Question of the Week: What improvements would you like to see on WikiTree in 2024?

Question

What improvements would you like to see on WikiTree in 2024? Is there anything you'd love to see in the WikiTree Browser Extension or Tree Apps? Tell us your wishlist!

Please tell us with an answer below. You could also answer on Facebook.

You might also be interested in this post about what the team is working on: "What is ahead for WikiTree in 2024?"

Comments

A feature where  Profile Managers can keep a living person's actual full name hidden, so that when a person profiled in WT dies, it would be easier to change from "Anonymous" to the actual name.

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I've certainly wished for this many times!

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My understanding is that the profile manager, in specifying that the person is still living, causes the full name of the profile person to be hidden from all except the profile manager and perhaps, the trusted list for the profile.

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Allowing the Trusted List to view the full name of a living person does not render that profile to be anonymous. So some profile managers opt to only use "Anonymous" or "Living" as the name in living profiles.

 Futhermore, all biography text scattered around various profiles that currently use names like "Anonymous Smith" does not change to the full proper name when a person is finally marked as Deceased. In short, WT needs a better way for managers to deal with the inevitable deaths of their living profiles.

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The descendants of my parents, from the profile of my father's father, before I logged in to Wikitree within this web browser on this computer (I have been working within Wikitree, on another computer before this session), are shown thus:

"

1. [private great-granddaughter (unknown - unknown)]
2. [private great-grandson (unknown - unknown)]

1. [private great-great-granddaughter (2020s - unknown)]

1. [private great-grandson (unknown - unknown)] m. [private spouse]

1. [private great-granddaughter (unknown - unknown)]
2. [private great-grandson (unknown - unknown)]

1. [private great-grandson (1990s - unknown)]
2. [private great-grandson (1990s - unknown)]

1. [private great-granddaughter (unknown - unknown)]
2. [private great-grandson (unknown - unknown)]

1. [private grandson (1940s - unknown)] m. [private spouse]
2. Phil Busby  (1940s - 2010s) m. [private spouse]
3. [private grandson (1950s - unknown)] m. [private spouse]
4. [private granddaughter (1950s - unknown)] m. [private spouse]
5. [private grandson (1950s - unknown)] m. [private spouse]
6. Bret Busby  (1950s - unknown) m. [private spouse]
7. [private grandson (1960s - unknown)] m. [private spouse]

"

After logging in to Wikitree, the details od each of the living people, in addition to me (I am mostly living), are displayed. But, the details, other that what is displayed above, are not displayed, until I, as the profile manager for each, am logged in.

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The formatting did not quite work, in my last previous post above - the great-grandchildren are not shown as being the children of their parents. But, my generation of my family, are those consecutively numbered 1-7, and, the displayed names, show the point that I was making.

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If you want to see what I saw (with the correct formatting), before I logged in on that computer, right click on my name above; open the link in a new browser tab or browser window, click on the Ancestors button, click on my father's name, or, his father's name, to open the profile, then, in his profile, click on the Descendants button, and, view my generation of my family. The only name in my siblings, that should be displayed, is my second-eldest brother, who died ten years ago.

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I would really like to see the Correct Nomenclature for the Colonies on the continent of Australia before 1901 when the Commonwealth of Australia came into being. At present the auto fill for Victoria, New South Wales, South Australia,  Queensland etc, is totally incorrect, because it does not align with the historical, political and geo-political facts around the evolution of Australia as a nation.

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Alison, the Australia Project allows for various forms of location statements in our Guidelines for such.  Even if you disagree with them, those are what we, as a group, have agreed are acceptable.
As for the list in the location dropdown, those come from FamilySearch.

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The drop down location list is from Family Search, and trying to get them to change anything takes an immense amount of time.

There is no requirement or recommendation to use the drop down list. As Melanie says the Australia Project has information about locations.

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Bret and David; as the profile manager you can see information that others can't.

If you look at the right hand end of the line with person's name where it says public view, click on public view, that is what anyone who is not on the trusted list sees for living people.

