My Ancestry - Member Search useless?

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Terry Pinnell

My Ancestry - Member Search useless?

Legg inn av Terry Pinnell » 08 des 2005 10:11:03

I've recently started using My Ancestry, at http://www.ancestry.co.uk/
I entered several targets, including ALICE RATCHUS, with a marriage
1938-1942. On clicking the icon to 'View Ancestry members interested
in this person' no fewer than 933 'hits' are displayed. The first few
results are about as wide of the mark as you could get:

Alice M Roodkowsky, Jan Radziszewski, Mary R Ritcheson, John
Yalitopolous Retsas, Esther Rydzewski...

Does anyone else use this facility? Do I have some basic
misunderstanding? Can it really be as useless as it appears?

--
Terry, West Sussex, UK

Steven Gibbs

Re: My Ancestry - Member Search useless?

Legg inn av Steven Gibbs » 08 des 2005 11:16:35

"Terry Pinnell" <terrypin@dial.pipex.com> wrote in message
news:a2ufp1ls1qui25495tau87m91f5uci8kgi@4ax.com...
I've recently started using My Ancestry, at http://www.ancestry.co.uk/
I entered several targets, including ALICE RATCHUS, with a marriage
1938-1942. On clicking the icon to 'View Ancestry members interested
in this person' no fewer than 933 'hits' are displayed. The first few
results are about as wide of the mark as you could get:

Alice M Roodkowsky, Jan Radziszewski, Mary R Ritcheson, John
Yalitopolous Retsas, Esther Rydzewski...

Does anyone else use this facility? Do I have some basic
misunderstanding? Can it really be as useless as it appears?

It's as useless as it appears.

Regards
Steven Gibbs
Bedford

Terry Pinnell

Re: My Ancestry - Member Search useless?

Legg inn av Terry Pinnell » 08 des 2005 13:42:34

"Steven Gibbs" <stevenng2@sgibbs1.freeserve.co.uk> wrote:

"Terry Pinnell" <terrypin@dial.pipex.com> wrote in message
news:a2ufp1ls1qui25495tau87m91f5uci8kgi@4ax.com...
I've recently started using My Ancestry, at http://www.ancestry.co.uk/
I entered several targets, including ALICE RATCHUS, with a marriage
1938-1942. On clicking the icon to 'View Ancestry members interested
in this person' no fewer than 933 'hits' are displayed. The first few
results are about as wide of the mark as you could get:

Alice M Roodkowsky, Jan Radziszewski, Mary R Ritcheson, John
Yalitopolous Retsas, Esther Rydzewski...

Does anyone else use this facility? Do I have some basic
misunderstanding? Can it really be as useless as it appears?

It's as useless as it appears.

Thanks - relieved to hear it's not just down to me then.

Incredible that it can't even manage to match on surname! At a pinch
it could be used as a Lottery win generator.

Making the reasonable assumption that my email to them last night
wasn't the first they've received on the subject, what am I to
conclude? That it's a technically intractable challenge? That Ancestry
is unresponsive to suggested improvements? Or what?

--
Terry, West Sussex, UK

cecilia

Re: My Ancestry - Member Search useless?

Legg inn av cecilia » 08 des 2005 14:15:59

Terry Pinnell wrote:
[...] ALICE RATCHUS [...]
results are about as wide of the mark as you could get:
Alice M Roodkowsky, Jan Radziszewski, Mary R Ritcheson, John
Yalitopolous Retsas, Esther Rydzewski... [...]
[...]
Incredible that it can't even manage to match on surname! [...]

[Soundex-type searches are often considered "useless" if they don't
produce what one wants.

But what one wants may be "way-out". <grin>

Once, when a new system for a hospital was being tested by users, the
computer team watched with alarm as the screen offered Peartree as a
result of a search for Partridge, only to be congratulated by the
Medical Record Staff who said that it was just the sort of mistake
they made.]

I cannot be sure whether you mean that Alice Ratchus is there, but
not coming up first, or that you would rather have "nothing found"
rather than very fuzzy results.

Terry Pinnell

Re: My Ancestry - Member Search useless?

Legg inn av Terry Pinnell » 08 des 2005 16:15:16

myths@ic24.net (cecilia) wrote:

Terry Pinnell wrote:
[...] ALICE RATCHUS [...]
results are about as wide of the mark as you could get:
Alice M Roodkowsky, Jan Radziszewski, Mary R Ritcheson, John
Yalitopolous Retsas, Esther Rydzewski... [...]
[...]
Incredible that it can't even manage to match on surname! [...]

[Soundex-type searches are often considered "useless" if they don't
produce what one wants.

