Automatic uploading of References to Lost Cousins

[At home in NZ]

I am now using version 7.6.4 and I'm not sure that I am understanding the 1881 reports I have run.
I am looking at the report for records on file to enter. They all have Unknown Census refs, when sorted by census name some of the people are listed twice and some are listed four times.
When I check them by name and census year in My Ancestors I can find all those I have, so far, looked for.
Why?

My results are
Lost Cousins facts recorded:

1881 England & Wales Census: 118 LC Records, 17 Missing LC Record
1841 England & Wales Census: 43 LC Records, 2 Missing LC Record
1911 England & Wales Census: 97 LC Records, 162 Missing LC Record
————————————————————————————————————————————————————
1881 Scotland Census: 3 LC Records, 0 Missing LC Record
1911 Ireland Census: 0 LC Records, 0 Missing LC Record
1881 Canada Census: 0 LC Records, 0 Missing LC Record
————————————————————————————————————————————————————
1880 US Census: 0 LC Records, 0 Missing LC Record
1940 US Census: 0 LC Records, 0 Missing LC Record
————————————————————————————————————————————————————
Totals: 258 Lost Cousin Records, 181 Missing Lost Cousins Record

You have 181 Census facts with no Lost Cousins fact
Use the Updates tab to automatically upload them today.
Use the Lost Cousins Website Link to join if you aren't already a member.

 

[Bryman]

They all have Unknown Census refs,

Do you mean that all of the census refs are new for My Ancestors page?

when sorted by census name some of the people are listed twice and some are listed four times.

Where you have multiple instances of individuals with identical names on My Ancestors page, is there a variation in the age (YoB)? Are there any other differences? Is one instance correct as you would expect so that the others may be safely deleted?

 

[At home in NZ]

Do you mean that all of the census refs are new for My Ancestors page?

I mean the report is saying there is an unknown census ref but those people are in My Ancestors page.
I have put together the attached doc which shows discrepancies in FTA. It is a different tree form the one I was looking at in my previous post.
It is making me wonder how much I can trust FTA.

 

[Bryman]

I mean the report is saying there is an unknown census ref but those people are in My Ancestors page.

I'm sorry but I do not understand the phrase 'Unknown Census Ref'. What does it mean and what produces it? It is not a term that I have seen before.

 

[Bryman]

I have put together the attached doc which shows discrepancies in FTA. It is a different tree form the one I was looking at in my previous post.

The report showing 3 instances of Emily Smith might at first look like duplicates but the Family ID is different for each so FTA has been told that Emily Smith appears in 3 families. Is that what you have in your tree?

 

[Tim]

Hi, I've had a look at your doc thank you. Hopefully I can help. But the good news is that you can trust FTA. FTA only ever reports on what it finds in your gedcom.

GEDCOM from tree in FTM - Errors/fixes tab
This is just letting you know that this person doesn't have a full dob considering that it has a 1939 record.

GEDCOM from tree in Ancestry - Errors/fixes tab. I have checked these people, their gender is correct
I also had these errors, and they are difficult to find and sort. Where I had some errors was in some of the marriage facts that Ancestry finds and that I added.
What I didn't notice at the time was that they had offered me the wrong spouse record for the spouse I was adding it to. I had to remove the incorrect facts and that sorted my issues.

GEDCOM from tree in FTM - Lost Cousins tab and GEDCOM from tree in Ancestry - Lost Cousins tab
I have never tried using my Ancestry gedcom in FTA. I just sync my trees and use the gedcom from FTM as it's much quicker, and tbh, I don't trust the gedcom from Ancestry. However, even though my trees are in sync, I do find differences between my trees.
I'm not sure why there would be a difference between the Ancestry and FTA gedcoms for this table. The good thing is that the total numbers are virtually the same, i.e. if you add the added and missing for FTM it equals the missing amount from Ancestry. Where the numbers are different could be down to how things have been reported out to the gedcoms.

In Reports tab in GED from Ancestry
This report identifies potentials and is based around families. If you then used the report on the next tab, you would only see one entry.
Here's an example from my next load. Henry mentioned twice.


By pressing this button highlighted, on the Updates tab


You can see Henry is only going to be loaded once



In Reports tab in GED from FTM
Please see my explainaton above.

 

[Alexander Bisset]

Sorry late to the conversation.

