Magda, author of the blog, hungarianfamilyrecord.org, recently shared the website RootsMapper.com on Facebook. I checked out the website and it's pretty awesome.
What is RootsMapper and what is its purpose? The website states the following:
"The goal of RootsMapper to is to allow you to visualize the origins of your ancestors and see how they migrated. We utilize the Google Maps API to plot and link up your family tree data that is pulled directly from FamilySearch.org in real-time."
You will need a FamilySearch account to use RootsMapper. Here's the start page.
To use RootsMapper, press the blue "Login to FamilySearch" button at the top left side of the page. You will be redirected to the FamilySearch login page.
After you've signed in to FamilySearch, the magic happens.
With myself set as the Root Person, RootsMapper mapped seven generations of my ancestors' origins and migration patterns. You can set the number of generations from one to seven.
The pink lines represent maternal ancestors and the blue lines represent paternal ancestors. The pin color represents the gender of the ancestor – blue for males and pink for females. The numbers on the pins represent what generation they belong to.
Here is my map showing seven generations. I cropped the map to show where my pins landed so it would be bigger and easier to see on my blog.
Isn't this just so cool?
As you can see, my paternal ancestors (represented by those blue lines) were born in Norway, Sweden and Denmark. Some of these ancestors immigrated to the United States.
My maternal ancestors (represented by the pink lines) were from several different parts of the world. Those pink lines heading out into the Atlantic Ocean are actually landing on Islands - The Archipelago of the Azores and the Island of Madeira. Some of those ancestors from Portugal immigrated to Brazil. My maternal grandfather and his family, including my mother, were born in Brazil and immigrated to the United States in 1952. Other maternal ancestors were from Mexico. And still others were from the United States.
You may have noticed that a lot of the pins on this map are overlapping each other. Not a problem! Just click on them, and they separate. You can see what that looks like in the screenshot below. Each of those pins represents an ancestor.
With the pins separated, you can click on each one to see the information for that specific ancestor. This can be helpful because I noticed that some of my ancestors were missing information. That could be a clue that I need to do more research, or that I simply need to add the missing information to FamilySearch.org.
Also, you can change the root person on your map by clicking on the ancestor's ID number in blue below their name.
On some of these ancestor information boxes, you will see a green "Expand Parents" box at the bottom right. If you click that, the map will show that ancestor's parents.
This is what happened when I clicked the "Expand Parents" button for Aaron Parsons, who was born in Massachusetts in 1737. The red arrows are pointing to the 8th generation pins that weren't there before.
When I clicked on the blue #8 pin, the ancestor information box for Aaron Parsons' father appeared. He was born in Massachusetts in 1712.
One more thing…you can also zoom in on the map to get a more detailed view of your ancestors' places of origin and migration patterns.
An important note – If you want an accurate map, it is very important to make sure the information contained in FamilySearch.org is correct.
So, what do you think? Pretty awesome right?
The website also has a helpful FAQ button on the bottom right side of the page. Have fun exploring RootsMapper.com!
Update:
Since publishing this blog post, RootsMapper.com has released version 1.0.3, which, according to their blog, includes these new features:
- You can now set the generation run to 8 instead of 7.
- There is no longer a green "Expand Parents" button. Instead there are pin icons.
- You can now view an ancestor in FamilySearch.org by clicking on the FamilySearch tree icon next to the ancestor's name.
Thanks for reading!
Jana
© 2013 Copyright by Jana Last
I absolutely love OneNote. (And no, I don't work for the company and I'm not getting any compensation for this post.) Last year I shared how I use OneNote to create my Fab Finds Posts.
Today I want to share another way I use it. I've discovered that OneNote is a fabulous way to save my place while I'm doing genealogy research. You can think of it as digital scratch paper.
So, here's a real life experience I had while trying to find the death record for my Grandaunt, Edna Lillie Webster. I was looking through a record set on FamilySearch.org when the time came for our family to go to the movies. Hurray! We were off to see The Hobbit! But, I hadn't finished looking at the record set in FamilySearch. Bummer! So what did I do? I just used OneNote as a research bookmark.
It was super quick and easy!
In OneNote, I created a Research Bookmarks Notebook. I organized the notebook like this:
- Sections (top tabs) = genealogy websites
- Pages (along the right side) = ancestor(s)
Saving my place using OneNote -
To save my place while I was researching Edna Lillie's death record, I copied the URL from the record set in FamilySearch.org, and then pasted it onto Edna Lillie Webster's page in OneNote. (see above)
When I'm ready to continue searching for Edna Lillie's death record in FamilySearch, I'll just click on the URL on Edna's page in OneNote, and I will be taken back to the exact location in FamilySearch.org where I left off. How cool is that?!
But wait! There's more!