But what one wants may be "way-out". <grin

Once, when a new system for a hospital was being tested by users, the
computer team watched with alarm as the screen offered Peartree as a
result of a search for Partridge, only to be congratulated by the
Medical Record Staff who said that it was just the sort of mistake
they made.]

I cannot be sure whether you mean that Alice Ratchus is there, but
not coming up first, or that you would rather have "nothing found"
rather than very fuzzy results.

No, no Alice Ratchus. It was pretty obvious there wasn't going to be
after the first page of 50, with names like those I mentioned (and
Henrietta Sophia Rutkowski, Charles Redchester, Betty Jean Rutkowski
Howen, etc). But I ploughed through all 933 to be sure there was no
elusive miracle lurking.

Nor did the search use the only other criterion I specified: marriage
1938-1942. For example:

Name: Cecylia Agnes Rutkowski
Birth: 08 Nov 1907 - POLAND
Marriage: 19 Jun 1928 - PA, USA
Death: 19 Jun 2001 - AZ, USA

Name: Jennis Ridges
Birth: 1900
Marriage: UT, USA

As you say, it must be a Soundex-based search. Buy why? Given that it
produces such obvious rubbish, why is that the default? Using it, the
inherent advantage of a rarish name is immediately lost. I was offered
no option to choose an Exact search. And if a soundex search must be
used, a little programmed 'intelligence' to rank or filter them could
make the results marginally more useful. It's hard enough to believe
that Rutkowski might sound like Ratchus, but who could mistake
'Henrietta Sophia Rutkowski' for 'Alice Ratchus'?

The sub-header says
"You searched for Alice Ratchus married in England between 1938 and
1942. Try a new search"

Of course, as I've shown, that's contradicted by the list having
almost exclusively USA entries. However, actually I did *not* specify
England. I suspected Alice (my mother) just possibly may have been
born before her parents came to the UK. And in any event, your earlier
advice to me in my first week, to initially avoid entering too much
data, has served me well so far <g>. So I left

I'll be interested to see what Ancestry will say in their defence. I'm
guessing any reply will mention that this is experimental, as I've
just noticed that the header says: "Members researching Alice Ratchus
- Beta"

--
Terry, West Sussex, UK

singhals

Re: My Ancestry - Member Search useless?

Legg inn av singhals » 08 des 2005 22:15:05

Terry Pinnell wrote:


As you say, it must be a Soundex-based search. Buy why? Given that it

Because it keeps some of us from having to search 24 separate variations
of a name -- Cresap appears as Creasap, Cressap, Cressip, Cresopp
Crisapp, Chrissop ... all SAID identically, and all will pop up on a
Soundex. (OTOH, Crosby and Crazy Bull are in the same list ...)

produces such obvious rubbish, why is that the default? Using it, the

Because it produces a _potentially_ useful list. There are lots of
_potentially_ useful things lying around the average genealogy library;
and even though you read the index, and find Alice Ratsch, no guarantee
you've found *your* Alice (who is in the index as R(a-umlaut)tsch anyway.)

inherent advantage of a rarish name is immediately lost. I was offered
no option to choose an Exact search. And if a soundex search must be

CTL-F is a grand thing on a web page.

used, a little programmed 'intelligence' to rank or filter them could

Now one encounters the problem that common sense isn't common.
Taliaferro to use one US example is pronounced Tolliver; should all
TOLLIVER researchers be patched to Taliaferro names? And what about the
Italian Taliaferro families, who (at a wild guess) don't pronounce their
name Tolliver.

Cheryl

Paul Blair

Re: My Ancestry - Member Search useless?

Legg inn av Paul Blair » 08 des 2005 23:38:13

Our (Australian) telephone white pages online index works like that -
quite infuriating! Just to add to the fun of finding someone, the
"lookup a map" system is quite bereft of logic, and you might be shown a
map of somewhere hundreds of km from your target!

Paul Blair
Canberra

singhals wrote:
Terry Pinnell wrote:


As you say, it must be a Soundex-based search. Buy why? Given that it


Because it keeps some of us from having to search 24 separate variations
of a name -- Cresap appears as Creasap, Cressap, Cressip, Cresopp
Crisapp, Chrissop ... all SAID identically, and all will pop up on a
Soundex. (OTOH, Crosby and Crazy Bull are in the same list ...)

produces such obvious rubbish, why is that the default? Using it, the


Because it produces a _potentially_ useful list. There are lots of
_potentially_ useful things lying around the average genealogy library;
and even though you read the index, and find Alice Ratsch, no guarantee
you've found *your* Alice (who is in the index as R(a-umlaut)tsch anyway.)

inherent advantage of a rarish name is immediately lost. I was offered
no option to choose an Exact search. And if a soundex search must be


CTL-F is a grand thing on a web page.

used, a little programmed 'intelligence' to rank or filter them could


Now one encounters the problem that common sense isn't common.
Taliaferro to use one US example is pronounced Tolliver; should all
TOLLIVER researchers be patched to Taliaferro names? And what about the
Italian Taliaferro families, who (at a wild guess) don't pronounce their
name Tolliver.

