Genealogy Chat

This problem has got a lot worse now. When GR made their New Tree program the default a couple of weeks ago, I noticed that random dates and relationships in my tree had become corrupted. They did not dispaly at all on the New program but were still apparently OK when viewed with the older program. But ALL the marriage dates and locations I entered in the past few days have magically been wiped. I am still using the old program to enter new names as it is much quicker and more efficient. What on earth is going on? I'd have thought GR would have ironed out their teething bugs by now.

Hi Tracey, I'm having problems viewing shared trees. I have stopped trying as when I do my computer freezes and I have to switch it off! Stock reply from GR they are aware of the problem and the team are trying to sort it ! Well hurry up and sort it then as I need to cross reference some of my data. From a very frustrated Beryl x

Certainly seems that our ancestors on our online trees are rapidly contracting the GR strain of cyber flu! Seems to be contagious. At this rate they'll ALL have the same death date!

Beryl ............ try clicking on 'OLD TREE' at top of screen and use as before. But how long will the facility of the old system be preserved? I called on this board to say my marriage places and dates have gone too, and I have seen other trees with 'Same-Death-Date-Syndrome', thought I was going mad!?!? I have sent a message to Feedback asking what compensation they are offering for corrupting my data when they have a duty of care for it. I think that is a fair question? Keep up the pressure everyone, and go to General Topics to add your comments to Sue in Lincs thread.

Just added this to the general board petition to reinstate the Old system. I have emailed the following to GR. --------------------------------------------------- Since the site upgrades have been implemented, I have been horrified to note random corruption of my online data. At first I thought that it was a simple glitch in the system which would soon be fixed and that my tree would return to normal. However, each day I notice even more data has been wiped from my tree. Now all the marriage dates and locations entered in the past few weeks are affected to some extent. I have been using the older tree program to enter and retrieve data as the newer one is not only erratic and faulty, it has a tendency to freeze my computer. Having first posted a message on the message forums to find out if it is only my tree with this problem, I was even more appalled to see that other members are also affected. Other reported issues include death dates being electronically altered so they read the same date, relationships between individuals on the tree being rearranged (eg-modern person being married to a long-dead-ancestor) and sections of trees floating adrift from the rest of the tree. This is a TOTALLY UNACCEPTABLE destruction of my work and that of other members of this site. Considering the amount of time and expense we have spent on our research and in entering it on to this site - where it attracts other members and has undoubtedly contributed to the success of Genesreunited - there is surely a responsibility for Genesreunited not to abuse our work in this manner. Could you please let me know if the problems will be fixed and whether the integrity of our data will be restored. If the affected trees are destroyed beyond repair will Genesreunited be offering compensation for loss of our data? I await your reply with interest but suggest in the meantime, for the benefit of all members, that you issue a notice on the website explaining what has been going on and what you will be doing to resolve it. Tracey Brown

Keep up the pressure on the management who think it's fun to destroy our data.

And this is GR's reply to my email: --------------------- Thanks for your email. We are aware of a few bugs in our new tree builder. These have all been reported to our development team. They will be fixing these as soon as possible. I do apologise for the inconvenience. If you had previously added marriage details to your tree then you can still view them. When viewing the relation just click on the link that says 'enter marriage and death details'. This will then display any details you had already entered. You can also enter new marriage or death details here and save the changes. Best regards, Erica The Genes Support Team ------------------------------------------ Cinsidering I was bringing to their attention that fact that entries were no longer displaying at all, I would say that their reply demonstrates that they did not read my email correctly. I had thought I'd made it clear that my recently entered marriage details had been completely wiped. It wasn't a matter of not being able to view them. Do you think they've had so many emails from people who hadn't realised they had to hit an extra button (how inefficient!) to enter and view details, that they they made a standard letter for them? Seems that our emails/complaints/error-reports are merely being scan-read for key words and standard replies then sent back. This isn't going to fix things, is it! Note how every other of my points have been conveniently ignored.

