New Search:Six months later

Monica Ross_1

I had really hoped that some even minor improvements would be made to the 'New and Improved' search.

It is still a nightmare, I have looked at and read all the how to information, I have spent innumerable hours looking for information that I could have found in less than 5 minutes in August 2021.

I no longer search for records before creating a profile. I add a person and then hope that if I come back to them several days later, that some records will pop up.

Even if I search from an existing profile the results are still garbage.

You need to have the entire search form available from the beginning. The results need to reflect the information entered in the search form.

If I enter born in Lancashire England, lived in Lancashire England, married in Lancashire England, died in Lancashire England, I don't want or need results from North America. And when I enter a spouses name and or parents names I don't want results for other names.

I would like to be able to pick results categories from the list of results, but I can't I have to go back to the search form, re-enter info, wander around until I can find something that seems to make sense, however it often doesn't.

I have been involved in family history research for over 10 years and have never been so frustrated.

Paul W

@Monica Ross_1

Even though I dislike the new Search interface about as much as practically every other user that comments here, I don't find myself struggling so much in getting the expected results.

The three main points that help in my searches are:

(1) Use of "Exact" match boxes - in conjunction with use of wildcards, where necessary.

(2) Only inputting one set of data at a time - e.g. if looking for a marriage, leave birth and death fields blank.

(3) Filter on "Type" and/or "Collection".

If I search for Lancashire records, in line with the above, I rarely find results from other parts of England, or the world.

Take the example below. I have inputted to two areas - Birth and Residence - and have not used any filters, but still most of my results relate to George Wilson individuals, born in Lancashire in the 1865-1867 period and found in Lancashire in the 1881 census. (Just two "irrelevant" results at the end, which would have been omitted if I had searched / filtered just on the 1881 E&W Census collection.

https://www.familysearch.org/search/record/results?q.birthLikeDate.from=1865&q.birthLikeDate.to=1867&q.birthLikePlace=lancashire&q.birthLikePlace.exact=on&q.givenName=George&q.givenName.exact=on&q.residenceDate.from=1881&q.residenceDate.to=1881&q.residencePlace=lancashire&q.residencePlace.exact=on&q.surname=Wilson&q.surname.exact=on

I wonder what types of inputs other users are making, when claiming their searches produce thousands of results from all over the globe.