The latest rabbit hole is one I've been looking forward to, and dreading, for a long time. I last added my RootsMagic 8 file to a new Ancestry Member Tree back in October 2021 using the RootsMagic TreeShare feature. However, due to a glitch (user error, RootsMagic to Ancestry transfer error, etc.) in the upload, the 68,000 profiles went into the Ancestry Member Tree without any source citations. Arrrgh! My list of profiles with changes in TreeShare was then about 40,000 profiles because the RootsMagic file profiles were not the same as the Ancestry Member Tree profiles. More Arrrgggh!!
Note: For more information about the RootsMagic's TreeShare feature, see My Best Practices for RootsMagic TreeShare and Ancestry WebHints (posted 11 July 2017).
1) For 10 months I worked around all of that by adding only new profiles to the Ancestry Member Tree. So now my Ancestry Member Tree was not up-to-date because of changes to existing profiles from added information. More Arrrgh! Then I had my heart surgery in May 2022 and I realized that if I survived I should upload my RootsMagic file to a new Ancestry Member Tree ASAP.
2) Also, because I did not have sources in my Ancestry Member Tree, the indexing of the Ancestry Member Trees by Ancestry may not include my profiles because, in 2019, Ancestry was only indexing Member Trees with "Ancestry Sources." If I had only "Other Sources" (meaning source citations uploaded from RootsMagic) then the profile would not be indexed. All of my Sources in RootsMagic get transferred to Ancestry Member Tree profiles are treated as "Other Sources" by Ancestry. If that is still the case, my Ancestry Member Tree profiles were not indexed since October 2021, and therefore not used to find DNA Matches. Another Arrrgh!
3) I got my RootsMagic family tree database, now over 69,900 profiles, ready to transfer via RootsMagic TreeShare in mid-August. I ran all of the database tools, checked for duplicate entries, reviewed the problem list and fixed what I could, etc. The upload seemed to go flawlessly over night on 26 August. I woke up with a new Ancestry Member Tree that had source citations, but only 69,600 profiles. Arrrgh! Where are my missing 300 profiles? TreeShare helped me find the profiles missing on Ancestry and I added them to the Ancestry Member Tree during the past week.
4) In addition the Ancestry Member Tree had not connected many of my close ancestors with their parents for some reason, but the profiles were in the Ancestry Member Tree. More Arrrgghh! Since the disconnected parents were already in my Ancestry Tree, I connected a number of ancestors to their parents using the Ancestry "Add Father" and "Add Mother" features. But now I had a RootsMagic profile for those ancestors that was different from the Ancestry Member Tree profiles for some reason. When I ran TreeShare, there were two profiles for the disconnected ancestors one with all the correct information in RootsMagic and one with bare bones information in the Ancestry Member Tree (just birth, death, and relationships). Arrrgh!
The fix for this problem was to add the Ancestry profile to the RootsMagic file, and then Merge the two profiles for each problem profile in RootsMagic. I had to check the Fact list for each profile and delete the poor entries (only birth and death facts) of the poor profile. Next I have to delete the poor profile in the Ancestry Member Tree. And then run TreeShare again to add the good profile back into the Ancestry Tree. I'm still in this process.
5) Here is what my RootsMagic TreeShare list looks like now, with the Abigail Gates (1797-1867) profile selected:
Note that in the RootsMagic TreeShare Changes list on the left that there is a second profile, on Ancestry, for Abigail Gates. So I need to download the Ancestry profile to RootsMagic, merge the two profiles, delete the poor profile on Ancestry, check all of the Facts and remove duplicate facts, and TreeShare the good RootsMagic profile into the Ancestry Member Tree.
6) Most of the other profiles on the TreeShare Changes list are persons in RootsMagic with Fact Notes which have different text lengths than on the Ancestry Member Tree. So I have to work through those persons TreeSharing the RootsMagic Fact Notes and replacing the previous Fact Notes on the Ancestry Member Tree profiles. More Arrrgh!
This has been a difficult process - I never had a problem TreeSharing changes with my Ancestry Member Tree before October 2021. I don't know how it happened to me, but it did. I don't know if anyone has experienced similar problems with TreeShare and a new Ancestry Member Tree.
7) I did discover that the Ancestry Hints were a significant number for the whole tree - it was 170,866 record hints after the new Ancestry Member Tree was uploaded. It is now 175,241 after adding the 300+ missing profiles and the right profiles to the Ancestry Member Tree. I already have information from many Hints in my RootsMagic tree. If I resolve 200 hints every night, it will take me only 2-3 years to get through the Hint lists. But I'm adding new profiles as time goes on, which creates more Hints.
8) This rabbit hole was very deep and I'm still working on it to get the RootsMagic tree and the Ancestry Member Tree in sync. The alternative was to TreeShare the RootsMagic tree to another new Ancestry Tree. My fear was that the same things would happen again and I would have to go through this hassle again.
In this case it was really SRDH (Sh!t Rolls Down Hill). This has not been "FUN." It's time for my carrots!!
Disclosure: I receive a complimentary all-access subscription from Ancestry.com, for which I am thankful. Ancestry.com has provided material considerations for travel expenses to meetings, and has hosted events and meals that I have attended in Salt Lake City, in past years.
I have purchased successive updates to RootsMagic over the years, and have used the program successfully for over 10 years now.
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Copyright (c) 2022, Randall J. Seaver
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