Let's say you don't want to create a separate Research Bookmarks notebook. Perhaps you've organized your genealogy research in OneNote by creating separate notebooks for different ancestors, surnames, localities or whatever. And you want to just add your research bookmarks within those notebooks.
But what about the possibility of these research bookmarks getting buried and forgotten inside all of those notebooks? Will they be found again easily without having to go through each notebook? That's a valid concern if you're anything like me. I tend to research more than one ancestor at a time.
Well, there's an easy way to find those research bookmarks again. How? By using the "tag" feature in OneNote.
Simply create a "Research Bookmark" tag in the "Tag" drop-down menu.
Then place that tag next to each research bookmark you create. Tags help you "remember" where you have placed your research bookmarks.
To find all of your research bookmarks again, just click "Find Tags" at the top of OneNote.
You will then see this handy-dandy box (below) on the right side of your OneNote page. You can search for tags by Tag Name, Section, Title, Date, or Note Text in the drop-down menu.
Now you're all set to find the Research Bookmark you are looking for and resume your genealogy research. Once you've found the bookmark you want, just click on it and you'll be taken to that page in your OneNote notebook.
So, that's it! I hope this will be a helpful tool for you in your genealogy research.
Thanks for reading!
Jana
Copyright © Jana Last 2013
I’ve been asked recently about how I put a watermark on the photos I use within my blog. And since more than one person has asked me this question, I thought I’d go ahead and write a blog post about how I do this.
One of the genealogy bloggers who contacted me said she’d had a couple of her photos “borrowed” from her blog. Hopefully using watermarks on your photos will help to stop this from happening.
The process I use is really very simple. I use Windows Live Writer to compose my blog posts. Windows Live Writer is part of the Windows Essentials suite. I’m currently using Windows 7 and there was a rumor that Windows Live Writer was going to be discontinued with the Windows 8 update. But happily, it looks like Live Writer has been continued in the new Windows Essentials 2012 Suite.
Windows Live Writer has a built-in watermark feature. So, here’s how it works and what the program looks like:
This is what the start-up page looks like for my blog. Your blog's settings and template will cause it to look different for you.
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When you are ready to add a photo to your blog post draft, click on the "Pictures" tab in the toolbar and insert your photo.
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Once you’ve added a photo to your blog post draft, just click the "Watermark" tab in the toolbar.
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The Watermark dialog box will appear. Type your copyright statement in the Watermark text line. As you can see, there are different options available: font family, size, and position of your watermark. Once you’ve created your watermark, press OK. And here’s a nifty little feature. When you press the "Set to default" tab, Windows Live Writer will automatically add the watermark you just created to each photo you upload in the future.
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And here we are! Your photo now has a watermark. It’s just that simple!
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After completing your blog post draft, press the "Post draft to blog" tab in the toolbar. Your blog post should then be sent over to your blog. (Check first before exiting Windows Live Writer.)
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I use Blogger. And when I write my blog posts, I will usually tweak them in Blogger once the draft has been transferred over from Windows Live Writer.
Of course, there are other ways to add watermarks to photos. I’ve used Photoshop to add watermarks to the photos I’ve uploaded to Pinterest. But for adding watermarks to my photos within my blog posts, I prefer the simplicity of Windows Live Writer.
Thanks for reading!
Jana
Copyright © Jana Last 2012
Thanks to Caroline Pointer’s posts "Using OneNote to keep up with those ancestors" and "More OneNote Features to Rock Your Researching World", I have become a OneNote fan!
I'm not saying I'm an expert by any means. But I have found OneNote to be very useful for my genealogy blog.
And I’m not going to try to reinvent the wheel and show you how to use OneNote. Caroline Pointer, as well as others on YouTube, have already done that.
What I do want to share with you today is how I put together my weekly Fab Finds posts.
Yes, you guessed it. I use OneNote to help me with these posts. It’s a great organizational tool! I've created several Notebooks for my blog and one of them is called Fab Finds Posts 2012.
The Fab Finds Post Notebook is then organized by month. And within each month I've created a page for each weekly post.
So, here’s the process for my Fab Finds posts:
As I read posts during the week, I copy and paste the link of the posts I especially like to the current week's Fab Finds Post page in OneNote.
Then when I’m ready to publish my Fab Finds post, I go through the list of potential Fab Finds candidates. I click on each link, which then takes me to the author's blog. I could just copy the link from OneNote, but I like to actually revisit the blog first. I then copy the link to Windows Live Writer.
As I go down the list of blog posts in OneNote, I insert a check mark next to the blog posts I’ve transferred to my draft in Windows Live Writer.
Once I’m done, I post the draft to my blog, preview it and then publish the post. Voila! Finished product!
Another perk to my method? In the process, I am building a list that I can refer to at any time. "Oh, where was that post about such-and-such? Oh ya, I have it listed in my Fab Finds Notebook in OneNote."
Thanks for reading!
Jana
Copyright © Jana Last 2012