Cheryl

Terry Pinnell

Re: My Ancestry - Member Search useless?

Legg inn av Terry Pinnell » 09 des 2005 00:16:59

singhals <singhals@erols.com> wrote:

Terry Pinnell wrote:


As you say, it must be a Soundex-based search. Buy why? Given that it

Because it keeps some of us from having to search 24 separate variations
of a name -- Cresap appears as Creasap, Cressap, Cressip, Cresopp
Crisapp, Chrissop ... all SAID identically, and all will pop up on a
Soundex. (OTOH, Crosby and Crazy Bull are in the same list ...)

produces such obvious rubbish, why is that the default? Using it, the

Because it produces a _potentially_ useful list. There are lots of
_potentially_ useful things lying around the average genealogy library;
and even though you read the index, and find Alice Ratsch, no guarantee
you've found *your* Alice (who is in the index as R(a-umlaut)tsch anyway.)

inherent advantage of a rarish name is immediately lost. I was offered
no option to choose an Exact search. And if a soundex search must be

CTL-F is a grand thing on a web page.

used, a little programmed 'intelligence' to rank or filter them could

Now one encounters the problem that common sense isn't common.
Taliaferro to use one US example is pronounced Tolliver; should all
TOLLIVER researchers be patched to Taliaferro names? And what about the
Italian Taliaferro families, who (at a wild guess) don't pronounce their
name Tolliver.

Cheryl

OK, I can see that Ancestry's 'Ranked' search might sometimes be
useful, although I haven't yet experienced it.

However, my points are:

1. An Exact search should be available, just as it is on other parts
of the site. I've now had Ancestry's reply, confirming my suspicion
that the 'View Ancestry members interested in this person' feature is,
as they put it, "hard coded to do a ranked search".

2. The Ranked search is currently too crude to be useful. (I'm
guessing it's been that way for a long time?) It's badly in need of
improvement, and I'm talking about *basic* stuff, well short of AI!

--
Terry, West Sussex, UK

singhals

Re: My Ancestry - Member Search useless?

Legg inn av singhals » 09 des 2005 15:47:52

Terry Pinnell wrote:

singhals <singhals@erols.com> wrote:


Terry Pinnell wrote:



As you say, it must be a Soundex-based search. Buy why? Given that it

Because it keeps some of us from having to search 24 separate variations
of a name -- Cresap appears as Creasap, Cressap, Cressip, Cresopp
Crisapp, Chrissop ... all SAID identically, and all will pop up on a
Soundex. (OTOH, Crosby and Crazy Bull are in the same list ...)


produces such obvious rubbish, why is that the default? Using it, the

Because it produces a _potentially_ useful list. There are lots of
_potentially_ useful things lying around the average genealogy library;
and even though you read the index, and find Alice Ratsch, no guarantee
you've found *your* Alice (who is in the index as R(a-umlaut)tsch anyway.)


inherent advantage of a rarish name is immediately lost. I was offered
no option to choose an Exact search. And if a soundex search must be

CTL-F is a grand thing on a web page.


used, a little programmed 'intelligence' to rank or filter them could

Now one encounters the problem that common sense isn't common.
Taliaferro to use one US example is pronounced Tolliver; should all
TOLLIVER researchers be patched to Taliaferro names? And what about the
Italian Taliaferro families, who (at a wild guess) don't pronounce their
name Tolliver.

Cheryl


OK, I can see that Ancestry's 'Ranked' search might sometimes be
useful, although I haven't yet experienced it.

However, my points are:

1. An Exact search should be available, just as it is on other parts
of the site. I've now had Ancestry's reply, confirming my suspicion
that the 'View Ancestry members interested in this person' feature is,
as they put it, "hard coded to do a ranked search".


OK, it may be easy to do it that way, but there IS a certain lack of
point, I'll agree.

2. The Ranked search is currently too crude to be useful. (I'm
guessing it's been that way for a long time?) It's badly in need of
improvement, and I'm talking about *basic* stuff, well short of AI!

I'm not sure I agree on how basic it is, but it is an option the could
be useful to someone else.

Did you look at any of the on-line pedigree sites? Pedigree Resource
File and Ancestral File at the LDS site, WorldConnect at Rootsweb,
f'instance? Both those specifically identify who submitted *this* info.

Cheryl

Steven Gibbs

Re: My Ancestry - Member Search useless?

