Family Historians and genealogists are usually very tech savy and take advantage of online databases, online resources and all possible ways to locate their ancestral families.
One of the many ways is to reach out through 3rd party websites that help to match those who submit their genealogical databases to other databases on their site. Once a match is found, the website informs each of the parties that there is a possible match between those two individuals.
The concept is a great one and I myself have discovered many new 3rd, 4th, 5th, and so on cousins from around the world. Early on, RootsWeb was the place to upload a gedcom file to put a family database online, however, one had to do the searching to find the connections to others
One of the early adapters to this concept of matching databases was OneGreatFamily which began back in 2000. At that time there were just a few other commercial companies trying to help individuals link with other individuals by comparing their genealogical databases.
Fast forward to 2012 and there are many sites that now aid this great endeavor, however, unless you are willing to use their online interface as your main and only database you run into problems of outdated files and lose the connections that have been made from those outdated databases. While I enjoy making connections, I still want to have my own database on my own PC and don't wish to keep it all online.
Today, there are many genealogical community databases, each one is able to assist those that belong to their community and are able to assist one another with genealogical research. Ancestry.com puts little green leaves when connections are made, MyHeritage.com sends emails of connections as well as GenesReunited which acts as the middle man and a notice through emails. OneGreatFamily attaches an icon to the place where additional information can be added and there are many others that follow a similar pattern.
My thoughts are that there ought to be a way to update the original gedcom file without having to remove it and re-upload a new gedcom which becomes outdated the next time you add to your database, perhaps someone will be able to figure out a way to do just that so those who don't wish to use the online system 100% can do so. Hopefully the wait for a solution is not far away...
Comments and Suggestions are always welcomed!
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Claire (*)
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