Review of Progress Made in Implementing My 2016 Systems

My list of 2016 systems for myself included the usual ideas, such as eating better and exercising more frequently.  Among those ideas were some serious commitments that I needed to make towards taking control of my genealogical research by documenting the sources I find and have found in the past.  Stopping the process of finding documents and not bothering to examine and analyze them until much later or ever.  Also, becoming more diligent about filing away the information I’ve collected after examining and analyzing it.

In looking back at 2016 and these systems that I created for myself to follow, some of these ideas did bear some small fruit and others just simply didn’t pan out for a myriad of reasons.  The documenting my sources did work out because I made a conscious effort to create citations or at least note down pertinent information about a particular source while I had in front of me and spent time over a period of months creating citations for items I’d found in the past.  After completing my research at a repository I wrote citations for the items viewed while still on site or immediately after leaving having that information still fresh in my mind.  Instead of writing these source citations sometimes weeks, months, or years later when I was trying to analyze the source later and write about.

In order to document, examine, and analyze these newly found bits of information, I came up with the process of after returning from a repository of entering the item into my research log which included the source citation, then entering the source into Evidentia and using that program to examine and analyze the source.

I tried using Evernote when researching online as a way to help me get into the habit of creating source citations when I found a piece of information or didn’t.  What I found was that it was easier for me to just not use Evernote when downloading a digital image of a document found online and instead save the image file to the pertinent research folder on my computer and record the search and findings along with a source citation in my research log.

John Washington Womble Neighborhood Project Part 5

Last Saturday, I again braved the intense heat and went to my local Family History Center to finish scanning the remaining petition files on the microfilm I ordered.  A couple of days ago I finished transcribing Mahala Grantham’s file and began on Sarah Daniel, widow of Ethelred Daniel’s file.  Today, I finished transcribing her file, afterwards took a break--watching some of the men’s gymnastics qualifying rounds--and will start on another petition file.

Since on the first go around with these files, I only made scans of about 5 files there isn’t much hanging over me for that day’s set of scans.  Last week, I’d been able to finish with my scanning and have about seven or so files to transcribe from that batch.

My plan once I finish transcribing the files is to then enter the metes and bounds descriptions into DeedMapper and hopefully place it logically in place with my other plats.  Then I’ll begin the process again by ordering another roll of microfilm of petitions from my list of missing land owners.

Evernote use

In a previous post I mentioned that I’d begun using Evernote and was trying out how it would work with my genealogy research.  I joined a couple of Evernote groups with the idea that I could troubleshoot any issues that might crop up.  I’ve experimented with using it in my research and have to say that there’s a steep learning curve at least for me in using it. 

Unfortunately, I’ve discovered that I don’t have enough space on my tablet to install it and so am not able to test out how the sync feature works.  The online help I haven’t found to be helpful in answering my questions.  The tutorials only seem to spark ideas, and are lacking in step-by-step details of how a particular feature works.

I learned in using the program that if an image is copied and pasted into a new note that text can’t be added above or below as far as I can tell.  When I first installed Evernote I tried out the web clipping tool and was disappointed in how it worked.  Anything I searched online, either in the groups I’ve joined, Evernote’s help files, or tutorials never seemed to fully explain how it worked.  So I spent a lot of time flailing around clipping things.   The clippings, I would find later were a lousy image of what I’d clipped and this was disappointing. 

Eventually, I was able to use the clipping tool effectively, but it’s taken a lot of work and just playing around.  I get that help files with any software are the last things to get written.  But what doesn’t make sense to me is this program has been around seemingly forever, so long that there are people who have outgrown it and are moving on to something else, so why aren’t the tutorials better in explaining how features work?

As a work around to figuring out how features work with Evernote, I’ve taken to posing my questions to Google and abandoning Evernote’s help files, tutorials, and the groups I joined.  This is the only thing that’s provided answers even if they’re negative answers.

I’m still mystified as to why many people in the genealogy community find this program helpful.  Maybe they like the organizational capabilities and that I can understand, especially if you add tags to your notes.  One aspect that I like about it is that it’s helped me become more disciplined in citing my sources when I find them--instead of trying to write a citation six months or years down the road when I’ve forgotten where it was when I found such and such information or image and various other important particulars.  However that hasn’t caused me to use Evernote more.  But it’s helped me get into the habit of recording where I found X document and to note down a citation for it, which keeps me disciplined in sticking with my system that I’ve strived to maintain for my genealogical research.