Blog posts are a snapshot in time. Just as a photograph can tell you a lot about someone, so can a blog post, even when they talk about seemingly trivial things. Even memes, those things that seem to go around like a craze in primary school, can be meaningful. I have been sorting through old drafts that were never published, and I found this one from October 2008: Ten years ago I was: Working on the implementation of a new computer system to prepare for Y2K Sharing our new house with my … [Read more...]
My own mini-scanfests
28 November 2010 by Leave a Comment
When you come back home after a productive research trip to an archive or library do you often end up with a stack of photocopies? Yes, me too. I use my digital camera whenever I can but sometimes it just isn't possible to take photos. Sometimes the repository doesn't allow it, and other times the documents are folded up so well that it is just easier to get the experts to photocopy them. When I get home I tend to leave them for a while in the 'filing' pile, and the longer they stay there … [Read more...]
Which is the best family tree program?
25 November 2010 by 1 Comment
I am often asked this question, and it is a difficult one to answer. The answer depends on what you want to get out of the program. There are some things you need to think about: Ease of use - is the layout easy to understand, and is it easy to work out what you are supposed to do to enter and change your data? Output - what do you want to do with the data once you've entered it? Reports, charts, websites and screen display are all ways of seeing the data you have spent all that time … [Read more...]
Picasa face-recognition scan conclusions
1 November 2010 by 3 Comments
I have posted previously about letting Picasa 3 scan for faces so I can identify them. I had hoped to publish the results at the time but I was caught up with other things and didn't get a chance. Unfortunately I don't have an accurate record of how long it took. I started it on about the 1st October with 14,000 photos to process. On the 4th it was 50% completed after I had added an additional 5000 photos because I added some of the folders under Documents. On the 5th it was saying all day that … [Read more...]
Top 10 Social Media Sites for Family Historians
22 October 2010 by 2 Comments
I think that social media was made for family historians. We are different from other people - we actually enjoy finding distant relatives and keeping in touch with them! Social media helps us to find relatives and old friends in ways that were not possible in the days of mailing lists and message boards. Here are 10 social media sites that are not directly related to family history (except one) but are nevertheless important for communicating, sharing and collaborating with other family … [Read more...]
Whose face is that? – Picasa 3
2 October 2010 by 4 Comments
I have recently upgraded my Picasa to version 3 and let it start running through my photos looking for faces so I could tag them. Picasa is photoorganising, editing and sharing software from the Google people. It's free. The scan started two days ago, and it's now 32% of the way there. Yes, I have a lot of photos. I have restricted to photos in the My Pictures folder for the present, which it says contains about 14,000 photos. Despite the slowness of it, and the fact that it uses up to … [Read more...]
