In today's Scotsman
St. Andrew's Day Free for All, from NOON on 30th November till 11.59 am on 7th December The Scotsman Digital Archive will be free to ALL users.
Caraid
Scotsman Digital Archive
Moderator: Global Moderators
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caraid
- Posts: 92
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- Location: Berwickshire
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tishgibbons
- Posts: 303
- Joined: Tue Jan 04, 2005 10:47 pm
- Location: Galway, Ireland
Thanks for that info Caraid - just need to keep reminding myself so that I don't forget the date!
Tish
Tish
Researching Mitchell Grassick Bowman Farquharson Wilson Allanach Leys Coutts Gauld McNerney from Crathie and Braemar, Strathdon and Glenbuchat and who moved on to Aberdeen, Glasgow, Ireland, Australia, India, Canada.
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Jean Jeanie
- Global Moderator
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- Location: Stafford West Mids
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ASGROOMBRIDGE
- Posts: 295
- Joined: Mon Apr 18, 2005 2:32 pm
- Location: Frome, Somerset, UK
Free day
Thank you for that, I expect they will be inundated. 
regards,
Audrey
regards,
Audrey
Looking for McGowan Anderson Fleming Sommerville Waddell in Lanarkshire. Semple Murray Baird Thompson Hutchinson in Annan Dumfriesshire Baird and Hutchinson also in Kirkinner Wigtonshire and Semple family of Annan Glasgow and Edinburgh
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grannysrock
- Posts: 472
- Joined: Wed Mar 02, 2005 9:21 am
- Location: Belgium
TIPs
Having got some experience of the beast , here are
Top Tips for searching the Scotsman Archives
1) When searching for Mc names , remember to search for
M' eg for McDougall try M'Dougall
2) Single letters are ignored but single letters followed by fullstops are not.
So an exact search for "Thomas A Brown" will give you the same results for "Thomas Brown" , but "Thomas A.Brown" will take the middle initial into consideration.
3) Boolean searches allow combinations of exact searches and normal ones. Ie " John Brown" Auchtenshoogle will give you articles which contain "john Brown" and Auchtenshoogle , whereas John Brown Auchtenshoogle will give you articles which contain the 3 words John, Brown and Auchenshoogle.
4) Use address and place info in exact searches. Our ancestors were often reported with their place of abode immediately after their name. Example your ancestor is John Brown. He lived at Hootsmon Street, Auchtenshoogle. an exact search for "John Brown" will unsurprisingly deliver more results than you have time to peruse. Try "Brown Hootsmon" and "Brown Auchtenshoogle". If the address/ place name is rare enough try searching on that alone in the time period that your ancestors lives there.
Because even if the newspaper clearly says Brown , there is no guarantee that the OCR process has captured Brown. If you don't believe me switch the article to text view - and see how many common words and names have become gobbledy-gook during conversion.
4) Single digit numbers aren't searchable, but double ones are. So if John Brown lived at 22 Hootsmon street , repeat the above with 22 in the exact search string eg "Brown 22 Hootsmon"
5) ACRONYMS - Despite what I said about fullstops above, the ones at the end of sentences seem to be ignored. This seems to extend to acronyms - so
"O.B.E" gives more results than "O.B.E." for example.
6) Make good use of death in your search string when hunting for BMD columns. ie add the words death and/or birth and/or marriage to your search string if you wish to restrict your search to BMD.
7) When searching for University results , try adding county or country of BIRTH to person's surname in the exact string. They were often reported by birth place, rathen than place of residence. SO if looking for the University results of John Brown above born in New Zealand now resident in Auchtenshoogle try
" Brown New Zealand " as well as " Brown Shoogleshire"
8 ) remember to search surname first. eg "Brown John" as well as "John Brown" . When lists were published they often were with the surname first.
9) When searching for marriages try with and without a hyphen. eg you think John Brown married Jessie White.
then try "Brown-White" as well as "Brown White" - the hyphen was always printed , but it doesn't always survive OCR.
10) Above all remember that just because something doesn't show up in your search results, it doesn't Mean it wasn't reported - on converting the image to serachable text, many things can go wrong. If you know the date of something - you can always use the Calendar to pull up the editon for that dats and try to find the report yourself.
Well thats my top tips. Has anyone got any more ? Or corrections to make to above ?
Sally
PS dont forget wildcards
Top Tips for searching the Scotsman Archives
1) When searching for Mc names , remember to search for
M' eg for McDougall try M'Dougall
2) Single letters are ignored but single letters followed by fullstops are not.
