PRO USERS PLEASE DO THE MERGE-REQUESTS OF NON PRO USERS !

Mohamed

I'm going to save your post as a concise explanation of the name difficulties in your area. Have you taken a look at the naming conventions projects? Perhaps one can be established for Southeast Asia, with active managers in the area contributing their thoughts.

Geni name fields were set up based on a contemporary American contact manager GUI which is of course severely limited for other languages, styles - and our own English origins ! There are however several things that have proven useful, and that is the "display name" field & the " also known as" (free form text string, comma separated).

I've been able to "stuff in" multiply named historic figures with accuracy by working with this.

We have the same problem in USA of course -- only 5 names in use, spelled many different ways ...

Private User,
done

Private User
Done

Klaas Jissink

and thanks for the last one!

bedankt ! Geldt waarschijnlijk ook voor:
Neeltje Jansen

en voor deze, maar dat kan ik als basic niet direct zien:
Gerrit Folmer

http://www.geni.com/merge/compare/6000000003417399168?return=match%...

Two different wives is that correct

Please merge thes profiles ?

http://www.geni.com/merge/compare/6000000027491542230?fsession_id=1...

Thanks for the merge

Fred Bergman

Thanks glad I asked...lol

I am curious, what does -geni-NL-gids- mean?

Oh great thanks Fred...

http://www.geni.com/merge/compare/6000000008498862389?return=duplic...

Fred what does that mean?

The profile on left

Private User thankyou for that useful info.

My pleasure Sharon. The confusion is also perpetuated by people nearer home. For example. SHAMSUDDIN may be the way the name was registered by someone above 50 years of age but a younger person may write SYAMSYUDDIN because that is the new spelling convention and thatis how he learned in school. We have not learned that correctly spelt names are important for identification purposes.

Thank heavens that Geni searches using all variations in the aka field too.

... which is a good reminder, Sharon ....

When merging profiles with different spellings/variations, put those different variations into the AKA (Also Known As) field. That will help with future 'matching' when other people add profiles with one of those variations.

Just remember to add the full names there.

Bjorn makes a very good point. For many of us, the "aka" field, which was originally labelled the nickname field has been used for such terms as "Bob", "Grandma" and etc. Those are - or at least might be - great for informing the family. They are abysmal as values for the searching algorithm to use as alternatives for the full name.

PS - Under Revisions - still find the term "nicknames" used - as in "[----]'s profile was updated by [---] ... nicknames" - AND in the chart you pull up if you click "view" at the end of that entry
Also - same thing under "History" from Overview Tab.

Do not know of anyplace (other than Bjorn's comment above) letting folks know one should put "Bob Smith", not "Bob". Nor that this should not be the place to let folks know whether her grandchildren called her Grandma, or Nana, or etc. And if there is such a place - how likely is it that folks find it?

It was originally labelled nicknames, and still are in the API and some leftover labels, but since the functionality is Also Known As (by going into search index, for tree, record and smart matches etc, it got renamed to Also Known As.

Unfortunately we don't have any extra field for nicknames yet.

And since we don't have a separate nickname field, I use AKA for both purposes - for nickname first in the list, then comma, then a comma separated string for search purposes. Or try to ...

please help initiate merges for the following

http://www.geni.com/search?search_type=people&names=Hart+Rotenberg+

http://www.geni.com/search?search_advanced=open&search_extended...=

Richard Radzinsky,

They have both been initiated.

I worry that people will hate me because I do so many merges. They feel as if I'm invading their private families and wonder who the hell am I and what the hell do I know about their family members.

Jonathan: As long as you are careful about it, it has been my experience that people appreciate having the 'messiness' cleaned up. Since you can only do that 'clean up' with either public profiles (or profiles within your own "family group"), it is all OUR tree, anyway. <grin>

Thanks for caring about making the World Family Tree better!

Private - personally, I would suggest contacting folks before doing the merges - telling why you want to do the merge, asking are they comfortable with it, etc. This is especially for merges that will definitely extend down into someone's Max Extended Family. This is not for merges of a profile you manage with a Public Profile managed by a dozen or more folks, way outside anyone's Max Extended Family.

As to Dan's comment - One of the reasons some do not make Profiles Public is because they do not want others doing merges on them with no contact. Others do not realize it can happen, and may switch them Private if it does - whereas contact first may leave them a happy camper.

Do not know if you noticed - but they recently added a line under "Actions" - "View Claimed Family" - so you can see if there is claimed family of the profile you are planning to merge (and have a way to contact them - tho apparently each indivicually).

Thank you all. I hope I have not raised a mundane issue.

Klaas Jissink
Grietje Jans van Dijk

Shalom Lois Lubin!

I fully understand your point of view. Geni must therefore take this concern seriously and develop a feature to accommodate but there must be a time limit to stopping a merge in case the manager decides to 'abdicate' this world before his work is done and before nominating a successor.

Kamal

geni already has the features you are discussing Private User some people just get startled

please help merge these historical profiles (a curator may be required)
http://www.geni.com/merge/compare/6000000006570476656?from_flash=1&...