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  • It's easier than ever before to check your entries from the 1881 Census - more details here

My Ancestors beta

Great tool Peter, whilst quite surprised and disappointed at the mistakes I've made, this has allowed me to make corrections.
Mostly I used the wrong set of numbers on some 1911 entries. But whilst revisiting the 1911 transcriptions, I have come across some awful transcriber errors. I think that I was initially only interested in the images of the original census forms, which of course we use to enter data on our Lost Cousins pages.
 
AndyMick said:
As I work though the 1841 census checking, it raises a question - for many Micklethwaites, the transcriptions on FMP and Ancestry differ, sometimes considerably. Does this matter?
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It shouldn't matter if there are differences as members take their information from the image when the transcription is wrong.
I've also found differences in page numbers on FMP and Ancestry on 1881 :(
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I suspect you'll find that you've been searching for someone who wasn't the head of the household. Ancestry and Findmypast use the same (LDS) transcription, but where a household is split between two pages Findmypast use two sets of references.
 
Correcting errors gained me a cousin match, so thanks for that. Unfortunately it takes the score to only three, and two of those date back to 2011. Slim pickings for listing more than 800 ancestors. Errors fell into two categories: mistyping and misreading. The former were mainly fat-finger clumsiness on the 1911 census. The other came from confusion over instructions. The 1841 transcripts, for instance, do not always match Peter's advice on folio/page numbers. The 1940 US census was not part of the exercise but that caused me great confusion when it came out as Peter asks for the "NARA roll number". It took some time to realise that transcripts call this the "Affiliate Film Number".
 
DavidL said:
Correcting errors gained me a cousin match, so thanks for that. Unfortunately it takes the score to only three, and two of those date back to 2011. Slim pickings for listing more than 800 ancestors.
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David, we'll all find many, many more cousins when the rest of the members - the ones who haven't yet been invited to join the forum, or who have only received an invite recently - complete their My Ancestors page.

The primary reason this forum exists is to provide a platform whereby those of us who have entered our relatives can encourage the rest to play their part in the project. Peer pressure will achieve far more than I ever could.

Unfortunately someone who reads your comments is likely to be discouraged from entering their relatives - it's important that when we whinge we direct our complaints at the only people who can actually help - our cousins!

Remember too that, for someone who has yet to enter their relatives, it's the 250 relatives you've entered from the 1881 Census that's really the relevant statistic, not the 800 total. Always consider the impact of what you say will have on other members - anyone of whom could be a 'lost cousin' of yours.
Errors fell into two categories: mistyping and misreading. The former were mainly fat-finger clumsiness on the 1911 census. The other came from confusion over instructions. The 1841 transcripts, for instance, do not always match Peter's advice on folio/page numbers.
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Are you following the advice on the FAQs page? I didn't address the 1841 Census in my newsletter article because I wanted members who hadn't completed their My Ancestors page to focus on the 1881 Census.
 
peter said:
I suspect you'll find that you've been searching for someone who wasn't the head of the household. Ancestry and Findmypast use the same (LDS) transcription, but where a household is split between two pages Findmypast use two sets of references.
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True for the one that's still visible on my browser - I'll bear that in mind.
 
Just a comment in case it helps someone else - the link obviously doesn't work on the 1881 if the folio number is followed by 'a', which we are instructed to omit, probably so a match can be made.
 
AndyMick said:
Just a comment in case it helps someone else - the link obviously doesn't work on the 1881 if the folio number is followed by 'a', which we are instructed to omit, probably so a match can be made.
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The 'A' suffix is extremely rare - a suffix was added only when a page was inadvertently missed during the numbering process. If you know that the folio number had an A suffix you can edit the URL by hand, so you might want to include a note to this effect against the head of household.
 
A great idea Peter. I've just been through my entries for 1841 and 1911. Found a few errors of mine. However I found even more transcription errors which I have taken the opportunity to correct.
 
peter said:
I can't alter what Findmypast show in response to a search - they offer various options to reorder the results, but none of those will display the results in the order they appear on the page. By all means post a suggestion on the Findmypast feedback forum if you think it's an option they ought to offer.
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Using the comments from this forum discussion, I did post a suggestion on the FMP feedback forum requesting the ability to display the search results in the same order as the original document. I have just received a reply saying . . .
"This appears to be a bug, we've passed it on to our team and they'll repair it as soon as they can."
Let's hope that it doesn't take long.
 
Perhaps they are calling it a bug because the order was supposed to be like the original document. I am not going to argue. As a bug, it is likely to be 'fixed' sooner than if it were a suggested improvement needing much support indicated from other users.
 
peter said:
I've just uploaded a beta version of the My Ancestors page which allows you to check the census references you've entered by clicking the
edit_grey.gif
symbol alongside. The search results appear in a new tab. For the 1881 Census (where we use the transcription) it's also an opportunity to check your entry.
Is this a useful feature?
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I have been reading all the posts regarding this new addition to the Lost Cousins site and wondered if I should check my "My Ancestors" list for errors:rolleyes:. I'm very careful when I add to my list, surely I couldn't have made any mistakes........ WRONG !!! Thank you Peter, what a useful addition, I had heaps wrong, mainly in the 1911 census where I had used the RG78PN number instead of the RG14PN number:oops: Still no more matches but at least I have a better chance now.
 
Really useful tool Peter - picked up a couple of typos & a few ref errors almost all being folio numbers
 
Peter - just noticed - the menu box on the "beta" My Ancestors page appears to have lost format in my browser (Firefox 32) - the Edit Household is split and out of alignment.
 
Phew! Finally finished checking all the census references I've entered for "My Ancestors". It's taken me a while but would have taken much longer without this checking tool, so I agree it's really useful. I did find an error in one 1841 reference - it's one that came originally from an index and I spotted it as being incorrect a while back and changed in my records, but didn't think to change it at Lost Cousins.

Another useful asset of the tool is, that in the process of checking, I noticed quite a few transcription errors at FMP which I was able to report.
 
AndyMick said:
Peter - just noticed - the menu box on the "beta" My Ancestors page appears to have lost format in my browser (Firefox 32) - the Edit Household is split and out of alignment.
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Threw me for a minute - it isn't 'Edit Household', the word Household should be on the end of the line (it's the Household sort option).

I must have made the My Ancestors beta graphic too large - as it's only temporary I may leave it as it is for now.
 
Having problems using the arrow check today. Response to all attempts is: "Object moved to . " [it includes that dot]. Something wrong with my setup? It's worked OK up till now.
 
DavidL said:
Having problems using the arrow check today. Response to all attempts is: "Object moved to . " [it includes that dot]. Something wrong with my setup? It's worked OK up till now.
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You're probably using Adblock Plus - if so you'll need to disable it for the Lost cousins site. Probably a good idea to disable it for this forum too.
 
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