• Ancestry's Thrulines

    From J. P. Gilliver@21:1/5 to All on Sat Sep 9 22:45:27 2023
    XPost: soc.genealogy

    I'm getting fed up with the Thruline suggestions - you know, the "You
    may be related to <other username> through <common ancestor>", which
    then shows the common ancestor in a box at the top, with two streams of
    boxes, going down to me on the left, and <other username> on the right.
    The part of the chain - usually, up from me to the common ancestor, and
    part way down on the right-hand side - that's already in my tree, is
    shown as solid boxes, and at some point they switch to dotted boxes with
    an "evaluate" button: when you click that, it shows a few possible
    trees, each with a collection of records that support the suggestion
    they're making.

    For example, one recent case, I'd verified all the links from myself up
    to the common ancestor and then down three generations, to Robert
    Davidson. The next suggested person was George Jobling. When I clicked Evaluate, it gave me two trees to support that - one with 10 records,
    one with 0 records. Of the 10, the ones that showed anything to do with George's birth or parents showed his parents as Robert Jobling and Ann
    Rennison - no mention of Davison. (So there'd be no point in contacting
    the owner of that tree to ask her.)

    Tonight's one looks at first more promising: I've verified all the way
    to Henry Patterson, and the next person suggested is Rachel Patterson.
    That does indeed seem plausible. But: Henry was born, baptised, resided,
    died, and was buried, all in Embleton, Northumberland; and Rachel,
    according to the "supporting" records, was born and died in Tennessee.
    (One of those records, an 1880 US census, shows her father was born
    there too.)

    I'd accept the odd error, but in cases this just - well, plain silly,
    it's very frustrating.

    What's more: in a normal profile, where Ancestry create a "hint",
    there's the option to reject it (and even say why - e. g. names, places,
    dates, and/or relationships are wrong, or even just that I already had
    the information) - and when you do, the hint disappears. But for
    Thrulines, the only option is "Add to tree" - or of course don't; but if
    you don't, the suggestion remains there, however wrong it is, blocking
    you (and presumably the Thrulines system itself) from making another suggestion.

    I've sent Ancestry a screenshot, and got a thank you. Little suggestion
    they're going to do anything about it, *or even investigate it*.

    Sorry, </rant>. (-:
    --
    J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

    Quantum particles: the dreams that stuff is made of - David Moser

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  • From Charles Ellson@21:1/5 to All on Sun Sep 10 16:25:02 2023
    XPost: soc.genealogy

    On Sat, 9 Sep 2023 22:45:27 +0100, "J. P. Gilliver" <G6JPG@255soft.uk>
    wrote:

    I'm getting fed up with the Thruline suggestions - you know, the "You
    may be related to <other username> through <common ancestor>", which
    then shows the common ancestor in a box at the top, with two streams of >boxes, going down to me on the left, and <other username> on the right.
    The part of the chain - usually, up from me to the common ancestor, and
    part way down on the right-hand side - that's already in my tree, is
    shown as solid boxes, and at some point they switch to dotted boxes with
    an "evaluate" button: when you click that, it shows a few possible
    trees, each with a collection of records that support the suggestion
    they're making.

    For example, one recent case, I'd verified all the links from myself up
    to the common ancestor and then down three generations, to Robert
    Davidson. The next suggested person was George Jobling. When I clicked >Evaluate, it gave me two trees to support that - one with 10 records,
    one with 0 records. Of the 10, the ones that showed anything to do with >George's birth or parents showed his parents as Robert Jobling and Ann >Rennison - no mention of Davison. (So there'd be no point in contacting
    the owner of that tree to ask her.)

    Tonight's one looks at first more promising: I've verified all the way
    to Henry Patterson, and the next person suggested is Rachel Patterson.
    That does indeed seem plausible. But: Henry was born, baptised, resided, >died, and was buried, all in Embleton, Northumberland; and Rachel,
    according to the "supporting" records, was born and died in Tennessee.
    (One of those records, an 1880 US census, shows her father was born
    there too.)

    I'd accept the odd error, but in cases this just - well, plain silly,
    it's very frustrating.

    What's more: in a normal profile, where Ancestry create a "hint",
    there's the option to reject it (and even say why - e. g. names, places, >dates, and/or relationships are wrong, or even just that I already had
    the information) - and when you do, the hint disappears. But for
    Thrulines, the only option is "Add to tree" - or of course don't; but if
    you don't, the suggestion remains there, however wrong it is, blocking
    you (and presumably the Thrulines system itself) from making another >suggestion.