The 181 census facts to upload to Lost Cousins indicates you have 181 facts you haven't got recorded as being already entered on Lost Cousins. Now it appears that all of these were missing a census reference that the program could recognise.

The idea is that if the program can find a valid census reference it records that against the census record. If it can't then it cannot do anything with the Lost Cousins site as by definition Lost Cousins REQUIRES a census reference. That's the core of how Lost Cousins works checking you have a census reference for each person. So sadly FTAnalyzer cannot help automate the upload if it doesn't find a census reference.

As Tim has pointed out it's possible to use various reports to identify candidate uploads and then enter census references for those census facts. Typically this is done in the source for the census as the reference will typically be the same for everyone tagged with that source. If you are able to add census references to your data file that not only enhances the records you're keeping by giving a verifiable census reference, it allows FTAnalyzer to automate the process of loading your records to Lost Cousins webste.

 

[At home in NZ]

Sorry late to the conversation.

Better late than never so they say.
I underrtsnad how FTA works, my document was actually pointing out the differences between FTA's interpretation of a GED from a tree in Ancestry and a GED from FTM for the exact same tree. The trees are in sync.
However it may be because I am using the FTA downloaded from GitHub which you have pointed out is the wrong thing to do (in the discussion FTAnaliser latest version will not install).
I'll read the comprehensive instructions and install the correct version.

 

[At home in NZ]

If you are able to add census references to your data file that not only enhances the records you're keeping by giving a verifiable census reference, it allows FTAnalyzer to automate the process of loading your records to Lost Cousins webste.

The references should be in my data file, I use Ancestry.
Ancestry is supposed to capture the census reference as you attach the census to a person’s profile.

I have figured out that the report entitled ‘Incompatible Census References in Records to Upload to Lost Cousins Website’ lists the people that are shown as Missing Lost Cousins in the Reports tab.
I have three family trees

Tree 1 (Maynard) there are 181 Missing Lost Cousins Records. The report shows 181 rows containing 174 individuals and 78 families.
Number of rows matches number of missing persons.

Tree 2 (Tyler) there are 798 Missing Lost Cousins Records. The report shows 525 rows containing 470 individuals and 173 families
Number of rows does not match number of missing persons.

Tree 3 (O’Malley) there are 421 Missing Lost Cousins Records. The report shows 210 rows containing 192 individuals and 72 families.
Number of rows does not match number of missing persons.

In the report, in the column for Census Reference there is a mix of ‘Unknown Census ref’ and ‘Piece xxxx Schedule missing’ and ‘Piece xxx Book x Folio missing’.

The total number of individuals is 836, seeing as I do not have any control of how Ancestry allocates or does not allocate the correct reference number I can do nothing about it. Even if I could I am not keen to make changes to that many people in my tree.

Furthermore, the small number of people that are supposed to have been added to LC are not appearing in LC. Is there a time lag?

 

[Bryman]

seeing as I do not have any control of how Ancestry allocates or does not allocate the correct reference number I can do nothing about it.

What makes you think that Ancestry allocates correct census reference numbers? I always manually assign reference numbers to individuals in my tree when I find those individuals in the various census records.

the small number of people that are supposed to have been added to LC are not appearing in LC. Is there a time lag?

There is no time lag. Updates to LC are immediate. If they do not appear then there must be a reason why they have been ignored/rejected. For instance, if you have not entered census reference numbers in your tree then FTA will not have that information to put in the GEDCOM and LC will not be able to process such updates.

The idea is that if the program can find a valid census reference it records that against the census record. If it can't then it cannot do anything with the Lost Cousins site as by definition Lost Cousins REQUIRES a census reference. That's the core of how Lost Cousins works checking you have a census reference for each person. So sadly FTAnalyzer cannot help automate the upload if it doesn't find a census reference.

 

[At home in NZ]

Updates to LC are immediate. If they do not appear then there must be a reason why they have been ignored/rejected.

When I used the upload button in FTA it gave the number of people it had added to LC and the number it couldn't load. There was nothing added to LC.
I am not seeing things.

 

[At home in NZ]

What makes you think that Ancestry allocates correct census reference numbers?

I checked one person and found the correct ref is in the census record when viewed in the Citation information window, i.e.
Detail
Class: RG11; Piece: 3474; Folio: 74; Page: 2; GSU roll: 1341832.