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M Ross - I do not know why you have addressed your comment to me - you seem to be telling me what I have already said.

What I had said, effectively, is what was requested " Dec 27, 2023 by David Chawes" is superfluous, because of what already exists, and I gave details and examples, to show that.

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Could someone who can, please,separate the sub-thread about the location names, from the thread about displayed names of living people, into which thread, the sub-thread was incorrectly inserted?

I have received notification of the response by M Ross, to the sub-thread, and, whilst I have participated in the thread, into which, the sub-thread was incorrectly inserted, I have not participated in the sub-thread, prior to, and other than, this request to have the sub-thread removed from the thread, to which thread, the sub-thread is unrelated and irrelevant.

Answer 1

I used to belong to an on-line group called *Random Acts of Genealogical Kindness".  I would offer to searches in the London, Ontario area for free.  I met some interesting people and it was fun helping someone else break through their brick wall.  Is there a chance Wikitree to offer a similar service?

Mark Edlund

London, Ontario

Comments

Great idea. I know the Netherlands project lists people that are willing to help.

The Canada project page does not list such a service. Did you contact the project leader?

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That sounds similar to Wikitree's RAWKing -Random Acts of Wikitree Kindness, and the recent secret santa on g2g allowed people to nominate profiles for "elves" to improve.

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The RAOGK group allowed people to send a request to a volunteer in a particular geographic location to do a look up in the local archives or cemeteries.  RAWKing, from what I understand, is not this specific.

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I see requests (or offers) like that on G2G from time to time.

Answer 2

I would like to see a relaxation of the project participation requirement for pre-1500s certification. While I understand that involvement with a project can be important in building expertise, there are many other ways to gain the necessary experience and know-how and to demonstrate competence. WikiTree would surely benefit if the assessment for pre-1500 certification could be broadened to look more critically at the quality of contributions a member has made in general rather than set as a requirement participation in group activities that are not necessary attractive to all contributors to our collective family tree.

Comments

One part of participation is sourcing profiles for a project, if that is what you want to do with pre 1500 profiles. If you can help a project to update the older profiles, show them that you know how to source with proper sources and citations for profiles that are pre 1600, then they can help you with the certification.

Number of contributions is not part of the requirements.

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I want to do is pre-1500 profiles of my own family. the kick I get out of research is finding and processing information myself and I don't really need any help to do it right.  Professionally it is what I do and I would like to be able to do it for myself on WikiTree.

Answer 3

I would like to see a more advanced data base query.  The nature of this feature is probably best illustrated by an example.  I have been working on a profile where I found an 1810 census record having a good probability to be the father of the target profile.  However the census record is labeled "S. Beebe", with an age of 45+.  So what I would like to do find is all males, surnamed beebe, and first initial S, born between about 1745 and 1765 in North America in the Wikitree database.   I presently keep a private database in Excel that has a limited capability to execute this function, but it sure would be a handy to have a more powerful query tool to do this type of selective search on the Wikitree database.  

Another example would be to find search and find profiles having a particular surname in a particular town during a particular time period.

Comments

Have you worked with wikitree +? It can easily give you everyone with a surname, location and decade

https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Help:WikiTree_Plus#Text_search_2

Answer 4

Not all records are accurate so citing a source could be using misinformation.  One obituary listed my grandfather’s place of death incorrectly but other sources were correct.

Using the WikiTree rule about Norwegian surnames isn’t always accurate.  It usually lines up with the church or birth records but not always.

Answer 5

I enjoy the challenges, but wish improvement on way to see if the profile listed has already been worked on, without opening. A check mark on the list or profile gets moved.

Comments

The lists that are used for the challenges are updated once a week. The update for all the lists that are created (hundreds of lists for unsourced profiles and for unconnected profiles only) takes so long that a faster rhythm is hard to do.

Answer 6

For me, and for many others, there is just one thing that is so far above all others that really to us only it matters:

That is, be able to download, or at least as a poorer alternative select and cntrl-c copy off the screen, an Ahnentafel listing, just as it is now, but covering ALL generation back from the root person. This needs to be applicable to anybody on Wikitree.