    I've sent Ancestry a screenshot, and got a thank you. Little suggestion >they're going to do anything about it, *or even investigate it*.

    Sorry, </rant>. (-:

    I have one which keeps getting offered as a suggestion but has been
    positively excluded. They often turn out not to be siblings/children
    but cousins, the DNA match possibly being somewhat stronger than usual
    thus likely to be a sibling match on a statistical basis.
    The ones I am having fun with at the moment are a whole group of
    people in the USA who with one exception are maternal matches. They
    all trace back to one English immigrant in the 17th century who is a
    match on my father's side; so far I have found no match on my mother's
    side although reputed Stewart ancestry in my grandparents' parish
    would land up in the same place around three centuries earlier.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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  • From knuttle@21:1/5 to J. P. Gilliver on Sun Sep 10 14:43:12 2023
    XPost: soc.genealogy

    On 09/09/2023 5:45 PM, J. P. Gilliver wrote:
    I'm getting fed up with the Thruline suggestions - you know, the "You
    may be related to <other username> through <common ancestor>", which
    then shows the common ancestor in a box at the top, with two streams of boxes, going down to me on the left, and <other username> on the right.
    The part of the chain - usually, up from me to the common ancestor, and
    part way down on the right-hand side - that's already in my tree, is
    shown as solid boxes, and at some point they switch to dotted boxes with
    an "evaluate" button: when you click that, it shows a few possible
    trees, each with a collection of records that support the suggestion
    they're making.

    For example, one recent case, I'd verified all the links from myself up
    to the common ancestor and then down three generations, to Robert
    Davidson. The next suggested person was George Jobling. When I clicked Evaluate, it gave me two trees to support that - one with 10 records,
    one with 0 records. Of the 10, the ones that showed anything to do with George's birth or parents showed his parents as Robert Jobling and Ann Rennison - no mention of Davison. (So there'd be no point in contacting
    the owner of that tree to ask her.)

    Tonight's one looks at first more promising: I've verified all the way
    to Henry Patterson, and the next person suggested is Rachel Patterson.
    That does indeed seem plausible. But: Henry was born, baptised, resided, died, and was buried, all in Embleton, Northumberland; and Rachel,
    according to the "supporting" records, was born and died in Tennessee.
    (One of those records, an 1880 US census, shows her father was born
    there too.)

    I'd accept the odd error, but in cases this just - well, plain silly,
    it's very frustrating.

    What's more: in a normal profile, where Ancestry create a "hint",
    there's the option to reject it (and even say why - e. g. names, places, dates, and/or relationships are wrong, or even just that I already had
    the information) - and when you do, the hint disappears. But for
    Thrulines, the only option is "Add to tree" - or of course don't; but if
    you don't, the suggestion remains there, however wrong it is, blocking
    you (and presumably the Thrulines system itself) from making another suggestion.

    I've sent Ancestry a screenshot, and got a thank you. Little suggestion they're going to do anything about it, *or even investigate it*.

    Sorry, </rant>. (-:
    I have been frustrated with Ancestry Hints for some time. I look at the possible matches in Trulines, get excited because this could be the
    break I am looking for. However when you review the trees, there is no documentation or their "documentation" is another unsupported tree.

    Shier DNA matches are pathetic. You get hundreds of matches, and 95% of
    them will be private, or have 0 to 10 people in their tree. ie 10
    people for a 4th to 6th cousin DNA Match is worthless.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From J. P. Gilliver@21:1/5 to Charles Ellson on Sun Sep 10 19:33:17 2023
    XPost: soc.genealogy

    In message <97nrfihnth90b5rofnub543uj7g258u84m@4ax.com> at Sun, 10 Sep
    2023 16:25:02, Charles Ellson <charlesellson@btinternet.com> writes
    On Sat, 9 Sep 2023 22:45:27 +0100, "J. P. Gilliver" <G6JPG@255soft.uk>
    wrote:
    []
    I've sent Ancestry a screenshot, and got a thank you. Little suggestion >>they're going to do anything about it, *or even investigate it*.

    Sorry, </rant>. (-:

    I have one which keeps getting offered as a suggestion but has been >positively excluded. They often turn out not to be siblings/children
    but cousins, the DNA match possibly being somewhat stronger than usual
    thus likely to be a sibling match on a statistical basis.

    It's the inability to dismiss them that's the most irritating - that and Ancestry's lack of interest, of course.
    []
    --
    J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

    "Bother," said Pooh, as Windows crashed into piglet.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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