Merging

John_Hill

My father recently passed away and I updated the information in my own tree. I wanted to merge it with my mom's information and it only gives an either/or option to merging. I want to add my comments to those made by my mom but it won't let me. I know I could just have her do it, but sometimes it isn't convenient to do that for other records. I think if one person was there at the passing of a loved one in addition to another then both witnesses would be better than one. The specific area of information is "why this information is correct."

JeffWiseman

Don't get too involved with the "Reason this information is correct" text. FS has set that field up in a way that it is schizophrenic. I.e., It is performing multiple functions and as a result, people are being misled as to what it does. Anything that you put in that field during a change you are making will eventually all but disappear, buried down in the bowels of the change history logs.

If the merging problem that you are referring to has to do with there now being 2 or more PIDs for your father (resulting from marking his living record as "Deceased"), the best way to accomplish what you are trying to do would be to copy and paste your mother's comments into a Note (i.e., a "Collaborative Note") in your version of your father's record. Then add your comments to it as appropriate. When you merge the two deceased record PIDs from you and your mother, all notes are carried over into the surviving PID from the merge.

Although the "Notes" on a person record have been inappropriately hidden away under a tab called "Collaboration" (which they are not), the Notes are the proper place to document how various "Conclusions" (e.g., the values for vitals) have been derived from the different sources including the logic behind that derivation.

In other words, the "Reason(s) this information (i.e., the conclusion) is correct" documentation really belongs in the Notes area.

The "Reason this information is correct" box that you are talking about is inappropriately titled. It should say something more like "Reason this (one specific) change is being made". That text is attached to the CHANGE and stored in the change history. Since each change is made for a DIFFERENT reason, the text in that field would normally be different for each and every change! That's why anything that you put there will potentially disappear the next time someone makes a change to that conclusion.

So that field is for documenting the historic EVOLUTION of a conclusion from moment to moment. So if you want to document your "conclusion's (e.g., vital's) derivation logic" in a single place that won't go away, it belongs in a Note that is titled to reflect the conclusion it is documenting (e.g. "BIRTH").

That note would then evolve over time and like the conclusion value itself, become more and more accurate as it remains attached to the person record itself and not buried inside a change history.

FS has taken a short cut to combine these two totally separate pieces of data. Since they have also moved away from the normal use of Notes by adding things like "Life Sketches" and hiding Notes down in an inappropriate tab, it is not obvious to people that the Notes are important. Instead, they are led to incorrectly believe that putting a long and detailed description in the current Reason as to why the conclusion value is "correct" is a lasting solution. It is not. Even if correct, it WILL eventually disappear.

Incidentally, I do understand why FS set things up the way they did, but it is not a correct solution to the problem IMHO. Unfortunately, now to fix it would likely be difficult. The work flow in those edit windows would need to be significantly rearranged in order to separate the two different reasons. Also they would need to add the ability to tag items in a record's Notes list to its vitals in exactly the same way that items in a record's Source list can be tagged to vitals are currently done.

JeffWiseman

Don't get too involved with the "Reason this information is correct" text. FS has set that field up in a way that it is schizophrenic. I.e., It is performing multiple functions and as a result, people are being misled as to what it does. Anything that you put in that field during a change you are making will eventually all but disappear, buried down in the bowels of the change history logs.

If the merging problem that you are referring to has to do with there now being 2 or more PIDs for your father (resulting from marking his living record as "Deceased"), the best way to accomplish what you are trying to do would be to copy and paste your mother's comments into a Note (i.e., a "Collaborative Note") in your version of your father's record. Then add your comments to it as appropriate. When you merge the two deceased record PIDs from you and your mother, all notes are carried over into the surviving PID from the merge.

Although the "Notes" on a person record have been inappropriately hidden away under a tab called "Collaboration" (which they are not), the Notes are the proper place to document how various "Conclusions" (e.g., the values for vitals) have been derived from the different sources including the logic behind that derivation.

In other words, the "Reason(s) this information (i.e., the conclusion) is correct" documentation really belongs in the Notes area.

The "Reason this information is correct" box that you are talking about is inappropriately titled. It should say something more like "Reason this (one specific) change is being made". That text is attached to the CHANGE and stored in the change history. Since each change is made for a DIFFERENT reason, the text in that field would normally be different for each and every change! That's why anything that you put there will potentially disappear the next time someone makes a change to that conclusion.

So that field is for documenting the historic EVOLUTION of a conclusion from moment to moment. So if you want to document your "conclusion's (e.g., vital's) derivation logic" in a single place that won't go away, it belongs in a Note that is titled to reflect the conclusion it is documenting (e.g. "BIRTH").

That note would then evolve over time and like the conclusion value itself, become more and more accurate as it remains attached to the person record itself and not buried inside a change history.

FS has taken a short cut to combine these two totally separate pieces of data. Since they have also moved away from the normal use of Notes by adding things like "Life Sketches" and hiding Notes down in an inappropriate tab, it is not obvious to people that the Notes are important. Instead, they are led to incorrectly believe that putting a long and detailed description in the current Reason as to why the conclusion value is "correct" is a lasting solution. It is not. Even if correct, it WILL eventually disappear.

Incidentally, I do understand why FS set things up the way they did, but it is not a correct solution to the problem IMHO. Unfortunately, now to fix it would likely be difficult. The work flow in those edit windows would need to be significantly rearranged in order to separate the two different reasons. Also they would need to add the ability to tag items in a record's Notes list to its vitals in exactly the same way that items in a record's Source list can be tagged to vitals are currently done.