So an exact search for "Thomas A Brown" will give you the same results for "Thomas Brown" , but "Thomas A.Brown" will take the middle initial into consideration.
3) Boolean searches allow combinations of exact searches and normal ones. Ie " John Brown" Auchtenshoogle will give you articles which contain "john Brown" and Auchtenshoogle , whereas John Brown Auchtenshoogle will give you articles which contain the 3 words John, Brown and Auchenshoogle.
4) Use address and place info in exact searches. Our ancestors were often reported with their place of abode immediately after their name. Example your ancestor is John Brown. He lived at Hootsmon Street, Auchtenshoogle. an exact search for "John Brown" will unsurprisingly deliver more results than you have time to peruse. Try "Brown Hootsmon" and "Brown Auchtenshoogle". If the address/ place name is rare enough try searching on that alone in the time period that your ancestors lives there.
Because even if the newspaper clearly says Brown , there is no guarantee that the OCR process has captured Brown. If you don't believe me switch the article to text view - and see how many common words and names have become gobbledy-gook during conversion.
4) Single digit numbers aren't searchable, but double ones are. So if John Brown lived at 22 Hootsmon street , repeat the above with 22 in the exact search string eg "Brown 22 Hootsmon"
5) ACRONYMS - Despite what I said about fullstops above, the ones at the end of sentences seem to be ignored. This seems to extend to acronyms - so
"O.B.E" gives more results than "O.B.E." for example.
6) Make good use of death in your search string when hunting for BMD columns. ie add the words death and/or birth and/or marriage to your search string if you wish to restrict your search to BMD.
7) When searching for University results , try adding county or country of BIRTH to person's surname in the exact string. They were often reported by birth place, rathen than place of residence. SO if looking for the University results of John Brown above born in New Zealand now resident in Auchtenshoogle try
" Brown New Zealand " as well as " Brown Shoogleshire"
8 ) remember to search surname first. eg "Brown John" as well as "John Brown" . When lists were published they often were with the surname first.
9) When searching for marriages try with and without a hyphen. eg you think John Brown married Jessie White.
then try "Brown-White" as well as "Brown White" - the hyphen was always printed , but it doesn't always survive OCR.
10) Above all remember that just because something doesn't show up in your search results, it doesn't Mean it wasn't reported - on converting the image to serachable text, many things can go wrong. If you know the date of something - you can always use the Calendar to pull up the editon for that dats and try to find the report yourself.
Well thats my top tips. Has anyone got any more ? Or corrections to make to above ?
Sally
PS dont forget wildcards
Newhaven-DRYBURGH,NICOLL,HUNTER(+Alloa) ; Lesmahagow-MITCHELL,LAMB, BARR, BROWN,CALLAN; Comrie-MCDOUGALL, MCEWEN, MCLAREN, BRYSON; BEW - PRINGLE, FISHER,SPENCE;Edzell-MIDDLETON,DORWARD;
Edin.-JOHNSTON, MONTGOMERY;Fife-SIME, FORRESTER, WANLESS
Edin.-JOHNSTON, MONTGOMERY;Fife-SIME, FORRESTER, WANLESS
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JustJean
- Posts: 2520
- Joined: Sun Dec 12, 2004 12:52 am
- Location: Maine USA
I'm sure it's bound to make a huge difference to those who are new to peeking in the archives.....(like me 
) Can't wait!!!-
CatrionaL
- Posts: 1519
- Joined: Fri Dec 10, 2004 11:11 pm
- Location: Scottish Borders
Sally
Thank you for your extremely helpful post and for sharing the info with us. It represents a lot of hard work on your part. I'll be keeping it handy as a reference tool. It will certainly contribute to our getting the most out of the Scotsman Searches, during the following few days or at any other time.
We'll be sure to let you know of our successes.
Bonne Journée
Catriona
Thank you for your extremely helpful post and for sharing the info with us. It represents a lot of hard work on your part. I'll be keeping it handy as a reference tool. It will certainly contribute to our getting the most out of the Scotsman Searches, during the following few days or at any other time.
We'll be sure to let you know of our successes.
Bonne Journée
Catriona
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DavidWW
- Posts: 5057
- Joined: Sat Dec 11, 2004 9:47 pm
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Legs11
- Posts: 21
- Joined: Mon Nov 28, 2005 8:48 pm
- Location: Sussex