The 'Possible Records' are doing my head in

[At home in NZ]

Am I being too intolerant?? Those 'Possible xxxx Record' blue boxes in the middle of a profile are ridiculous.
They are worse than the Hints for accuracy.
I get 'Possible Marriage record' for people who died young. for dates after the person has died, for people I have joined together as partners.
If I do allow it to go to the search , the screen is presented with All Collections in the Collection field even though all my previous searches are set to England. That is really unhelpful.

It is also annoying me when I am forced to tick a box to say why I am deleting the 'Possible Record' screen.

It feels as though these Possible record suggestions have been occurring for a few months and recently been 'enhanced'.

When is Ancestry going to actually advise us of changes/enhancements, prior to introduction so that ALL users can have a say beforehand???

If there is an Off switch, I'd love to know where it is.

 

[Bob Spiers]

If I do allow it to go to the search , the screen is presented with All Collections in the Collection field even though all my previous searches are set to England. That is really unhelpful.

I agree generally with your comments but, in particular, with the one highlighted - reverting to "All Collections". This is currently happening all the time and drives me to distraction. So I change it back to UK & Ireland (my normal default)...until the next time. It has happened before (I am talking months, years) and I do eventually seem to stop it one way or another, I just can't remember what worked. I am sure it will get to the same point this time, just a matter of time. But if anyone knows how to prevent searches changing to All Collections at whim, please do tell, my sanity is at stake, and clearly that of AhinNZ.

Edit: believe it or not just after posting I recalled a note on my notice board (it is covered with all sorts of bits of paper, pinned for future reference..and then forgotten) and there it was - 'If the default changes in Ancestry to All Collections (or whatever) go to Home page - Search - click on more options and look for Collection Focus. If it shows All Collections' set it back to (in my case) UK & Ireland. I have just reset it and wait to see if it makes any difference.

 

[PhilGee]

The other, linked, irritation (or should that be "idiocy") is the the "collection focus" compatible place names usually appear near the end of the place name list if UK/Ireland is selected!

I do, however, understand a major re-write would be needed to change this to benefit a (relatively) small portion of the user base.

 

[Bob Spiers]

compatible place names usually appear near the end of the place name list if UK/Ireland is selected!

Not entirely sure I know what you mean about place names appearing at the end of the place name list, can you elaborate please?

 

[jorghes]

They do seem to be tinkering - I also get a green highlighted strip with something along the lines of "Possible [B / M / D] Records" and the green search button.

These green bars only appear when a marriage or birth is missing, and I presume it would work similarly with a death for a suitable person on your tree. (I was working with live people most recently, so no hints for their deaths!)

But the change I was finding most interesting was the removal of the number of new hints from the leaf on the top right of any page (next to your name) and its replacement with a small green dot. And yesterday, after adding information to a person, the top navigation bar had a small "hints loading" (or something along those lines) with the three progress dots you see in messages when someone is typing. After a couple of seconds it disappeared and a green dot appeared next to the leaf.

 

[Helen7]

Those 'Possible xxxx Record' blue boxes in the middle of a profile are ridiculous.

I agree, pretty useless, but I haven't found a way of turning off this feature. As jorghes says, they always seem to appear when you haven't recorded a birth, marriage or death. Even when you have both birth and death and the person died as a child, you still get the box to search for a marriage. I just ignore them, but they are annoying.

But the change I was finding most interesting was the removal of the number of new hints from the leaf on the top right of any page (next to your name) and its replacement with a small green dot.

I don't have any numbers next to this leaf, nor any green dots. When I click on it, I get the message 'You have no recent hints in your tree', bizarrely followed by a drop-down menu to 'See all recent hints in...' with a list of all the trees I have access to. Then when I select one of my trees, I can see thousands of hints, including new ones for people I've just added. I can't remember when the number next to the leaf disappeared (it was always 99+ for me, so not very useful), but it was many months ago.

 

[At home in NZ]

the change I was finding most interesting was the removal of the number of new hints from the leaf on the top right of any page (next to your name) and its replacement with a small green dot

I haven't had that yet, mine has 99+ almost obscuring the leaf.

