In October 2012 the "
DBSIG", a
Data
Base for
Special
Interest
Groups was officially opened.
The aim of the DBSIG is
- to create a searchable database of people belonging to these "Special Interest Groups" (SIG)
- to discover which RootChatters are also interested in any of the people in the database
- to discover family links and connections between RootsChatters
So far we have the Special Interest Groups
- GPB : German Pork Butchers
- TRV : Travelling People and
- CRB : Canal and River Boat People
And most recently,
- BHC : British Home Children This has been started with over 20,000 records from a previous (now offline) database.
Anybody can enter data about any relevant persons.
Contributors (submitters) may be researching the entered persons as part of their own family history, or simply have an interest in these Special Interest Groups.
So data here may be the results of personal family history research, or may just be transcripted data from various publicly available sources (shipping lists, etc).
Contributors should enter as much data as possible, with detailed sources.
Experience has shown, that one field for sources is inadequate. We are gradually
adding fields for "Notes" to individual items, where the source can be entered, and we will continue to do this.
RootsChatters with family connections to people in the database can enter themselves as
Researchers on any relevant records. If they have more information to add, they can also add a "Readers Comment", or make a "Request to Edit" a record, or simply send the contributor a PM.
A database is only as good as its contents, and because this database is constantly growing,
I am appointing some
Data Coordinators to help me maintain it and thus keep it "usable".
The coordinators' duties will be
- Overseeing new entries and helping newcomers to enter their data
- Checking for duplicate entries. If found, the coordinators will contact the original submitters and researchers and endeavour between them, to create one cohesive record.
- During it's development new fields have been added to the DBSIG. The coordinators will check existing unstructured data (usually in the "Comments" field) and copy relevant data into the new fields. This should make searching, filtering, and finding links and connections easier for everyone.
- Coordinators may correct minor mistakes, or make minor modifications, but otherwise no original data will be deleted. That will be left to the original submitter, as the coordinators will always work together with the contributors.
- When browsing RootsChat the coordinators might see data in topics that could be entered in the database. They can then contact the original poster and ask whether s/he would like to enter the data themselves, or if they would like the coordinators to do this. Not every poster will want to have their ancestor's data entered, so it is important to respect the wishes of the original poster.
Bob
DBSIG Caretaker
DBSIG access:
»
Reference Library (link at bottom of every RootsChat page)
»
DBSIG - Database for Special Interest Groups » Select your interest
