DJY wrote: ↑06 Aug 2023 19:17
Thanks, Mike! I totally misunderstood what that query was doing. I thought it would be an easy way to print out a task list for a research trip to a library. I was interpreting the links as 2-way and missed the nuance about one-way links. (One links are counterintuitive to me!) But I figured it out another way, building a custom research note query where I looked for the repository name in the research note text. I could then use that query to add the notes to a Research Note report (Misc. report). So, in the end, I finally got to where I wanted to go but in a completely different way. There are a lot of places in FH where the framework logic eludes me, and like always, your guidance on what to do (or in this case, what I'm doing wrong) helped me go down the right path.
Appreciate it!
Best,
Dorie
Hi Dorie,
I want to thank you for your question as it got me to exploring research notes, queries, expressions, functions and even roots, but most importantly how I want to be able to group my tasks. And I hope this long message might a) help and b) allow more experienced users to build.
Ultimately, my experience is that research tasks boil down to two things 1) we haven't had enough time to see the task relating to an individual through online or 2) we need to visit a place (or need a particular subscription). 2a) is a repository of records 2b) is a physical place to find gravestones, houses, streets etc. And it's the 2s I think there is much discussion about.
We build our to dos ancestor by ancestor (and hence easiest to add them at this point), but we often need to view them by place/subscription/repository to follow the 2s through. It's easy enough to link them to a place/repository but it is time consuming and unless they are linked to a place/repository, building a query on those is difficult.
So here's my current thinking:
I've used Tools - Manage Autotext to add a new research note called "Natasha" (I cloned "Tasks"). I added four lines at the top "Place" "ResearchLocation" "Country" and "People" - these are free text and represent mainly how I want to find to-dos that are not just about not having time right now. I don't have to fill any of these in if I don't need them.
I've then used the query "Research Notes" to create a custom query. First I went to rows and edited the "Add if" first filter by going to "type" at the bottom left and adding "Natasha" as a text item. Then i went to columns and added some headings by copying the GetLabelledText expressions and changing them to my new four lines. I sorted descending, just because blanks come first.
Ultimately this follows my opportunities to research. For me, I get random opportunites to visit towns or villages in Yorkshire where most of my ancestors are. So place is important for that and free text is fine because I've spent so long thinking about how to label places so I can sort Z to A and get everything I am looking for. I added "Country" because on the odd occaisions I get to travel abroad it's useful to know. I plan to use "ResearchLocation" for both repositories and subscriptions. It's freeform and I need them to order alphabetically but WYAS and North Yorkshire help. As does British Newspaper Archive or Ancestry Worldwide - it's whether you feel confident that the first few letters are the same.
I can then run the custom query and change the column whether I am looking to a place, researchlocation or country first. And if they are blank they drop to the bottom of the list.
I was then thinking I would either have shared (relatively generic) queries across multiple people (eg Ramsgill burial records [Not on ancestry I need to go to North York archives] or St John's Church memorials or Names to research when I get a British Newspaper Archive subscription to which each time I linked it I would add a task line to look for said person with date and any info I had) or the really specific ones like "Walk down Leeds Road to find the Railway Cottages" linked to place "Otley" etc.
With this approach it wouldn't matter if I'd forgotten to add to a more generic note as they'd still pop up, but equally it would be more easy to link eg "Ramsgill burial records" to the repository and place directly so I could run the standard research notes by place/repository as a double check.
Anyway, I realise this is a super long answer. I am discovering with FamilyHistorian that it's important to understand both the why you are doing something from a genealogical perspective and how you are playing with the technology to allow people to question both.
