Records that need checking

[AndyMick]

Following the suggestion in Peter's recent newsletter, I have been inputting households for the 400+ soldiers on Crich (Derbyshire) War Memorial. I'm doing this to help my friend who is researching them, and seeking more information on some of them. Over the last month I have input over 1500 names, mainly on the 1911 census for England, and had 3 matches (which is where my friend takes over).

I now have a number of "records that need checking". As far as I can tell, this implies that someone else has previously input the details for the person on the census, but the details are not 100% matched. If we could only agree on how the entry should be transcribed we'd have a match. I carefully checked the census image, and clicked "confirm" - and the potential match disappeared. Confirming doesn't seem the best strategy

So I have a number of questions:

• How have others made best use of this near-miss? If the other person believes his entry is the correct one, we will never match - unless I can work out what detail they entered that is different.
• When, if ever, does the other person get notified that their records now need checking?
• In a list of 1500+ names, is there as easy way to find those that need checking? Find in text in the browser doesn't work as the exclamation mark is an image. Selecting all details and copy/paste to Excel shows the exclamation mark only as an image again, which can't be searched for.

TIA Andy.

 

[peter]

"Records that need checking" may be near misses with other members but the fuzzy matching algorithm is fairly primitive, and about half of the time the 'match' is with someone in the same household of the same age and with a similar name. Where there are two entries by different members the exclamation marks will show up on the My Ancestors pages for both members.

Most of the time the discrepancy is in the forename and there will usually be full matches between other family members. However if it is the surname that has been spelled differently it could affect the entire household.

At one time emails were sent to both members but these caused so much confusion that this had to be stopped at a very early stage - they now come to me instead. When I have time I check them out and most of the time it transpires that the member concerned has already made the necessary correction.

It would probably be ideal if after clicking Search and new matches or outstanding near matches were sorted to the top of the page - I'll take a look at the code and see whether that change is within my limited capabilities.

 

[Tim]

I've had a similar issue to Andy. I had a whole household that matched, apart from one person which came up as needing to be checked. So I checked the source data again, confirmed it, and it's no longer a possible match. But the rest of the household is matched. Instead of disappearing, it would be nice for it to change to a green question mark.

That way you would know it was a match with someone but the data was different. It would also be nice to see who the match was with.

 

[peter]

I've had a similar issue to Andy. I had a whole household that matched, apart from one person which came up as needing to be checked. So I checked the source data again, confirmed it, and it's no longer a possible match. But the rest of the household is matched.

I really don't want to encourage people to enter data carelessly or to leave it as incorrect even after they have been asked to check it.

If you have a match with someone on the rest of the household isn't the best solution to ask them to correct their entry?

 

[AndyMick]

One particular mis-match is rather interesting - Frederick W Collins is the name on the census, but Ancestry have transcribed it as Cellins (looks like Collins on the image to me!!). He is not with family, but resident with the family who own the shop (Yeomans) RG14 20982 SN215. However, it is believed he was registered at birth as Frederick William Beresford in 1897 (variations on Beresford are rife!) and is on the memorial as such.

If I change something (e.g. surname to Cellins) then confirm, the exclamation mark disappears - so I've deleted it and re-input the original details in the hope that the other member will notice and check their entry - maybe!

 

[Alexander Bisset]

I have been inputting households for the 400+ soldiers on Crich (Derbyshire) War Memorial. I'm doing this to help my friend who is researching them, and seeking more information on some of them

Andy is your friend aware of the new Lives of the First World War site? The site is due to launch in May and they will have a feature to group together into a "Community" everyone who appears on a war memorial. For each individual there is a "Life Story" to which you can attach facts such as 1911 census entries, births/deaths/marriages as well as military service. Others will be entering things such as linking War diaries for a regiment so that different sources build up a story of the individuals and give a far more detailed and accessible archive than has ever been possible before.

 

[AndyMick]

Thanks, Alexander. I've forwarded the link to him. He has a web site for Crich Parish, already mentioned in these pages

 

[Tim]

I really don't want to encourage people to enter data carelessly or to leave it as incorrect even after they have been asked to check it.

If you have a match with someone on the rest of the household isn't the best solution to ask them to correct their entry?

Peter I have 2 exclamation marks on a household of 5 that I have entered today, the others have no mark against them.
I have checked the Ancestry census transcription and all looks good. And I've even checked FamilySearch.

I have checked to make sure and there is no one else in my entries that is similar.

So, I don't know what to correct, but does this mean that I've almost matched with someone, but they have something different?

I have checked all my cousins common relatives and these names don't appear there.

So I have no one to ask to check their data.

This is the 1881 census ref if you need it 28/99/25