"Expected tag sources"

Mormor192

What are the "expected tagged sources' for a birth when births were not being reported by a county?

Julia Szent-Györgyi

Despite how it sounds to both you and me, that message apparently isn't meant to imply anything specific. Any ol' sources will do, as long as there are two of them.

PamelaCarter2

I have used a marriage record that contains a DOB/POB and/or a death record containing the same type of info

Gordon Collett

See: https://generationsgenealogy.com.au/how-many-sources/

If there is birth information, it came from somewhere and that somewhere is the source that should be tagged to it and good practice expects two independent sources that support the information both be tagged to the birth information. I would say having at least two source is most important when there is no birth record.

Mormor192

I was curious as to what sources are accepted by the algorithm. I have the impression that it expects county or state birth certificates which starte very late and varied by state. People living on the frontier (and even far western part of present Virginia was the frontier at one time) were dependent on the circuit rider and what and where he recorded anything. People are lucky if they have a christening record from that period. Records were sometimes written in family Bibles and were also cut out to send to the government when applying for a pension, thus lost to the descendants. Census records are not a valid source as they can be quite variable from year to year and depending on who gave the information, how much they knew about the family and what the census taker wrote down. Grave markers were erected by descendants who may not have had much detailed knowledge about the person and some have been erected much later with whatever information the person decided to put on them

Gordon Collett

Computers are dumb. That part of the algorithm has no idea what sources are tagged to data. Just whether there are any. One would hope that the sources tagged to a birth actually contain something about the birth, but the algorithm is just counting up the total number of tags.

The important thing about tagging, is that it makes it easy for other users to look at the tagged sources and see that the recorded birth information is the average of five census records, a couple of marriage records, a death record, and a headstone.

Julia Szent-Györgyi

Mormor asked: "I was curious as to what sources are accepted by the algorithm."

Any source. Really: anything. You could go to a profile's Sources tab, click Add Source, choose Add New Source, type a random character in the Title field, and click Save, then find that new addition on the Sources list (it'd be at the bottom, since you didn't add a date), click the title line, click Add Tag, click Name and Birth, and click Save, and lo and behold, the name and birth would each have a tagged source. Repeat, and tada, the algorithm would be happy: two tagged sources for name and birth.

Yes, the tool really is that dumb. The brains have to be supplied by the people using the tool, i.e., us.

Rhonda Budvarson

Thank you all for the comments. FamilySearch would love two accurate tagged sources for a birth. And no, this is not possible in many cases. As we work together to improve the accuracy of the tree, if you choose to look at the suggestions, do the best you can to check facts, tag appropriate sources, etc. Then feel free to dismiss the suggestion.