BUT, when you select Edit, the reference looks like this:
Class: RG11; Piece: 3474; Folio: 74; Page: 2; GSU roll: 1341832.

Which field is FTA programmed to search?

 

[Bryman]

The " " appearing in your second example just inserts a blank space without having the space character terminate the string so the two examples are equivalent.

I don't know which field is appropriate to contain that information in Ancestry or FTM. I use GenoPro but due to my own laziness, I often supply the required information as a Note/Comment, such as . . .
"1911 census - Piece 730, SN 399 - living at 34 Little King Street, Camden Town, London."
Sometimes I also enter that information later in the correct entry form for "Sources" and "Contact" within GenoPro, but not always. It is always safest to use the official section but Alexander has been very kind to accept similar information wherever he finds it, if FTA can recognize it. If you find out what the official section/field is supposed to be used in FTM then FTA should have no trouble finding the data.

 

[At home in NZ]

If you find out what the official section/field is supposed to be used in FTM then FTA should have no trouble finding the data.

I have been using Ancestry to build my trees for more than 10 years and have never once entered a source citation.

I can’t find anything in the how to build your tree in Ancestry which tells you to add a source citation when you save a record such as a census.

Owing to the very high number of Unknown refs that FTA is reporting it makes me think there is something wrong somewhere. i do not belive it is of my making.

 

[peter]

What makes you think that Ancestry allocates correct census reference numbers?

They certainly won't do this for half of 1841 entries (because the folio number is wrong due to a misunderstanding), and they won't include the schedule number for 1911 entries (because they appear not to have captured this data). But Ancestry use the LDS version of the 1881 Census so I would hope they would get those references correct!

 

[At home in NZ]

Ancestry use the LDS version of the 1881 Census so I would hope they would get those references correct!

Seems not, see upload.

 

[jorghes]

Just as a side note - often when the "gender is incorrect in the marriage" error comes up (I'm sorry, I forget the specific way this is written), but FTM has a habit of adding "unknown spouse" to marriages when no other spouse is assigned (even if the person already has a spouse). This "unknown spouse" is an empty slot, and doesn't always have a gender and thus can force a female person into the "male" position in a marriage.

The fix is reasonably simple, check the marriage fact - and that it is attached to the correct spouse and not an "unknown spouse" and then detach the initial person from the "unknown spouse".

 

[Bryman]

I can’t find anything in the how to build your tree in Ancestry which tells you to add a source citation when you save a record such as a census.

Ah! I am beginning to see the light. As far as Ancestry is concerned, census references are not mandatory . . . but they are for LC !!

The "&nbsp." appearing in your second example just inserts a blank space without having the space character terminate the string so the two examples are equivalent.

"&nbsp." is an HTML tag for 'Non-Breaking SPace' but FTA is not expecting to be reading HTML so you do not want such tags in the GEDCOM file. I see that your attached FTA report in your latest post includes "Unknown Census Reference" followed by "&nbsp.", or it would if you widened the column, so that is the problem.
If you replace each instance of this tag with a blank space character, you may find that your troubles disappear when the file is submitted to LC. Note: there could be thousands of instances to be changed so I suggest that you take a backup copy of the file and then use an editor to change all instances of "&nbsp." to " " before submitting the changed file to LC. I would probably use SPF Lite, having been a mainframe software developer, but it may be possible to use something like Notepad too.

 

[Alexander Bisset]

I have been using Ancestry to build my trees for more than 10 years and have never once entered a source citation.

I can’t find anything in the how to build your tree in Ancestry which tells you to add a source citation when you save a record such as a census.

Owing to the very high number of Unknown refs that FTA is reporting it makes me think there is something wrong somewhere. i do not belive it is of my making.

Could you email me a snippet of your GEDCOM that includes the unknown references it may be there's a tweak I can do to fix the way it's recording. Whilst Bryman is right that   is a code for "non breaking space" I'm not sure that my pattern recognition would take that into account so it might be that it actually sees   and that doesn't match the pattern. If so I can add an option to replace those with a space before it checks the reference for a pattern.

If I have a test example I can fix this. My email is ftanalyzer@gmail.com

 

[At home in NZ]

If I have a test example I can fix this. My email is ftanalyzer@gmail.com

Done.