Frequently asked questions
The members of our Forsythe Family Network would like to take this opportunity to welcome all our 'cousins' in genealogy and encourage you to catch the fever as you search for your ancestors . This can become both a labor of love - and hate - because it can consume an extraordinary amount of time, but personal satisfaction, camaraderie, and other rewards are exhilarating. Dawn and I offer you the opportunity to enjoy family tree research by using the contributions made to this site.
A role is a set of access rights, which give permission to view data, change configuration settings, etc. Access rights are assigned to roles, and roles are granted to users. Each family tree can assign different access to each role, and users can have a different role in each family tree.
Visitors
Everybody has this role, including visitors to the site and search engines. The records that are visible are those of deceased but only the names of living unless that person has requested for it not to be displayed. Most digital photo images are watermarked.
Member
This role has all the permissions of the visitor role, plus any additional access granted by the family tree configuration. Where a member is associated with an individual record in a family tree and has a role of member, editor, or moderator, you may be prevented from accessing the details of distant, living relations. If you feel you need more access, just ask! Photos are still watermarked, but if you would like a non-watermarked image, just request it and I'll give you what I have. Our reason for doing this is privacy related and we just want to give proper credit to those individuals who have made contributions.
This role has all the permissions of the member role, plus permission to add/change/delete data. Any changes will need to be approved by a moderator, unless the user has the "automatically accept changes" option enabled.
Moderator
This role has all the permissions of the editor role, plus permission to approve/reject changes made by other users.
Manager
This role has all the permissions of the moderator role, plus any additional access granted by the family tree configuration, plus permission to change the settings/configuration of a family tree.
Administrator
This role has all the permissions of the manager role in all family trees, plus permission to change the settings/configuration of the site, users and modules.
Just drop me a line and I will send it to you again.
You may either notify me and I will make the change or, if you like, I can give you Editor access which will allow you to make changes or add records yourself.
The easiest way is for you to scan them on your computer and send us the digital file. You can also have them scanned at a photography store or a K-Mart, Wal-Mart or Target.
If you have a scanner at home but just aren't sure how to do it, drop me a line and I'll be glad to help!
Honestly, I can only do so much, but here's what I can do.
1. Not display it online at all, but make reference to it with a description. I would keep it in the family archives.
2. I could display a small version of it with watermarks and not release it without watermarks.
This is all I can do.
Of course! I would gladly conduct a telephone interview and type them for you. Then, I'd send you a draft for final approval.
We actually have a discussion forum where one of the topics is using this application. You can get there by clicking this link. It's located in the main discussion forum at www.forsythe-family.net. Just so you know, you can read there without joining but if you would like to enter into the discussion, you must join there. We do this to keep spammers from flooding the site with ads.
Here are a few pointers for users who are approved to EDIT online. (You may also send your updates by email.).
HELP: Help is amply provided on the site. Behind most links and terms with the "?" image you will find the help information. If you are still confused, simply ask us via email.
CHANGES and ENTRIES: Changes to existing data for a person or family will not appear until they have been approved by the site administrator. When you make changes, the site administrator will automatically be notified and can thus assess and accept the changes. Only after changes have been approved by the site administrator, they are visible to other users.
NAMES: Entering of names is pretty straight-forward via the form and help is provided. The form should already have expanded fields. If not you could expand the fields by clicking the corresponding + sign.
- NAME PREFIXES are usually titles or honorifics such as Dr., Ing., Drs., Judge, etc. Ordinary honorifics such as Mr. and Mrs should not be entered.
- GIVEN NAMES are the first and middle names usually selected at birth.
We enter the given name with an initial uppercase letter. The rest of the name is entered in lower case letters.
- SURNAME is the family or last name. This is the birth name for a married person, and not the surname assumed after marriage. See married name below. When name changes occur after birth, these additional names can be entered separately after the person has been recorded in the database. They can also be entered as AKA (also known as) names.
We enter the SURNAME with an initial uppercase letter. The rest of the name is entered in lower case letter.
- NAME SUFFIXES are Jr, Sr, III, etc.
- NICKNAME is the name commonly used for the person if different from their given name; e.g. Jack would be the nickname of John "Jack" Arnold, Daniel Wilson Avery had the nickname Tuggy, and many Margarets have the nickname Maggie, Nancy, Peggy, Polly, etc.
- MARRIED NAMES are the person's new name when assuming the spouse's surname) It is auto-created by the program when you enter the new surname in the Married Name field. i.e. Mary Jane Smith marries John Jones and becomes Mary Jane Jones when you enter Jones in the Married Surname field. Married names are not gender-specific; you can enter a married name for persons of either gender.
DATES: We use the GEDCOM v5.5 standard format. DD MMM YYYY or 01 JAN 1822 instead of January 1, 1822 or Jan 1, 1822. The system can make some minor corrections to input errors, but you should not depend on this.
