FamilySearch? (16111) and others.

The first thing to recognise is that it makes no difference how the 'hints' are signalled; whether directly on a website or via the FH Internet Data Match feature; nothing migrates into FH automatically. In every case the 'hints' must be carefully ratified, and when satisfied they are genuine, only then should Individual, Source, and other records be created in FH using downloaded Media images where appropriate.

It is never advisable to download and merge family tree branches wholesale.

Just as good are the Lookup Missing Census Facts and Lookup Missing BMD Records Plugins that offer filtered searches for missing details from chosen Individuals and support Ancestry, FindMyPast, FamilySearch, and MyHeritage.

One snag with FH 'hints' is that they take no account of existing Source Citations in your Project.
Another is that you must bring the Individual into the Focus Window to see the 'hints'.

Obtaining 'hints' has little to do with having a subscription, as mostly they work without one. Even most searches can go a long way without a subscription, and there are many websites offering free searches and some source documents are free. What a subscription does is allow you to inspect and download the source document records that are otherwise hidden, and also access other subscriber's family trees.

Checkout research:useful_research_web_sites|> Useful Research Web Sites for the most popular sites available, especially under Scotland, and note that some public libraries subscribe to Ancestry/FMP granting free access for members.

BTW: Not all 'hints' are the same; some only signal matches with a subset of source records, whereas others also match with other subscriber's family trees.

[GeneSniper]

Forgot about Ancestry at my local library, Mike. From what I remember you could only search for individual information on Ancestry at the library, you couldn't use it to get hints by uploading a Gedcom or hints from other users trees. But good call.

I downloaded your plugins and will try them out. I have never really used any plugins apart from the one that was suggested to me from another post.

[AnneEast]

If most of your family are From Scotland, then you can't beat Scotland's People, which you pay for in a different way. Non of the other three sites you mention have the details because they were not allowed to.

Getting hints is NOT the same as searching for the records yourself and could lead you seriously astray, although it can be useful to glance through them. You'd need to assess each site to see if it has the records you might need. Personally I subscribe to both Ancestry and FMP because they both hold separate records that I need.

Anne

[GeneSniper]

I agree Anne, I use ScotlandsPeople a lot. There are just a few things that can be hard to get past without a little luck or a hint. When doing a part of my wife's family (only 2 generations back) , I was stuck at one part for about 8 months and then Ancestry came up with a census hint for McGaddia instead of McGrady and cracked that line wide open. The wife who was head of the house due to her husband being a merchant seaman was Irish and that's what it must have sounded like to the scotsman writing the details down. I always took hints with a pinch of salt unless I could prove them myself, especially if it was something transcribed which that hint was. However off to ScotlandsPeople I went and sure enough there was the McGaddia's entry in the census.

Sometimes you can get a hint that you may have never found any other way, although you may have eventually found the information another way. Even down to someone mentioning in a reply to me on here the other day about times being normally put on an English birth entry only for twins. Well the McGaddia census was the only mention of his twin due to her dying before the next census. Without that census I would never have found my wife's grandfather was born in Birkenhead as his family were all born and brought up in the Glasgow area. I had spent most of my time searching for them in Scotland, as none of his children knew he was born in England or was a twin.

As you said I will have to assess the sites to see if any have the information I need. I was just asking here in case anyone had experience of them from the Scottish/Irish side. I will wait until I have redone my tree and then try the free trials to see if any suit me.

Thanks all, for the advice

[tatewise]

Unfortunately, my Lookup Missing ... Plugins do not search ScotlandsPeople.
( I cannot remember why they were omitted. It may be that their URL search format is illogical or inconsistent. )
Nevertheless, the search criteria and records help identify the missing records you need to search for.

[AnneEast]

As I understand it, hints do not come from some Ancestry (or other site) algorithms but are produced by the number of subscribers who attach them to their trees. There are many, many times when I have gone and easily found the record I need but it has not been produced as a hint because no one else has used it. I wouldn't mind betting that your example of a mis interpretation of a name was originally found by a subscriber, used by others and then generated as a hint.
Anne (aka Cynic!)

[AdrianBruce]

As I understand it, hints do not come from some Ancestry (or other site) algorithms but are produced by the number of subscribers who attach them to their trees. There are many, many times when I have gone and easily found the record I need but it has not been produced as a hint ...

I think that Ancestry definitely use trees as part of the hinting process - the hints cover both other people's trees and historical records. However, I suspect that the non-appearance of records as hints has something to do with the scope of Ancestry's hints at any one time. My impression is that at any one time, Ancestry have not produced all the hints for all the people in my tree - I say this because if I go and look at a part of my tree (possibly only look????) then a short time after, I get hints for the area that I've been looking at - that surely can't be to do with other people making updates to their trees. It's as if Ancestry produces x-hundred hints and then stops to let me get on with adding those hinted records. Usually I don't, of course, so if I go to another area, the software effectively says, "Well, how about these hints for you - any more interest?"

[DonF]

That's sort of how Ancestry hints work - if you put up a tree, you'll get no hints, initially. As soon as you look at any part of your tree in tree view, the Ancestry fairies will start sprinkling hints, but ONLY for the parts of your tree you've looked at. If you want to get ALL the hints, you need to work your way through looking at all of your tree.
I'm not sure what happens if you never look at any part of your tree, but if people lodge new information in their trees for people on your tree, then these also get given to you.