Help prevent a murder

keewik · Post by **keewik** » Sun Feb 08, 2009 7:03 pm

At this moment I'm so frustrated I'll either hurl the laptop out the window or kill the first person I meet as I walk out of the room!

I haven't been on Ancestry for a wee while and they seem to have changed the lay-out, with the result that no matter what I press - 'Card Catalogue' or 'Census and Voter Lists' I cannot at all access the range of records. All I wanted to do was look at the 1841 Census for Scotland, but all it seems to show is the 1901 Census. Obviously the Christmas holidays has somehow reduced my IQ by at least 100 points because I can't find my way round the site at all. Can anybody help?

LesleyB · Post by **LesleyB** » Sun Feb 08, 2009 7:12 pm

Hi Keewik
I don't use Ancestry very often, but I went off and had a look. There is a link up the top of the Ancestry page which is maybe of help - it says "Switch back to Old Search Experience". Have you tried that?

I seem to be able to get access to other years (inc. 1841) of the Scottish census data that way.

Best wishes
Lesley

keewik · Post by **keewik** » Sun Feb 08, 2009 7:20 pm

I did try that without any luck, BUT - Eureka - I noticed a button which says 'reset all filters and start over', pressed it, and as if by magic ALL the Censuses were listed. I suppose at some time in the past I must have inadvertently clicked on something that changed things.
I am no longer feeling murderous.

LesleyB · Post by **LesleyB** » Sun Feb 08, 2009 7:28 pm

I am no longer feeling murderous

Good!
- hey everyone! it is safe to come out again now.....

Post by **emanday** » Mon Feb 09, 2009 1:00 am

LesleyB wrote:
I am no longer feeling murderous
Good!
- hey everyone! it is safe to come out again now.....

I know how keewik felt

I have a subscription to Ancestry and have lately been really annoyed that previously successful searches suddenly come up with nothing. Anything from a few minutes, hours or even days later the same search does get the info I wanted.

The inclination to murder hasn't been my immediate reaction (YET), but

........

Post by **AnneM** » Mon Feb 09, 2009 7:25 pm

Can I join the posse. I have ended up spending credits on TS looking for people in the censuses because of Ancestry's rubbish transcribing and the minimal ability it has to accept wild cards. I've been looking for McConnachies in Aberdeen and there is no substitute for being able to search for M*Con*ch* or even M*C*n*ch* especially given the number of possible renderings they can come up with for Georgina. What frustrates me particularly is that they give you all the other people with the same spelling of the surname before they give you people with the same forename but Mac instead of Mc. They also give you widely diverse age groups. It would seem to me sensible that if I'm looking for a Charles McConnachie born in 1841 in Aberdeen I'm going to be more interested in a Charles (or Chas) MacConachie born 1842ish than I am in an Andrew McConnachie born in 1875!! End of wee rant but I got so frustrated with this the other night I just about screamed.

Anne

Post by **SarahND** » Mon Feb 09, 2009 9:15 pm

Hi Anne,
I've been trying to duplicate your results, since I couldn't believe that if you asked for Charles you would be given Andrew... And realized that you must have unchecked "exact matches only". I always check that box to avoid unrelated stuff. If you take, for example, the 1861 census and search for Charles Mccon* born 1841 +/- 2 years, you get a nice manageable group of 4 hits. Maccon* comes up with nothing, so that's fine. If you change it to Mcconnachie and use soundex you get 17 hits, all of whom are named Charles. In my experience, if you search for Charles, you also get all examples of Chas. and likewise searching for William finds Wm.

The moral of the story is: Always check "exact matches only" and it will lower your blood pressure

Cheers,
Sarah

trish1 · Post by **trish1** » Wed Feb 11, 2009 1:43 am

I do so agree re only using exact matches. I also get much better results if

- I search an individual data base (much as it is nice to search ALL census records in one search, each one separately seems to work better

)
- always revert to the "old" search when it decides to give you the new option (I get that about once a month)
- since the advent of the "new improved main page" (falling over laughing about that nonsense) I always go to the search page instead
- Have a set of links for your frequently used searches and go directly to them
- try searching the census by given names only - (unless you have NO other information, when volume may be very large for common names)
- Rant and rave when they change it all - yet again

I do sometimes find folks on ancestry that I can't find on SP. Searching techniques for both are somewhat different.

Trish