Attention All Users: The New Merge Process is Live in Beta.FamilySearch.org
Comments
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Justin Masters said: Thanks Gordon, I forgot the playground aspect of it.0
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Justin Masters said: "marriage" seems to be abused a lot these days, and I wonder how much power that's having in opening up the acceptance for the practice of marrying literally whoever and whatever you want (people, cars/objects, animals, etc).
(I note with some chagrin the current definitions of Him and Her as pronouns being changed or forced, based on the perception of how one wishes to be defined or identified at the moment.)
Not wanting to digress, but simply point out that words being misused for the power of redefinition or acceptance shouldn't be minimized or dismissed.0 -
Juli said: Here are some suggested tweaks to the "step 1" screen:
It's impossible to answer the question of "Are these people a possible match?" without at least dates on family members. Places would be good, too, but I couldn't come up with a format/placement that I could mock up quickly enough.
Both the revised top part (name and dates instead of "ancestor" for the column heading) and the need for dates and places apply also to step 2.
The box for the reason statement at the end is a popup, but it's movable, and the screen underneath is scrollable! The only tweak I'd make here is to still display the name and ID of the non-surviving person, to aid in composing a meaningful/useful statement.0 -
Adrian Bruce said: It might be the data - but I still don't know what the up and down arrows against events and facts on the Stage 2 merge screen are there for...
Ellen Salmon has six sources on her name but when I click the up and down arrows against her name, nothing appears. There's a slight increase in the height but that's all. I only mention sources because I thought that might be why they are there...
(The up and down arrows against the Sources listed at the bottom of the page reveal details - that's fine)0 -
Adrian Bruce said: Joe - you're making me nervous. I'm seriously not OK with the up and down arrows against events on the 2nd stage screen because nothing appears to happen when I click them (see my reply, 3 replies down). That suggests a half job and half jobs should not be released without explanation. (Especially since half jobs seldom get completed because management presumes everything was done so remove / reassign the technical resources)
Re "What information needs to be seen by the users"
- dates of children and spouses need to be visible, otherwise the names are just decoration;
- because the left and right alignment of the columns has swapped, one of two things must happen - either everyone must be warned beforehand or there needs to be something a bit clearer like some arrows over the top of the columns to show the direction of data flow. I think we all know that the chance of FS warning patrons beforehand is about zero (well, I can put out a challenge and hope! :-) ). Because I'm struggling to think of appropriate headings if someone presses "Switch Positions" I personally would prioritise the arrows over getting the "right" column headings.0 -
Paul said: Joe
I know the other issues being raised here are far more important, but when you ask (regarding use of the word "ancestor"): "... is the word good enough for the majority of users to understand what is being said..?" - that is surely not the point. Firstly, as applied, it's plain bad English. Secondly, just as using the word in the wrong context had been eliminated (I believe) just about everywhere else in FamilySearch, it crops up again! So consistency, as well as accuracy, is a key factor with the terminology.
Speaking generally, to be honest I haven't had much opportunity to experiment in the beta version with the feature, but it does appear there is still a way to go before it's ready to go "live".0 -
Gordon Collett said: My guess is that when the code is finished these will open and close the reason statements for each item.0
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Adrian Bruce said: Who knows? It's just that my cynical dark side gets worried about the code getting finished....0
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Gordon Collett said: I think just dropping that first line in the head is a great idea. It really isn't needed, it takes care of the misuse of English, and would eliminate needing to translate it.
One thing people have not commented on, is the overall change in the page design. Is this a preview of what the entire site is heading to? Overall the appearance is softer, not as harsh on the eyes. There has been a tweak in the fonts that I think makes the text easier to read.
