2-field update limitations
If you're adding information from a Research Help record to a 2-field record, such as Birth, which is composed of the Date of Birth and Birthplace fields, you cannot import a date if the birthplace field is already populated. And vice versa -- cannot add a birthplace if the date field is already populated.
There's no +Add option to import the Jul 1844 date because Ireland is already in the Birthplace field. So you must remember the new information and update it manually.
Same problem for Death and Burial fields.
I'd your algorithm to be altered to allow for an update to a 2-field record , more along the lines of the logic used when merging records. It's too easy for users to overlook updates if they are not prompted to replace/add data with the +Add prompt.
Comments
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I believe it is a good thing that Source Linker cannot replace conclusions. This is because the Source Linker page does not show full information about what's on the profile: you cannot see the reason statements, collaboration notes, or already-attached sources. For example, what if that "Ireland" birth conclusion were accompanied by a reason statement indicating that the person was definitely not born in the summer of 1844, but that no better birthdate had yet been found? If the process allowed you to just blindly transfer the index's information, you'd be potentially wiping out someone's careful reasoning and research.
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Rarely is one blank in a two-field value the result of an intentional "conclusion". A blank field should be able to be filled during linking, and even a populated field should be allowed to be overwritten. I encounter this problem frequently, in a vast majority of cases it's because the person is added via census report that includes only an approximate year and state, then FS finds the hint for a birth record with the exact date and city. This is a good suggestion and should be implemented. If you're really concerned that some hypothetical intentionally-blank field might get filled, they can always add a toggle to show the existing "Reason this is correct" field if it's populated. Most of the time valid data is overwritten is by people blindly syncing their GEDCOMs or personal trees using software, and nobody's scampering to ban that.
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If Source Linker were to be (completely) revised, so that it showed existing information in full (including not only reasons, but also tags and notes and all other conclusions), then yes, being able to copy an indexed field to a corresponding profile field would be handy.
The fact that synching/uploading already does this without that necessary visibility is not relevant. That's like saying that the thugs over there pushing people off the bridge makes it OK for the cops to do the same thing.
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That's like saying that the thugs over there pushing people off the bridge makes it OK for the cops to do the same thing.
No, no. It's more like saying there are thugs pushing people off of bridges and banning people pushing kids down slides. The risk/reward component of each isn't really equivalent.
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