I'm searching Records, specifically Virginia death certificates, for Margaret A Smith. The 10 pages

DanaChou

I'm searching Records, specifically Virginia death certificates, for Margaret A Smith. The 10 pages of search results returned my target name as the parent or spouse of the dead person. How do I get the search to look for Margaret as the dead person?

Sheila DuBois

@DanaChou DanaChou​  I have moved this from the General group to the Virginia Research ..

DanaChou

Me question is about the behavior of the search function. Is there a better place to move it to than the Virginia group? This is not the only time I've had a search limit results only to children with the target name, for example, when I was looking for a parent, or vice versa. Why do searches sometimes limit themselves like this and is there a way to turn off the limiting criteria? ​

Melissa S Himes

I will move it back to General Questions and tag @Dennis J Yancey​ and @Brett .​ They are very good at answering these questions!

Dennis J Yancey

I dont see any way to filter on the relationships (principal, mother, father, etc)

This would be a good item to send feedback on - as to the ability to filter on relationship.

However, having said that in this specific case - I dont think you would see anything different

Though all the relationship that show appear to be "mother"

if there were any other entries where it was "principal" - - they would have shown

and they don't - which leads me to believe there just arent any matching entries for what you are looking for.

 

Though I do bring up the tip that as far as search parameters - when you dont see results you are looking for - it is usually better to leave off some of the parameters

 

In this case I would have left off any middle initial or name and left off the birth date

so that all that was potentially matching was the first, last name and the death date.

but again - it appears there is no match.

X24 MOM

@Dennis J Yancey​ 🤷🏻‍♀️I dont know🤷🏻‍♀️... this is a strange one indeed... I played around with this last night using the info from @DanaChou DanaChou​ ss, and I got what seemed like everything EXCEPT mother ... I tried to force it to happen and couldn’t .... I’m no programmer, lol who am I kidding I’m not even exactly sure what a programmer does but, is it possible that this particular search result is connected to the “person” ... like perhaps @DanaChou DanaChou​  used the “search” feature from the fs “person” page? ... just a thought ... I would def report this over on the FS side though if I were you @DanaChou DanaChou​ they’re really good about responding (you have to click on the ? Then choose “my cases” to see their response and there’s nothing there to indicate they’ve responded lol... I usually find mine months later after it’s beennsittnt there forever ... I’m making a suggestion to fix that too guys 🤣 ...

 

I’m gonna tag @Community.familysearch.org Feedback​ And @Mark Mitchell​  (lol he’s gonna get tired of me doing that 🤣... but he’s the only one who comes to mind here when I think about that kind of “internal” stuff lol...sorry mark😬)

Dennis J Yancey

its only showing mothers - because in that specific case - thats all there was to show

in other cases it would have shown entries besides mother.

 

you cant find whats not there to be found . . . (for that specific case)

 

there is no bug as far as I can see

though it would be nice if you could search on relationship type

(which in this case would have ended up with no results at all)

 

 

DanaChou

There are definitely Margaret Smiths who should show up as principles in this search. I know of 4 buried in Norfolk close to the death year I used, two of whom even have the "A" initial in their names. The search seemed to return the usual assortment of people who broadly match the criteria, except it seemed to exclude principles. I've had other searches in other areas hit this issue too, where only "daughter" results came back on someone for whom I know there should also be spouse and/or parent results, for example. I know I can't filter on relationship type but it seems like at times the search itself does that, to my frustration.

Dennis J Yancey

yes - but not with the specific criteria that the person entered

(with birth and death dates)

 

if there had been a specific record that matched the query it would have shown - but there wasnt.

 

thats why it is better to start with less criteria

just a first name and last name and death range - and see what shows up

adding any additional criteria - will limit the results not expand the results.

Dennis J Yancey

So for example - in that same "collection"

if you do a search of Margaret Smith and death 1930

you do indeed find a match that isn't just a "mother"

but is the "principle".

 

it would be nice if you could limit the search to "principle" (the person who actually died)

but doesn't seem like that is an option.

 

 

DanaChou

Do you mean yes, the search itself filters on relationship type and arbitrarily excludes some results sometimes?

Dennis J Yancey

Im saying with the dates that were entered - there were no matches

where the person was "principle" (and not mother)

if the dates had been left off and no middle name used - I would imagine it would have produced results of "principle" - like ones you found.

 

there is no filter for the user to select - to choose "principle, mother etc..