A Tale Of 2 Brenans or Unmerged matches suck

Question

As I continue to womble around WikiTree singing

 Underground, overground, wombling free
 The Wombles of WikiTree pages are we
 Seeking out sources for profiles we find
 Tidying bios 'cos we never mind

I come across unmatched merges, many of which with a bit of poking about actually are matched, but the perpetrator of the unmerged match did not see it one assumes.

 Wombles are organised, work as a team
 Wombles they tidy and Wombles they dream
 Dream that the Gedcom's are sourced and pristine
 The Wombles of WikiTree pages are we

I have found a new method of inflicting stress up my self which is 'Showing pending merges across WikiTree and ready for action by any member'. This wonderful tool can cause hours of agony - and delight!

One such item was 2 Branans of the agony variety. The changes of which reading in chronological order were - to the 5th July just passed.

Branan-9
2 February 2014
18:35: Jeri (Marshall) Leonard imported the data for James Branan from Marshall Family Tree.ged
23 March 2016
01:23: Amy (Miller) Braun proposed a merge of Branan-9 and Branan-51 with a comment.
2 May 2016
01:38: Ashton Carter added an unmerged match of Branan-9 and Branan-51 with a comment.

Branan-51
13 March 2016
05:13: Amy (Miller) Braun created James Branan. [Thank Amy for this]
23 March 2016
01:23: Amy (Miller) Braun proposed a merge of Branan-9 and Branan-51 with a comment.
2 May 2016
01:38: Ashton Carter added an unmerged match of Branan-9 and Branan-51 with a comment.

These loked innocuous and straight forwrd and not frought with stress and anxiety, but I was wrong.

After diligently comparing the profiles and deciding they were OK to merge I click to to the merge.

Dire warnings flashed across the screen OMG an unmerge match exists. Sorry but you cannot merge these profiles without removing the unmerged match.

Ah joy, the stress I was hoping for in full measure, now to be compounded by even further obscure reasoning in the system operation which makes you create a new merge having been forced to remove the unmatched merge, despite the fact that it says the unmerged match was added. The comment at the time was given as:

Branan-9 and Branan-51 are not ready to be merged because: They ARE one and the same person but I think there parents should be merged first THEN we can finish this merge.

On other merges I have done the system requires these merges before the one being proposed takes place and there does not seem to be an issue with that. This unmerged match should never have been created because having removed the unmerged match, now one has to create a new merge proposal, instead of reverting back one stage to the already approved merge. 

6 July 2016
19:25: You removed a match of Branan-51 and Branan-9.

So now a new merge proposal has to be made. This is absolutely pointless in my opinion as the original merge had been approved. This is time wasting in the extreme in this instance as one of the PMs has not made any contributions since 2 March 2014 - A flyby contributor - loads, shoots and leaves.

6 July 2016
19:27: You proposed a merge of Branan-51 and Branan-9 with a comment. 

This means that the PM of the other profile now has to wait another 30 days until the default kicks in an the profiles are merged - and all this on a pre-1800 profile that should have none of these silly restrictions.

 Underground, overground, wombling free
 The Wombles of WikiTree pages are we
 Seeking out sources for profiles we find
 Tidying bios 'cos we never mind

Comments

95% of your readers are wondering what all this womble stuff is and thinking what a strange person you are

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I guess you are possibly right, but 95% of UK and Ireland users would know exactly what I was on about.

For those who are not enlightened: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wombles

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It played in Australia as well.

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I wasn't familiar with the Wombles but I loved the poetry. Awesome, David.

We do need to rethink the Unmerged Match system.

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@Chris: Thanks. Yes I do hope that despite my inevitable longwindedness something does get sorted to resolve the 'problem'. :)

Answer 1

You can solve this by sending a trusted list request to the other profile manager.  That person has not been active in over two years.  Put a note on the page and after the appropriate time, fill out the unresponsive manager form.  It may take two weeks, or a month.  But it can't hurt to attack the problem from two angles.

Comments

Yes, of course I realise this, but the point is that this was already an approved merge until some silly person set it to an unmerged match. I have no interest in this merge other then that it was one I was trying to 'clear off the books' but now we are stuck with it while the wheels of the system turn slowly.

I have neither the time nor the inclination to jump through all these hoops for a set of profiles that are nothing to do with me.

I guess the simplest answer is just to save the stress by stopping doing anything to help tidy up.

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There was not an approval.  One profile manager approved.  It must be approved by managers of both profiles.  There are reasons for this.  Profiles can be merged away and families confused easily.  There is almost as much un-merging being done in some projects as there are profile creations and enhancements.  Just because this particular reason not to merge did not make sense does not mean that other ones don't.  

I sent a trusted list request, wrote a note on the profile and marked my calendar for when to fill out the unresponsive manager form.  It didn't take that long and I have about as much interest in this family as you do.

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Then I guess you did not look because there was an approval from one and a default approval from the other. That constitutes an approval. Again you miss the point entirely. This running around should not be necessary.

Yes and I have long lists of things to go back to as well, which is another thing that if there was a more sensible way of managing these older profiles would not be needed.

But fine, you have your view on it and I have mine and we will just have to agree to differ on whether the current system is usable or needs an overhaul.

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Agree, people that aren't ready to make a default approval merge and then set the default approval merge as an unmerged match don't understand the unnecessary delay they often cause.

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Maureen, you're a hero for having the patience, especially given that you don't have a connection to the profiles.

I can appreciate David's point. If a pair have been set as an Unmerged Match, we know they are duplicates. Any approvals should be preserved for when the merge is ready to be completed. I'm not sure why we have them handled in the same way as Rejected Matches. There shouldn't be the same set of hurdles to completing the merge.

Answer 2

I just want you to know I am sincerely sorry about all this.  I certainly never intended to inflict stress and anxiety.   The only thing I can do to encourage you in this situation is to say that I don't have any one else to add.

Thank you for what I'm sure is hours of volunteer time.

Amy Braun

Comments

It is fine. Don't worry about it.

You can also request to be added to the trusted list of the other profile.  If you hear from the profile manager, you will be able to complete the merge.