No whips. No threats of harm
to me or my family. It’s software that
forces me (sort of) to do step-by-step research planning and gives me a place to
put research notes. This is necessary because I have no self-discipline.
I mentioned Research Ties in
my 4 Feb 2018 post Getting my Act Together…
I learned about it in Researcher’s Guide to American Genealogy 4th Edition by Val D. Greenwood. He
implies that he uses it. It is a cloud based program specifically designed for
family history. I signed up for a 2-week
trial.
It was a rocky start in spite
of having a Beginner’s Guide and a series of tutorials. Even with that help, it
was non-intuitive to me. Could have been crystal clear to other folks, but not
to me. I stuck it out and now think I’ve mostly got the hang of it. Mostly.
Research Ties leads you
through your research step-by-step. You can upload a
Gedcom file or enter individual names manually.
You first state an objective.
Then one or more searches to
accomplish that objectives.
Then the results of each
search.
The discipline comes in defining
each step and then carrying it out. The sequence is very logical. Left to my
own devices, I tend to jump all over the place and have vague plans, if any. I go down rabbit holes and lose track of what I was looking for. I write (often abbreviated) results in a
notebook - some of the times. I am poor at citations. When I
go back later, I can barely read my own handwriting let alone figure out my
abbreviations.
There are two great benefits:
a) because it’s in the cloud, I can use it with my tablet when away from home;
b) it has excellent report capability. Reports
can be downloaded in either MS Excel or PDF format.
I have now signed up for a $30 annual
subscription.
DISCLAIMER: This works for me
mostly because I use 2 displays. When doing online research, I have Research Ties
on one screen and do my searches on the other.
I am not certain this I would be so enthusiastic using only one screen
and having to switch back and forth between applications
.
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