User talk:Rlward

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Old Messages through 30 Sep 2007

Pages

Robert:

I've corrected the first two links. The Manor records link was one that you added a link to back in November. Although we do have that document, I have not attempted to put it online. Unless you had something in mind when you added the link to the page, I'd suggest we just remove the link for now.

I know about the discussion forum issues - it's a big issue that I need to look into, but thank you for reminding me about it.

- Tim Doyle - Talk to me 18:41, 8 October 2007 (CDT)

Fred Whitney

Robert:

Can you identify Family:Whitney, Frederick H. (c1816-a1860)?

- Tim Doyle - Talk to me 07:27, 12 October 2007 (CDT)

New Wiki

Robert:

No, I had not seen that site, thank you for alerting me to it. It is interesting for two reasons - the first is that it is yet another wiki being used for genealogical purposes, but also because it is based upon another wiki platform that I was unaware of.

- Tim Doyle - Talk to me 13:21, 17 October 2007 (CDT)

Tree

Robert:

Take a look at User:Tdoyle/Sandbox14. This was now possible because of the recent update.

- Tim Doyle - Talk to me 19:39, 23 October 2007 (CDT)

Chauncey B Whitney

Thank you for your help. As I looked at the photo of the grave stone, I learned that his life was from 12/31/1809 to 12/22/1887. But this does not match the other Chauncey B. Whitney (1805 - 1866 and with a different wife and kids) or any other Chauncey Whitneys on this website. How should I go about going back another generation to find Chauncey B. Whitney's parents?

Incidentally the Chandler Bradley you identified - son of Mary Elizabeth Whitney is my Great Grandfather.

Thanks for your help.

Bill Gray

Thank you

Thank you for your great ideas. I appreciate your help.

I am having fun researching my genealogy.

Bill

List of Whitneys by Given Name (no page of their own)

Robert:

I'm making progress on an automated system to extract a list of Whitney children listed on the Family Group pages who do not have pages of their own. The process is not yet fully automated and does not yet extract birth or death years for these individuals, but the first such list can be viewed at User:Tdoyle/Sandbox18. If you're looking for an individual, this list may help.

- Tim Doyle - Talk to me 07:20, 29 October 2007 (CDT)

Whitney List

Robert:

I've updated the list at User:Tdoyle/Sandbox18. The remaining non-Whitneys have been removed and the date ranges have been added. Note that there could still be issues with the dates - if you find any examples, please bring them to my attention before fixing any pages. Also note that any individuals who have links to pages which do not exist (such as I have seen on the Henry Whitney descendant pages you have been adding), they will not be included on either list.

- Tim Doyle - Talk to me 13:57, 29 October 2007 (CDT)

Standard for unknown children's names

Robert:

I noticed in the current list that we've used the following various designations for children's names which are unknown:

• ----- - FIXED
• son - FIXED
• Son - FIXED
• daughter - FIXED
• Daughter - FIXED
• child - FIXED
• Child - FIXED
• Male - FIXED
• Female - FIXED
• unknown - FIXED
• Unknown - FIXED
• ----- (son) - FIXED
• ----- (daughter) - FIXED
• (male) - FIXED
• (female) - FIXED
• (--?--) - FIXED

If we are to properly organize these, I propose we create a standard for listing such children.

In order to group such children all together, I propose we use (parentheses) around whatever term(s) we select. This assures that they won't be intermixed under the letters s & d or m & f, but instead will rise together to the top. I also propose that we use the terms "son" or "daughter" if the sex of the child is known, and "child" if not. All other versions listed above would be converted to "(son)", "(daughter)", or "(child)".

Your thoughts?

- Tim Doyle - Talk to me 15:16, 29 October 2007 (CDT)

Status

Robert:

All of the various children forms have been corrected, and a new list generated. The script that I run to gather that information is supposed to automatically slow itself so as not to affect other users, but it could be set incorrectly. If the access issue comes up again, please let me know. I checked the access logs and I did see others accessing the site during the time period you mentioned.