These green bars only appear when a marriage or birth is missing, and I presume it would work similarly with a death for a suitable person on your tree

This is exactly what my opener is all about. It is most annoying to see a possible marriage when the person died at a very young age. It's such a waste of time.

Home page - Search - click on more options and look for Collection Focus.

Can we have a screen shot please, I can't find this.

 

[jorghes]

I don't have any numbers next to this leaf, nor any green dots. When I click on it, I get the message 'You have no recent hints in your tree', bizarrely followed by a drop-down menu to 'See all recent hints in...' with a list of all the trees I have access to. Then when I select one of my trees, I can see thousands of hints, including new ones for people I've just added. I can't remember when the number next to the leaf disappeared (it was always 99+ for me, so not very useful), but it was many months ago.

That may suggest that you have switched off hints? I only get hints for one of my trees, because I turned off the notifications for all the other trees, that means that they don't appear when you click on the leaf in the navigation bar.

It hasn't appeared on more than one of my tabs - I tend to have 2-3 open to Ancestry (one is always open to Ancestry DNA), but only one of them - the one I used the most, has changed to the green dot rather than the number.

 

[Helen7]

That may suggest that you have switched off hints?

I don't remember turning them off, but it seems I must have done (just checked on the site preferences page), but it doesn't really matter as I can see them all if I click on 'see all recent hints' for the relevant tree. I can also see the hints for each individual when viewing that person's page.

 

[Bob Spiers]

↑

Home page - Search - click on more options and look for Collection Focus.
Can we have a screen shot please, I can't find this.

Yes below; but whilst changing the 'Collection Focus' to the one you want instead of 'All Collections' -where it used to work and remain - this time round I am not so sure. But here is where and how to locate it on the Home Page.

#1 Scroll down until you find this



#2 Click on 'Show more options' and you will get this



Change All Collection to the one you use as your default. Whether it will remain as such is another matter, but it used to work is all I can really say.

 

[peter]

This is exactly what my opener is all about. It is most annoying to see a possible marriage when the person died at a very young age. It's such a waste of time.

You might not make mistakes, but other Ancestry users do - there is plenty of evidence for that. I'm not ashamed to admit that I sometimes make mistakes, especially on the fringes of my tree where it is hard to justify spending a lot of time looking for someone who just disappears.

Prior to the release of the GRO's online death indexes, which give age at death from 1837-65, there were a few twigs where I had assumed that the individual had passed away - there was a death in the right district, the person didn't appear on any later censuses, and there was no plausible marriage that I could find. I rarely buy a death certificate for someone who isn't a direct ancestor - I'd need to win the lottery to buy every certificate for every person in my tree.

We need to stay open to the possibility that we're wrong - although DNA helps enormously, there are still relatively few circumstances in which we can absolutely certain. Sometimes an entire mound of evidence can be undermined by a single deception, one that goes right back to the individual's birth.

 

[PhilGee]

Not entirely sure I know what you mean about place names appearing at the end of the place name list, can you elaborate please?

Bob, perhaps "end" is a slight exaggeration try:-

On the Ancestry home page select UK & Ireland for the search (which does not "stick" between sessions) and type "som" in the "Place ..." box; then add "e" and "r" whilst watching the selection list. You have to type "somerset, en" to get "Somerset, England" at the top of the list (it is then the only entry!).

For completeness, "swa" has "Swansea, Glamorgan, Wales" second in the list and "Swansea, Wales" sixth

 

[At home in NZ]

it used to work is all I can really say.

Thanks Bob for the screen shot. It used to work is the operative phrase, it doesn't anymore which is why I raised the point. It's like the number of records you want displayed, set it at 50 and it turns back to 25!!

 

[Bob Spiers]

Thanks Bob for the screen shot. It used to work is the operative phrase, it doesn't anymore which is why I raised the point. It's like the number of records you want displayed, set it at 50 and it turns back to 25!!

Yes agree, and just the tip of the iceberg I think, as Ancestry seems to have determined that he will not let go of some of its defaults, as changes I make (like you) last barely to the search or enquiry in hand, then revert back. There has to be a way to prevent this but have yet to discover what that is. Perhaps someone else knows how?