Also, there would ideally need to be one choice you make before generating it: whether to list repeats (i.e. the same person appears numerous times in the Ahnentafel) or not (only the first appearence shows, and latter ones say "see [the earlier one, with number]". A repeat would not have the ancestors listed, making a vastly shorter list. The latter choice would of course be default.

Long ago I wrote a program that does this and despite all the work it does, its essentially instantaneous on trees containing over 20,000 people, such as the one of Prince William back all the way to dear Arnulf (d. 640).

Answer 7

I have used WK a number of years now.  There are a number of areas where simple formatting would help I think.  For example, whenever there are more than couple siblings, it is painful to find the person you are interested in.  As an example, if you look at my grandmothers page, Ulrich-481, she has 14 siblings and they are all listed in a paragraph.  What would be more helpful to me, would be something like this:

Effie Nettie Ulrich

 Born 1 Apr 1902 in Tilden, Randolph County, Illinois

Daughter of Casper Ulrich Jr and Sarah Murphy

Sister of:

   George Ulrich (1880 – 1880)

   Anna Marie Ulrich (1881 – 1957)

   Nancy Catherine Ulrich (1883 – 1955)

   Casper James Ulrich (1884 – 1954)

   Neil Alexander Ulrich (1886 – 1962)

   Albert Sands Ulrich (1888 – 1942)

   Carl Henry Ulrich (1890 – 1958)

   Eugene Ulrich (1891 – 1891)

   Oscar Harold Ulrich (1892 – 1957)

   Bertha Jane Ulrich (1895 – 1981)

   Barbara Rosina Ulrich (1896 – abt. 1955)

   Sarah Ulrich (1898 – 1899)

   Freida Ruth Ulrich (1900 – 1977)

   Susie Elizabeth Ulrich (1904 – 1998)

 [add sibling]

Comments

Have you tried the Change Family Lists feature of the WikiTree Browser Extension?

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Hi, I have not tried that extension.  However, this is such a minor formatting issue that I would prefer the website just provide this without going to other tools.  But, that is just my opinion!

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Maybe read this to see why this won't happen in the near future: https://www.wikitree.com/g2g/1390337/would-you-collaborate-on-a-browser-extension .

Answer 8

I am sure this is a stretch from a technology standpoint, but I would really like the ability to add facts associated with one or more individuals. A fact is an entry with a date, location and/or description, possibly with images associated with it.

I like these because it helps with geographical or other clusters of people and families. Most genealogy programs use this construct.

I currently use a combination of categories and the narrative to accomplish this (and the latest browser extension really helps by creating drafts of the narrative and the timeline), but it would be nice to have it in the database.

Thanks for all you've done!

Answer 9

Forgive me if this has already been done, but possibly simplifying the uploading process for photos. I tried some time ago and found it very convoluted and frustrating. As such, I gave up.

Answer 10

When a person is entered on the tree, it would be nice to have a place to enter "Cause of Death" and "Date and Place of Burial with another line for the Cemetery".

Answer 11

I have noticed that the fan app is not uploading all the people in my tree. Some of them will only appear if I go a generation or two beyond them and they then suddenly pop up. This is a recent development (2023), but it is a bit frustrating as I love seeing my whole tree in one hit.

Comments

Are you using the stand-alone Fan Chart app or the Fan Chart Tree App?  I think the problem you mention has been fixed in the Tree App version...

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I honestly don't know, sorry. I just choose the fan-chart view from the options list and it pops up.

Answer 12

Dear Santa,

I guess this is the time to ask; I've been holding onto this for awhile.

I do very much like and appreciate the OPS and ONS free-space options.  However, I also wish there was a third option:  the OES (One Event Study.)

I feel a bit like a fraud.  I have an OES already, but it's masquerading as an OPS.  Why not just use the Free Space option you ask?  I dunno.  I tried that and didn't like it, gave up, then went to the OPS and it stuck.  Now it's my favorite thing to do on WT.