FYI - we currently have 3,071 family group pages with the surname of Whitney, and there are an additional 10,187 Whitneys who don't have pages of their own, making a total of 13,258 Whitneys identified on our Family Group pages! However, compare this number to the estimates on How many Whitneys? and I think we still have a ways to go. Keep in mind that that page doesn't list the total number of Whitneys ever, just the estimated number at any given point in a specific time range.

- Tim Doyle - Talk to me 22:13, 29 October 2007 (CDT)

Access Issue

Robert:

I actually had to increase the memory usage size limit of the wiki software in order for that page to load without timing out, so I know it is way too large. I didn't attempt to patrol it as I knew that it would be too large for the difference engine to handle and tried to patrol them the backdoor method, but it appears that you go there first and obviously had issues.

I have two plans on how to do the Given Name pages. 1) Have the bot create/update subpages ("Adam Whitney/BotCreatedList" or some other such name) and then include that on "Adam Whitney". This would allow users to see and edit the main page but not have access to the bot-generated page. 2) Have the bot load the main pages "Adam Whitney", remove all contents between certain markers, replace it with the new list, and save the page. There are pros & cons to each, and I am thinking this through, but I know for certain that one large page will not be the answer.

- Tim Doyle - Talk to me 09:23, 30 October 2007 (CDT)

Indexing Project

Robert:

I ran my new script to index all Whitney children listed in the family group pages who don't have pages of their own last night, and it completed alphabetically through "Rachel" last night before timing out. I will run it again today to complete it. If you look at the recent changes list and select 'show bots' and 'show patrolled', you can see all of the changes. It appears as though this version of MediaWiki pre-patrols any bot edits. Let me know if you see any issues. I've noticed that the sorting could be improved in these new sections. Note that my script will automatically purge and replace anything in that section, so don't make any changes in there or it will be lost.

Although this script now automates the task of adding children to the list, as well as removing children from the lists who have their names adjusted (deleted, spelling changes, etc.), the one thing it will not do is remove the index page when the last child of that name is removed. Keep in mind that there will be some cleanup required if we adjust the names of children with unusually spelled names. Of course, I could also write a script to search for any such index page which has no children listed.

- Tim Doyle - Talk to me 08:14, 31 October 2007 (CDT)

Robert:

I've noticed your continued work on Archive:1860 Census Extracts, Massachusetts. That page is getting fairly large. What would you think about splitting these large later census extract pages up by smaller geographical units, such as by County, and using the existing page as a list of counties to click through too? We'll want to do this before we start linking family group pages to the entries.

- Tim Doyle - Talk to me 14:31, 4 November 2007 (CST)

Census Issues

Robert:

First, I have been wondering about the main census page. I've noticed that we use a grid format for the index pages, yet for the extracts, we list the years, then select the states from those pages. Although I don't have an answer, I'm just wondering if we might be able to rework something so we're more consistent in our approach.

Also, I just ran the Rename Bot. One of the pages to be renamed was the 1880 extracts for MA. Although the page was renamed, the bot apparently was not able to remove the rename banner at the top, nor was it able to change any of the census index pages that link to that page - probably because of the size of the pages. This will all need to be cleaned up manually now. I wanted to point this out, as we'll have to remember this when we want to rename overly large pages in the future.

- Tim Doyle - Talk to me 09:44, 11 November 2007 (CST)

Census Organization

Robert:

I like this approach. Would we get rid of our current grid approach?

What do you think about using an imagemap for the localities? Take a look at the map on the page en:U.S. state and note that you can just click on a state to go to that state. I don't know if I care for the colorization of that particular map, but it's the concept I wanted to show you.

- Tim Doyle - Talk to me 16:36, 11 November 2007 (CST)

Census Reorganization

Robert:

I like the new approach. Let's keep the grid for now, but we may end up getting rid of it. I see you've already started - excellent!

I now have the old website back online (realized it was off - loose network cable was the culprit). I also got the databases working again, but they're offline for now as I realized there were privacy issues in them before. I'm trying to set something up so we have access and can migrate data over.