Legg inn av Steven Gibbs » 09 des 2005 16:12:09

"singhals" <singhals@erols.com> wrote in message
news:4e-dnbOL3LaFBATenZ2dnUVZ_t6dnZ2d@rcn.net...

2. The Ranked search is currently too crude to be useful. (I'm
guessing it's been that way for a long time?) It's badly in need of
improvement, and I'm talking about *basic* stuff, well short of AI!

I'm not sure I agree on how basic it is, but it is an option the could
be useful to someone else.

Did you look at any of the on-line pedigree sites? Pedigree Resource
File and Ancestral File at the LDS site, WorldConnect at Rootsweb,
f'instance? Both those specifically identify who submitted *this*
info.

Cheryl,

The problem is that the search doesn't do what it says.

I bring up the 1851 census page for my ancestor Samuel Jeffs, born about
1810 in Godmanchester, Huntingdonshire, England. The "Make A
Connection" box says "Find others searching for Samuel Jeffs". I take
this to mean others searching for *this* Samuel Jeffs. So I click the
link and get 513 matches. The first one is an unspecified "Samuel
Joseph Jeffs", no date given, no place given. Definitely not mine. And
that's as good as it gets. The second match is Henry Jeffs, born 1735,
died England. The sixth match lived all his life in New Zealand.
Around match 90 it changes to Soundex.

What I would expect is that it finds in decreasing order of priority 1)
Links to my Samuel Jeffs 2) Links to Jeffs in Godmanchester 3) Links
to Jeffs in Huntingdonshire 4) (perhaps) Links to Soundexed Jeffs in
Huntingdonshre. I don't need anything else. If I want to try to
connect to another line, I'll search for people researching that line.
If I want to do general research on a surname, I'm quite capable of
looking at the IGI etc., but I'm not expecting to do it from a page
about a *specific* individual.

Regards
Steven Gibbs
Bedford, England

Mardon

Re: My Ancestry - Member Search useless?

Legg inn av Mardon » 09 des 2005 16:13:22

Terry Pinnell <terrypin@dial.pipex.com> wrote:

I've recently started using My Ancestry, at http://www.ancestry.co.uk/
I entered several targets, including ALICE RATCHUS
*snip*
Does anyone else use this facility? Do I have some basic
misunderstanding? Can it really be as useless as it appears?

Perhaps you're not familiar with "wild card" searches? If you do an
"exact" search (not soundex) and use wildcards, you can usually get pretty
close to finding name variants. Use a "*" to match up to any six
characters. Use an "?" to match any single character. For example, an
exact search on "Alice" for the first name and "Ractch*" shows an "Alice
Racthin" in Shillington and an "Alice Ratchff" in Marylebone. Searching
for Alice and "Ratc???" finds these same two names. Searching for
"Ratch*s" finds nothing.

singhals

Re: My Ancestry - Member Search useless?

Legg inn av singhals » 10 des 2005 15:53:41

Steven Gibbs wrote:

"singhals" <singhals@erols.com> wrote in message
news:4e-dnbOL3LaFBATenZ2dnUVZ_t6dnZ2d@rcn.net...


2. The Ranked search is currently too crude to be useful. (I'm
guessing it's been that way for a long time?) It's badly in need of
improvement, and I'm talking about *basic* stuff, well short of AI!

I'm not sure I agree on how basic it is, but it is an option the could
be useful to someone else.

Did you look at any of the on-line pedigree sites? Pedigree Resource
File and Ancestral File at the LDS site, WorldConnect at Rootsweb,
f'instance? Both those specifically identify who submitted *this*
info.


Cheryl,

The problem is that the search doesn't do what it says.

I bring up the 1851 census page for my ancestor Samuel Jeffs, born about
1810 in Godmanchester, Huntingdonshire, England. The "Make A
Connection" box says "Find others searching for Samuel Jeffs". I take
this to mean others searching for *this* Samuel Jeffs. So I click the
link and get 513 matches. The first one is an unspecified "Samuel
Joseph Jeffs", no date given, no place given. Definitely not mine. And
that's as good as it gets. The second match is Henry Jeffs, born 1735,
died England. The sixth match lived all his life in New Zealand.
Around match 90 it changes to Soundex.

What I would expect is that it finds in decreasing order of priority 1)
Links to my Samuel Jeffs 2) Links to Jeffs in Godmanchester 3) Links
to Jeffs in Huntingdonshire 4) (perhaps) Links to Soundexed Jeffs in
Huntingdonshre. I don't need anything else. If I want to try to
connect to another line, I'll search for people researching that line.
If I want to do general research on a surname, I'm quite capable of
looking at the IGI etc., but I'm not expecting to do it from a page
about a *specific* individual.

Regards
Steven Gibbs
Bedford, England




Yes, I understood that, Steven.

Cheryl

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