PLACES: We try, wherever known, to include the full place descriptive: city and/or township as well as the County, State and Country. For countries, we use the GEDCOM-approved 3 letter standard abbreviation rather than the country name: Netherlands [NLD], England [ENG], France [FRA], Italy [ITA], United States of America [USA], etc.
There are two helpful methods of acquiring a place's correct format:
- use the tiny "world" icon adjacent to the Place field to see what places are already entered in our database. This is a good way to look up a city's county if you don't know it as it probably already exists in our data. Use the filter to narrow your search and simply click on the desired result which will then be copied to the empty Place field.
- click on the + sign below the Place field. You will see an additional series of fields for country, state/province, county, city. Next to the country field is a drop down list of countries with their standard 3-letter designation.
FAMILY: Facts pertaining to the creation or modification of a family unit are entered on the Close Relatives/Family Link page. This is where you note marriages, divorces, children, family census - any fact or event that affects the family unit. We find when adding several children, it's best to bring up the VIEW FAMILY link for that husband/wife and add each child via the link at the bottom, 'ADD a CHILD to this Family'. It is faster than using the Close Relative page as with each addition it defaults back to the View INDI page rather than the Close Relative page. Any questions? Just ask if you don't understand. Corrections, advice, and help are readily and freely offered.
SOURCES and CITATIONS: In genealogy, it's not enough to simply say something "happened on such-and-such a date". Historians like proof. We do too! Please provide whatever information you have as to the source of the information you are providing. Look over the various sourcing notations available and use the NOTES option when in doubt or you need space to write. Put in more than you think may be necessary, it won't be too much. Any questions? Just ask if you don't understand and we'll be happy to assist.
MEDIA: We really appreciate your addition of pictures, Birth Certificates, Marriage Licenses and Certificates, Death Certificates - anything you've got for support. Members with edit rights can upload these images themselves by using the ADD MEDIA link and Upload/Browse feature.
When entering new media, consider a naming convention that is unlikely to conflict with existing media. The system allows you to browse your hard drive and upload the document with an entirely different name, retaining your local filename intact. Just imagine how many "john.jpg" files there could be (well - only one) but you could possibly overwrite an existing file if you don't change the filename. We like to keep them short (less than 35 characters) but descriptive - something like J_Name-b1820-I23445.jpg or K_Name-I23444-Headstn.jpg. If in doubt, please, simply ask us.
If you have any trouble uploading your images or if you have no rights to upload the images yourself please send your digital images to us by email and we are happy to add them on the site for you.
Each of us at Forsythe-Family.net consider privacy of paramount importance and we protect our data vigorously.
Fortunately, webtrees' software confidentiality functions are excellent in the application of certain rules of privacy - our main site hides details about people who are alive or to those who you are not linked. To view details of living people, you will have to be a trusted member of our site and you must connect to the site with your username and password account. Your free membership gives you access to your special page (INDI record ID #) in the family tree. In addition, our site uses several levels of privacy access and user verification, as well as webtrees' relationship privacy. The latter function lets you see information for people defined as a close relative. If you are a member of the site and connected and still see some individuals or families still marked as "private", this feature has been enabled for your account. If you think your access is too restricted, please email the genemaster and explain with details of identification numbers, where you were blocked and why you believe you should see this information. Of course, no system is perfect or unbreakable and inadvertent access to data remains a remote possibility. We do our best to address all privacy issues quickly. If you feel strongly about some of your personal data stored here, please contact the genemaster via the e-mail links below. Your data can be removed from the site, but your access may also be restricted. See also the FAQ on the site information. We take abuse of our information seriously, and will not tolerate theft or misuse. We will take legal action against those who engage in or attempt identity theft or harassment as result of accessing our data.
Do not copy our data on living persons to any other sites or to places that you may be unable to protect the privacy of these individuals. You can be held responsible for this exposure or abuse. As you will see, there is a lot of time, effort and talent that has been extended to assemble this database. We don't want others simply copying our collective work. Also, we do not share the information contained herein with other sources, nor do we contribute information to any commercial enterprise (Ancestry.com, Geni, Tribal Pages, etc). We expect you to respect this policy as well. Please do not copy our data to other sites, and certainly never post information on living persons elsewhere. This database will remain in our possession for the public display of public domain information, and will not be sold, given or loaned in any way or form in order to generate revenue by us or by others. Personal data will not be shared by us with a public source and you, as our users, are sworn to the same high standards.
Remember, the security of your password is essential in protecting the privacy of your own and other family members information, so keep it safe. We recommend that you change your password from time to time. Please note also that, as site administrators, we can not access your password. If you forget yours, please use the "Request for new password" on the login page and a new, temporary one will be sent to your registered e-mail address.