Ancestry.com has introduced Ancestry Pro Tools. This is a collections of tools for Ancestry Member Trees, The four tools included in the newly introduced Pro Tools are Tree Checker, Charts and Reports, Advanced Filters, and Map Views.
The new Ancestry Pro Tools is a service sold separately from their subscriptions.
Initial response from many customers is that it is too expensive and
should at least be included in Ancestry's all-access subscription.
The Pro Tools are currently only available to American customers.
That the Pro Tools subscription was introduced at just below 10 dollars a month,
and quickly increased in price to just below 20 dollars did not help to quell that criticism.
Discussion on social media has focussed on price instead of features.
Today, these aren't Pro Tools, but Common Tools.c
In the latest years of the previous millennium, a Tree Checker, Charts and Reports, Advanced Filters, and Map Views could perhaps still reasonably be referred to as Pro Tools. Today, these aren't Pro Tools, but Common Tools. Leading genealogy editors have included tools like these for decades. All major desktop genealogy software has features like these, and they are no longer uncommon in web genealogy either. That Ancestry.com calls it Pro Tools is worrisome, as it suggests that they are living in the past (pun intended). More than a full decade ago I proposed that online genealogy platforms should be an Inconsistent Genealogy Free Zone, yet Ancestry.com is only now taking its very first baby steps in that direction.
You should get these tools if you are using Ancestry Member Tools as your main genealogy editor, but you should not be using Ancestry Member Trees as your main genealogy editor.
You should get these tools if you are using Ancestry Member Tools as your main genealogy editor,
but you should not be using Ancestry Member Trees as your main genealogy editor.
Your main genealogy editor should be a desktop application,
with backups under your own control, instead of hoping that Ancestry.com keeps backups for you.
You can and should use more than one genealogy application.
You are not limited to either a desktop application or a web service,
you can and should take advantage of what each platform has to offer.
Your desktop application is practically sure to include tools like Ancestry is offering now already, and do so for a one-time license fee instead of a monthly subscription. Two desktop genealogy applications even provide the ability to sync your desktop database with Ancestry Member Tree. One is MacKiev Family Tree Maker, a continuation of Ancestry.com Family Tree Maker, and the other is RootsMagic.
Both Family Tree Maker and RootsMagic include consistency and reasonability checks. While I have never recommended using Legacy Family Tree as your main genealogy editor, I have repeatedly recommended and still recommend that you get it for its extensive consistency and reasonability checks. Two free products with extensive consistency and reasonability checks are Genealogica Grafica and Family Tree Analyzer.
A genealogy editor without tree checks is like a word processor without spell-check.
Almost fifteen years ago, back in 2009 The Importance of Consistency Checking
stated that Consistency checks are not a nice-to-have advanced feature,
they are a must-have fundamental feature that separates tools from toys.
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A genealogy editor without tree checks is like a word processor without spell-check.
Today, every major genealogy editor includes some consistency and reasonability checks,
some even include one or two of the advanced consistency checks I invented
(Vendors do not always bother to tell me when you they take advantage of my innovations,
but I know that Genealogie Online implemented the Same Name Children Consistency Check,
and it turned out to be the most common genealogy mistake).
Ancestry's major competitor, MyHeritage,
has been offering tree checks for online trees since early 2017.
For freemium products and services, the trend is to include the tree checks as part of the free offering, acknowledging a growing understanding that those checks are a basic feature of genealogy software.
Ancestry.com should roll the Tree Checker to all Ancestry Member Tree users, and actively encourage its usage.
Consistency checkers have become a common feature of genealogy software because consistency checking is an essential feature of genealogy software.
Ancestry Member Trees are created by members, not Ancestry.com,
but that does not imply that Ancestry.com is without any responsibility
when these trees offer erroneous or even inconsistent data.
Ancestry.com should have created the Tree Checker decades ago,
and now that they finally have one, they should not be limiting its use
to one region and further limit its uptake through a paywall.
Ancestry.com should roll their Tree Checker out to all Ancestry Member Tree users, and actively encourage its usage.
Ancestry.com should highlight issues found by the Tree Checker,
warning both the owner and the visitor of the tree.
Ancestry.com can and should promote awareness that consistency checking
isn't an optional but a fundamental feature of genealogy software.
Copyright © Tamura Jones. All Rights reserved.