- Tim Doyle - Talk to me 21:10, 13 November 2007 (CST)

Whitneys of Clarendon, VT

Robert:

Take a look at the Whitneys of Clarendon, VT in 1800 and compare to the family of Silas Whitney. Note that we've already matched up Oliver and David. Sons Silas and Bart were dead by 1800. Son Benjamin was not yet married, and was probably living with his father or one of his brothers. His father has not yet been located. Son Samuel is supposedly 40 miles to the north in Jamaica, VT. That leaves two men as yet unidentified in Clarendon: Samuel and Solomon. Now I believe that Solomon is actually another son of Silas that we knew about, but had no information other than his name. If this is him, then he was born between 1755 and 1774. Unless he was a twin, I see no spot for him other than at the later end of that time period, about 1774. He has a man aged 16-26 with him, and this could be his brother Benjamin. This is starting to fit nicely. The real issue comes up when we look at the last unidentified Whitney - Samuel. Now Silas had a son named Samuel, but he was supposedly up in Jamaica according to Pierce. If he is instead here in Clarendon with a wife, 2 daughters, and a son, who then is the Samuel whose family is outlined at Family:Whitney, Samuel (1764-1825)?

Where was Silas? My guess was that he was living with a daughter and son-in-law.

Thoughts?

- Tim Doyle - Talk to me 21:39, 13 November 2007 (CST)

Samuel of Jamaica

Robert:

I just finished adjusting for the change we discussed (and got sidetracked splitting up 1880 MA as it was too large to save as it was). Now I have run into a major problem. This Samuel supposedly married Cynthia Powers and is the ancestor of Ben H. Whitney (see User:BenHWhitney and User:BenHWhittney) through his son Benjamin. Now since the Samuel we adjusted did not marry a Cynthia nor did he have a son Benjamin, this is a problem! Added to this is the fact that Ben has a DNA pattern which matches three other descendants of Eleazer³ and now I don't feel this is a good match.

Unless... perhaps the Samuel who m. Cynthia Powers was actually the same as Samuel, son of Family:Whitney, John (1731-a1760).

Thoughts?

- Tim Doyle - Talk to me 23:28, 13 November 2007 (CST)

State Census Records

Robert:

I have a book here called State Census Records by Ann S. Lainhart and there are literally hundreds of such censuses listed. For example, New York apparently had enumerations in 1790, 1825, 1835, 1845, 1855, 1865, 1875, 1892, 1905, 1915, and 1925. Let me know if you think this might be of use in our current project.

- Tim Doyle - Talk to me 22:06, 14 November 2007 (CST)

Genealogical Metadata on Wikis

Robert:

Take a look at http://genealogy.wikia.com/wiki/Forum:How_we_encode_our_data. This genealogy wiki is using metadata, saved on /info subpages under each "person" page, to represent the specific details of a person. This then allows programs to process the data. For an example, see the "Family Tree" tab on William the Conqueror's page on that site. This is an example of the growing tide of "Semantic Web" concepts, and something which we may want to consider implementing in some way at some point.

- Tim Doyle - Talk to me 15:27, 18 November 2007 (CST)

Your Dream

I am amazed at how much of this has come true!

- Tim Doyle - Talk to me 21:08, 19 November 2007 (CST)

Who is using the site?

Have you ever wondered how many people were using the site at any given time? This page shows all logged in users, the time of their last access, and a count of users who have not logged in. People fall off of the list after 1 hour of no activity.

- Tim Doyle - Talk to me 08:24, 21 November 2007 (CST)

Death of Samuel Whitney

Robert:

Could you please review the death date of Family:Whitney, Samuel (1707-1789). Did he die in 1754 as Pierce appears to imply? Did he die in 1789 as we have it? If so, what is the source of this date? The records seem to conflict with each other. One says he was taken prisoner in 1754 and died 3 weeks later, another says he was taken prisoner and escaped in 1751. He is stated to have been granted land in 1761. I am confused.

- Tim Doyle - Talk to me 09:40, 21 November 2007 (CST)

RE: Good to Have You On Board

Thanks a lot for you help. What do you recommend about pages concerning me and my mother. I really don't mind that they are posted. Do you think it would be best to delete them?

--SDiedrick 20:55, 21 November 2007 (CST)