I emailed about 'lost' ancestors. Them..I can see them try again. Me......Still not there Them..Tell us about your computer. Me.......Never mind, one of the many threads complaining about this site told me the old tree was still available and everything is still O.K. there. PP

I don't sell family tree software or take any money from doing so, but would IMPLORE everyone to use another method of storing trees separate to Genes. If GR (or Ancestry/Tribal Pages for that matter) loose data then the best you can hope for is that they may extend your membership by a few months without charging you. Your tree has taken many hours of research, subscriptions to sites for accessing records and money to buy certs and travel to records offices. PLEASE PUT your tree on software like Family Tree Maker (FTM) or similiar. You don't need an internet connection to edit/add to your tree and you can keep backup copies to disc/stick which will mean even if your computer goes bang you STILL have the information stored. FTM can be bought for £5.99 at Morrisons, trust me it is the best money you could spend just for the backup option alone. Xmas is coming, send a letter to santa for a copy. Glen

As Glen says, don't just use one method of storing your precious data. My main info is on my PC which I back up to CD every now and again. I also have a copy on Rootsweb which is updated every six months or so. GR just has a cut down version, which as far as I am concerned It a data store for others to search against. Having said that, I don't believe that GR are guilty of loosing your info, I think it is more to do with the fact that the viewer is still not working correctly. They may need to rebuild some of the indexes, but the raw data is fine. Lets hope they get it fixed soon. I uploaded a gedcom about three weeks ago and everything is there where it should be - births, marriages, deaths and even notes. The only problem is that it default to show the earliest ancestor when I open it up. Other than that the tree viewer works fine for me.

Ann Don't let on that you could upload a Gedcom and do the whole name/date entry in five minutes with a few mouse clicks. You will of course have to add family photographs, census returns copies of certs etc, tell him it is such a HUGE task he will be cooking Xmas dinner till 2010 at least. If that doesn't work tell him that you will send the boys round. Glen

Fortunately my main tree is on FTM on my own PC. However, when I started genealogy, I did not own a reliable computer so the GR's online tree was totally ideal for me. I assumed it would be safer there than on a dying home computer which was so old it could only save to floppy and not CD, plus I could access and add to the tree using the library computers. No doubt there are many folk out there who are still in that situation and use a public computer as they do not possess their own. My FTM tree has all sorts of info which is private (eg addresses and phone numbers) and not for public display. The least of this is that includes loads of living people. I know it should be a simple matter of concealing the identities of the living, should I upload this tree online, but what can I do about the odd private note? Any ideas?

Tracey If you were to upload a GEDCOM from your FTM to here then any notes you have are transferred here too.You could send a gedcom from FTM to GR and delete the details from GR tree builder (long process if there are lots of notes) The quickest way around the problem is as follows, it is all mouse clicks, no keyboard work required; 1 Create a GEDCOM file from the file you want to share. (See the article on exporting to GEDCOM for more help or look in Family Tree Maker's built-in program help for GEDCOM.) By default a GEDCOM file will include all of the facts, information and Notes that are in your file. 2 Next open the GEDCOM file that you just created back into Family Tree Maker creating a new file. During this process you will see a Facts to Import button that will allow you to decide what information you want to include in the file you are creating. In this case you would choose not to import the Notes field. 3 The new file created from GEDCOM will not contain any notes. You can now send the file you created, or create a GEDCOM from it to send. Glen

n...............

Thanks ever so much Glen. Mind you, I'm going to wait until this site settles down before uploading anything. I still have a vain hope that my tree and everyone elses will be magically to their former integrity if/when GR gets to fix the issues. In the meantime there is no harm (apart from bewildered frustration) in keeping an eye on what strange things my online tree does next! Tracey

I've not noticed data disappearing (will double check now) but I can't add marriage info on new tree - I have to go into the old tree to do that - it then becomes magically available in the new 'improved' version! Sue

I wouldn't just use one family tree program. My main work is on FTM, but after finding out they have spyware installed, even though they say they don't use it and provide the tool for removing it, I will be changing to another program. I also have my tree on PAF available as a freedownload from the LDS. Quite a bit of my tree is also on my own website. I did have some on tribal pages, but can't seem to find that anymore Rosalind

I wouldn't worry too much about the FTM 'spyware' Many programs have what might be termed spyware without you even realising it. How do you think that you get messages telling you that newer version of something is available? It is only malicious 'spyware' that you need to worry about .

Hi Sue, You OUGHT to be able to enter marriage and death data into the new tree directly. This is how it SHOULD work but doesn't now does it! Select the immediate family view (which I leave selected when I open and close that tree as the huge view takes a-g-e-s to open and sometimes crashes). Then once you have your person's initial details entered, you click on 'save details to tree'. This then activates the 'enter marriage and death details' button just beneath. Click that and Bob's your uncle!...and probably your mother, sister, husband, neighbour's cat, etc too if the program plays up (only joking, I think!) EXCEPT, as you discover, there IS NO MARRIAGE FIELD in the new tree for newly created entries. Oh, well!

As far as I can see, the 'Enter marriage and death details' box is for adding to or amending your existing data. If you want to add a new spouse then you first have to go into + Partner to create the person concerned., Also before you finish click on 'Save Details to your Tree'