I hadn't noticed the reason statement popup, having never actually gone that far in the merge process. Does this mean the end of the modal windows which you, Juli, have called "EVIL INCARNATE" is in sight for everywhere in FamilySearch? People have been complaining about them for about a year, and that seems to be about the right time span for accepting a suggesting, designing, testing, revising, and releasing such a change.0 -
Gordon Collett said: I also really like that the copy ID function has gone from three clicks to one as long as one puts up with the "ID copied" banner sitting there so long and ignores the Dismiss link. I assume this will be propagated across the entire site with time.0
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Gordon Collett said: I've noticed something else that should be addressed before the release. If Vital Information is missing on one of the people, it throws off the order of the display. People are not going to like this!
The display really should stay in the order Birth, Christening, Death, Burial no matter what information is blank.0 -
Justin Masters said: Joe, a quick question....
If I find other problems on the beta site (which I presume will get migrated to production) that are not related to the merge process, should I report that in THIS thread, or start a separate one?
That nature of the "problem" I'm seeing is that on an ancestor, I look at sources that are attached https://beta.familysearch.org/tree/pe... , and I see for the 1900 Census "This source has not been attached to all people found in the record."
When I click on "Unfinished Attachments" landing here: https://beta.familysearch.org/search/...
I find there are NO attachments made.
So, the question is... HOW was this attached in the first place to be able to show an Unfinished attachment error message in which NO attachments are even visible? I see it was supposedly created by me in 2016... but NO attachments? (Data transfer error between Production and Beta?) Hopefully this isn't some kind of "bit-rot" that is happening on the production side as well.
(I saw the same thing on 1910, and wondered about it, but attached them anyway, but seeing it again for the 1900 Census... )0 -
Paul said: Justin
Sorry to "intrude" relating to comments directed at Joe, but you really have to treat beta and production versions as two separate programs. For example, I compared the two Sources sections for M31W-VN7 and the beta version contains far fewer sources. Also, the "duplicate" 1910 census source you added today has "beta." at the front of the URL, whereas the one you added in 2016 has the same URL reference, less the beta prefix.
As explained earlier, the work carried out in the beta version will not be carried over into the production model. Likewise, you might not see much of what you have added in the production version when you switch over to beta. So just use beta for trying things out, not for any serious work on (or comparisons between) the same IDs.0 -
Gordon Collett said: Also, the beta site often does not appear to be the actual, complete code that is being developed to be released into production. Since the Unfinished Attachment process is released and working just fine on the real site, half-finished remnants of it being a work in progress on the beta site can just be ignored.0
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joe martel said: Please start a new thread. Thanks0
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Adrian Bruce said: Gordon, re the overall page being "softer". I personally would like a "tighter" display but as I've said, I'm one who can (and do) run at 90% zoom. Other people's eye-ball mileage may vary...0
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Justin Masters said: No problem... In my work, "pre-prod" is supposed to be a precursor to "prod", and as I found yesterday, there were programming errors in the beta side that seemed to intrude into the production side for data selection (or maybe to other fields found on that screen).
Promotion from "pre-prod" to "prod" is supposed to result in no change between them.
So, I DO understand what's being said. I just don't know if there's OTHER functionality that's being brought over from the "beta" site to the production site.
I just can't tell (as a user) where to draw the line between the scope and "functionality" found on the beta site and what's going to be promoted to production.0 -
Gordon Collett said: Yea, but I don't think beta is "pre-prod," My impression is that it is more partial mock up the check major functions.0
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Justin Masters said: 2nd Screen...
Others have questioned what the down arrows (chevrons) are for. Clicking on them appears to flip the arrow, but no functionality is seen.. Is it meant to show supporting "facts" for that piece of information?
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The "-> REPLACE" is placed TOO LOW and should be more parallel to the info being considered. The placement suggests that there is more to be expanded, which would cause the "REPLACE" to be placed even LOWER.
I get the visible elements (blocks) causing some grief here, so I'd suggest having a middle "column" with JUST an arrow in it, that can be indicative of the info that will be moved/modified. Or use the arrow in conjuction with the color coding of the info that will be replaced. (The color coding is seen already, but the softer yellow I can't see unless I get my face down low enough and parallel to the screen to see that there's color there - probably an artifact of the screen texture that presents colors more visibly up/down. I'm seeing on my screen something akin to the lenticular pictures where you move your face and the image changes, but in this case, the colors are changing. This is happening on one of my screens more than the other.)
