Did you see the new Connection Finder features?

+59 votes
4.0k views

Hi WikiTreers,

Today we released a round of improvements to the Connection Finder, our tool for exploring the connections between the 20+ million people on WikiTree who are all connected to each other through family relationships.

As some of you know, last month we made the Connection Finder significantly more powerful by utilizing code that Ales Trtnik initially developed on his WikiTree+ service. Now we have imported some of the additional special features created by Ales.

Most significantly:

  1. You can now use the Connection Finder to explore blood relationships, i.e. common ancestors.
  2. You can exclude anyone from a connection path, thereby enabling you to explore alternative connections.

#1 means that the Connection Finder essentially functions like our Relationship Finder, but it has more flexibility and some special abilities. In addition to just finding the first common ancestor, you can limit the search to direct-line paternal or maternal ancestors. This is something that was long-requested by our DNA project members because they're the inheritance paths of Y-chromosome and mitochondrial DNA. You can also search for a shared descendant, rather than a shared ancestor, and you can combine #1 and #2 to explore different relationships.

The help page has some additional information but you'll probably just want to start exploring: https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Special:Connection

Please post here if you spot any problems, have questions, or want to suggest future improvements. Thanks!

Onward and upward,

Chris

in The Tree House by Chris Whitten G2G Astronaut (1.5m points)
I took a look at the Connection Finder. Today it shows 24 degrees between Peter Falk and myself. I was intrigued. Then I followed the line and we're not related. It appears one of his relatives [if it's even accurate] married my 1st cousin 5x removed. I am only interested in blood relatives, not a distant relative of someone who married into my blood line. That to me is not a connection.
Dear Pat, Connection Finder is different than Relationship to Me. It is more like "Six Degrees of Separation from Kevin Bacon" and it is primarily for fun (IMHO). Relationship to Me is based on family lines as you are interested in.  

Connection Finder includes marriages and obscure connections that are more intricate than the standard Relationship to Me.  Here is my Relationship to You search tool.  https://www.wikitree.com/index.php?title=Special:Relationship&action=calculate&person1_name=Williams-38665&person2_name=Cooper-1

6 Answers

+29 votes
This is great! Just great. Good work to Ales and team for the hours it took to make this work!

Mags
by Mags Gaulden G2G6 Pilot (638k points)
+24 votes
Really great! I was just about to suggest yesterday as improvements two of the features released today, connection by common descendants, and alternative paths. Those are really great to explore parts of the tree with a lot of pedigree collapse (such as my paternal ancestors).
by Bernard Vatant G2G6 Pilot (166k points)
+23 votes
I am SO glad to see the ability to exclude people from the connection path!  A lot of my "connections" are through one particular couple that I find very iffy.  To be able to leave them out will be great.
by Nan Starjak G2G6 Pilot (378k points)
Yes, that will be very useful. I haven't explored the other new options - but I just love the new possibilities for exploring connections between local people when I'm working in an area where more or less everybody was married to a sister of everybody else.
+9 votes

It is great to see that the Connection/Relationship Finder can be limited to a direct maternal line or a direct paternal line!  Thank you.

When a user is on a profile such as 

https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Beziers-5

may we please have a pink relationship -><- icon next to (or instead of) the green -><- when there is an mtDNA result under DNA Connections?  That pink -><- would show the direct maternal line relationship between the mtDNA testee and the WikiTree profile it is displayed on.

However clicking on a pink -><- should link to a display like this (easier to follow) style:

https://www.wikitree.com/index.php?title=Special:Relationship&action=calculate&person1_name=Metz-1008&person2_name=Le_Sueur-16

and not in this style:

https://www.wikitree.com/index.php?title=Special:Connection&action=connect&person1Name=Hesse-Darmstadt-7&person2Name=Beziers-5&relation=5&ignoreIds=

May we please also do similar for Y-DNA and direct paternal line relationships using a blue -><- ?

Thanks and most sincerely,

by Peter Roberts G2G6 Pilot (695k points)
+7 votes
What a great help, I am still working on putting together the fraternal side of my birth family, and hoping to narrow down the multitude of connections that lead to nowhere.

Thanks guys for all your hard work.

James
by James Brooks G2G Astronaut (1.3m points)
+5 votes
I like it, when I joined the connection with Kevin Bacon was some 36 steps away from me. The one week it showed the link though my father and the next through my mother, with the same number of steps. By making more connections, the number decreased but I could only see the connection through my father. With the new options, I can see both number of steps again! And I found out that there was a link between my mother's side and my father's family.

Thanks Ales and WT!
by B. W. J. Molier G2G6 Mach 8 (88.9k points)
A note for B MOLLIER, above:  WOW!! Just WOW!!

Why thank you, Roberta!blush

Related questions

+53 votes
115 answers
+108 votes
31 answers
+18 votes
3 answers
+21 votes
3 answers
+3 votes
1 answer
175 views asked May 5, 2023 in The Tree House by Robert Judd G2G6 Pilot (133k points)

WikiTree  ~  About  ~  Help Help  ~  Search Person Search  ~  Surname:

disclaimer - terms - copyright

...