Why is it important to have a designated OES?  Because a One Event Study is like nothing else on Wikitree, or for that matter, any other genealogical site (that I'm aware of.)  An OES offers something that neither an OPS or an ONS can offer: storytelling.

Often, genealogy can be awfully dry.  The equivalent of a 1960s slideshow of a trip to the Grand Canyon that your neighbor thrusted upon poor, hapless friends and family, or worse - there's not even pretty pictures most of the time.

The OPS provides some opportunities for story, as does a well-constructed ONS.  A One Event Study, though, DEMANDS a story.  It's built-in, inherent.

Take, for instance, the Titanic, the Hindenburg disaster, the Battle of Great Meadows, the first Women's Rights Convention at Seneca Falls... the list is endless.  Some, like the Titanic, would be herculean, others quite manageable.  Some involve a local event, others are internationally important.  Many have been well-covered by a plethora of historians.  And yet, even these famous events are rarely, if ever, covered with an eye toward genealogy, and the community derived thereof, the relationships between participants both in blood and proximity to one another.

To have a designated OES might fire the imaginiation of those Wikitreers who love this kind of research and need a place to both park their research, and to share it with the world.

My Christmas wish.  Happy New Year!

Comments

I strongly support this suggestion!

Answer 13

J'apprécierais que la largeur du display pour le birth ou bien le death place soit augmentée lors de l'edit ou de la création d'un nouveau profil. Il y a beaucoup d'endroit qui apparaisse dans la fenêtre qui ne montre pas la totalité de l'écrit ce qui peut apporter à confusion.

Answer 14

Please, please, please always put the Description of the Featured Connections immediately above the Featured Connections List in the Wednesday email!!!

I frequently screen capture the list for family members but have to either send 2 screen shots (description and list) or manually describe the list.  And sometimes the description is sort of buried in the rest of the information in the email.

Thanks!

Answer 15

Maybe there's a way to do this and I'm just not aware or maybe it's too much to ask for or it's just my preference but I wish there was a way to separate the Person Profiles tab in the Watchlist into something like "Family Person Profiles" and "Other Person Profiles"...

Comments

How do you define 'family'?

Answer 16

I'd really like to see an easier way of associating sources with entries -- maybe an improved user interface.

The current system is kludgey and hard-to-use.

Comments

Inline sourcing does that, the "C" button immediately above the edit box inserts the reference tags and you can paste the source in between them then add a narrative in front, or you can paste a source in the bio and highlight it then click the button.
 Better yet Sourcer extension automatically generates the narrative and/or inline reference (depending on the option selected) from supported sites and has a citation generator for unsupported sites. There are also a range of citation generators, see under "Find"  then "Apps" on the menu at the top of a profile.
 Wikitree Bee extensional also has citation generators.

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From the text of the request, I do not see how this differs from what is already provided, where, in entering an item in the biography, using the <ref><source citation></ref> syntax, links the source citation to the specific information item entered.

Perhaps, clarification of exactly what is wanted, if it is not what I have described, would be useful.

Answer 17

I'd like an AND operator for search, so I can search for Lastname AND state and place a tag on that search. Right now I can only search Lastname OR state, so I get everything for both of those items.

Answer 18

How about an option in the "My WikiTree" column, at top right of our screens, to select the last profile I've visited?

I'm up to 824 alphabetized names in my Watchlist. Often I don't recall a distant female relative's married name, so I can't quickly find where the Watchlist has sorted her. I am now working in the realm of 4th and 5th cousins in my Carroll and Garahan branches, and the last names are multiplying like rabbits!

My "work around" has been to return to a 2nd or 3rd great grandparent that my distant relative and I share, then click on names of progeny till I get back to where I was last working.  

Many thanks for soliciting our ideas. The technical team at WikiTree is a wonder to behold!

Terry Zimmerman

Comments

If you sort watchlist by last edit date, that should help.

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Wow, Linda, who knew? I found what I think you mean in the options bar across the top of my Watchlist. Selecting the first button on the left, "Activity," converted my screen to "Recent changes in Profiles watchlist." There was my most recent work.