The 2nd screen shares more of the context I was looking for in the evaluation needed on the 1st screen.
So I question the need for the 1st screen.
But I would DEFINITELY have some visual representation at the top of the screen that makes it more clear (than the text that's there) what will disappear and what will stay.
Screen 3... Confirm your changes...
WHY is this screen here? Isn't that what we we decided on the 2nd screen? How about a SMALL modal window that covers the NEXT button on the 2nd screen, and says "CONFIRM CHANGES" or "FINISH MERGE" but also include a "NOPE" button. (lol) that allows you to not move forward. (ie, if more analysis/merging was needed, or just back out completely at this point)
The layout below the individual (on the 3rd screen) is confusing and lengthy... if you're going to show that, make it similar to the layout of the individual page where family units are shown.0 -
Justin Masters said: Interesting....
I tried to hit the back button AFTER the merge was completed, and got the following:
I would say that at this point, the 1st two bullets should probably be removed.
And why duplicate the "Step 1 of 3....." message?0 -
Adrian Bruce said: Re "I question the need for the 1st screen."
My initial reaction to that is that it's a reaction to the current process where the single(?) screen starts in the upper part with all the moving and choosing as if we are going to merge - and only puts the "Not A Match" option right down at the bottom. So the current screen is Action first - then - Question: Is the Action correct? Wrong - to my logical brain.
So we now have Question first, then Action, as I wanted.
Now I suspect that you are right and the first screen doesn't have enough evaluation data on it - in particular, I don't think that the "Hey there's a lot of difference in the birth dates" warning comes up until later. (I could be wrong but I've closed down Chrome so can't immediately check).0 -
Justin Masters said: I think what this entire process is trying to accomplish is two-fold...
1. Make it easier for people to do ACCURATELY, and
2. Make it more useable on SMALL form factors like phones (while,
(3. trying to re-use code/layout as much as possible)0 -
David Newton said: That's an alpha however. A beta is a largely feature-complete version of the finished product. The incomplete features should be the ones being tested and only minor changes should be made to the beta code.0
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Adrian Bruce said: I must admit, Gordon, that I'm pushed to understand exactly what the Beta Site is in relation to any known software life cycle. It's very nice to have and I wouldn't want to be without it but.... What's it actually for?0
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joe martel said: This feature on beta is what is being coded and tested prior to going to production. Other services like Sources may be a bit out of sync. But Merge here is very close to what you will see going to production quite soon.0
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Adrian Bruce said: Arrows now make sense in Beta site - they only appear against Sources and expand / contract them.0
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Adrian Bruce said: Silly boy - didn't read it all, did I? Arrows appear against events on Screen2 onwards but they sensibly expand to show reasons & last change date ,etc.0
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Adrian Bruce said: Re " I don't like "Your Ancestor" either because (a) it might only be a relative (b) it might not even be that and (c) if it is my ancestor then it's actually my ancestor on both sides! "
Good. it now says "Possible Duplicate" and "Surviving Person". That's perhaps not totally obvious but right now I really don't think it can be made any clearer. Sometimes it's a bit complex because it's a bit complex!0 -
Adrian Bruce said: It would be well worth people going back and having another play with the new merge. Sorry, not "play", of course not, another assessment! (grin)0
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Gordon Collett said: Some nice modifications. I also like that if the merge can only go in one direction, instead of letting you get into the merge backward and being told you have to switch sides to merge, the merge opens with the required configuration and you cannot switch which side the people are on.
Looking through the new merge, and knowing that there is a balance between impedance of hasty work and annoying people with inefficiency, I would suggest the following modification at the top of the merge screen:
Current:
Would suggest changing to:
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This discussion has been closed.