Many thanks for your kindness!

Terry Zimmerman

Answer 19

My initial wishlist of improvements to Wikitree:

1. DNA connections for autosomal DNA tests to be displayed to sixth cousin level (about 0.09% ?) .

2. Exported GEDCOM files to be fully compliant with the GEDCOM standard.

3. Exported GEDCOM files to include all of the ancestry of the member requesting the GEDCOM file, and, all descendants of those ancestors, and, the partners/spouses (and their parents) of all biological relatives of the member requesting the GEDCOM file; not restricted to profiles for which the requesting member is on the trusted list - a profile manager  should not own a profile to the exclusion of the blood relatives of the profile, especially when the profile manager is not a blood relative of the profile.

4. Where a profile creator/manager/editor enters a location for an event, instead of erasing the location entered by the person who entered the information, to replace it with a location name that is from another time, adding a note index to the location name, and, in the notes section, adding the note index with a comment such as "In the period from <start date> to <end date>, the locality was known as <name of locality during specified period>". What we have at present, is obscurantism, due to the imposition of obscure place names, with it reference to the known name(s) for places, excluded, which is not conducive to family history research.

5. In the G2G text input boxes for entering comments, providing functionality of pasting copied text through mouse functionality, and, similarly, providing web browser spellchecking functionality - both, by enabling the use of the non-dominant mouse button.

Comments

Number four would be especially valuable for me.

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I would also like for Wikitree to not automatically log me out every 5-10 minutes. Repeatedly having to log in, every 5-10 minutes, during a session, is somewhat arduous.

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Do you have the option to "stay logged in" checked?  I get logged out every month or so, when my session expires.

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Melanie - When I log in to Wikitree, on the login screen, I do not have an option to stay logged in. I have an option (that I uncheck, when I remember), that is something like "Remember my details fo the next time that I log in".

I just logged in on another computer, to demonstrate a point, regarding another person's wish, that person's wish, I believe, is already implemented, from my responses to that person's wish statement.

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Automatically getting logged out? I have never experienced that in the 4 years I have been a WT member.

I am using a laptop not a phone if that makes any difference.

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I have just tried to upload an image file, to show what is displayed on my Wikitree login screen, but, whilst the text box (?) for entering these posts, incorporates an icon with the label "Image", that icon apparently does nothing - what clicking on the icon, brings up, does not include, as other web applications that incorporate uploading images, include, and that is a "Browse" button, to find on a user's computer, the image file to upload.

So, in the context of this thread; as the functionality appears to be missing, in order to show what a user sees, to which the user refers in such a post, including the functionality to browse for, and, upload, image files, such as screenshots, would be conducive to problem solving, as, at present, I cannot even upload an image of what is displayed in the box into which I enter this post, to show the "Image" icon that does not work for uploading images to show what is displayed (this is starting to sound like recursion...).

So, that constitutes another, separate, new, item for a wishlist - the functionality of being able to upload images, such as screenshots, in these comments and posts to the G2G facility, so that readers of such posts, can see what is displayed to the poster, when what is displayed to the poster, is problematic.

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M Ross - regarding the device being used when getting automatically logged out - I am using a heavy duty desktop computer, and not a laptop, for most of my work on Wikitree and other family history work. I do not use a cellphone, for anything like this.

I do not know how this reply will be displayed, when it is posted, but, the box for entering the text, does not display immediately below the comment to which I am replying, and, I believe that an improvement (another new item for the wishlist), would be for both the box for entering the text for replying to a posted comment, and, the reply, once it is posted, to appear immediately under the comment to which the reply is being made (or, at the end of a sequence of replies to the particular comment), with the posted reply, being indented, respective to the comment to which the reply is being made, to show that the reply is applicable to the comment to which the reply is being made,

Answer 20

In general, a more navigable help search feature. I don't know how to express this in technical terms, but maybe more keywords? Sometimes when I search, either I have to dig through multiple layers to find the answer to my query, or it doesn't come up at all. Thanks.