When was the last time you backed up the files on your computer? The 3-2-1 rule for protecting your digital archives means you keep three copies of everything on at least two different platforms (hard drive, external drive, thumb drive, etc.) with one copy stored off-site (Dropbox, OneDrive, iCloud, etc.). Backups should be performed monthly at the very least. Yes, these things take time and money but what would it cost to replace all your research should a disaster strike?
Don’t forget . . . dues are due! You can pay your dues at February’s member meeting or you can email it to St. Augustine Genealogical Society, 6670 U.S.1 South, St. Augustine, Florida 32086. Your dues make it possible for us to provide interesting speakers at our member meetings, a weekly newsletter and our quarterly Ancient City Bulletin.
Have you downloaded the RootsTech app yet? It’s free and can be installed from Apple’s app store or from Google Play. The conference doesn’t begin until February 27th but you don’t need to wait until then to take advantage of some of the app’s features. In this case, I’m talking about the speaker handouts. Once you have the app installed, go to the main screen and you will find a collection of icons taking you to the various components included in the app. Tap the Conference Schedule icon and the app will display lists of the sessions for each day of the conference.
In this example I’m looking at the first day (Wednesday) list of sessions. The PDF icon visible just under the session’s title means there is a downloadable handout for that session.
Scrolling down a bit and a familiar title caught my eye – One-Name Study. Yes, SAGS member Paul Howes is one of this year’s speakers. The small PDF icon just below the title means there is a speaker handout for that session. Tap the session item to display the details screen for that session. At the bottom of that screen, under the Resources title, you will see the Handouts button. Tap the button and a new button appears for taking notes on the handout, downloading it or emailing it to yourself or someone else.
There are a number of sessions that will be live-streamed online during the conference. You will find them here. Use the conference app to take notes while you’re watching.
While the North Florida Genealogy Conference can’t compete with RootsTech, it still has a lot of great sessions along with the opportunity to mingle with other area genealogists. Registration is now open. You can register online at the conference website or download the registration form, complete it and mail it in with your check. Registration is $25 and includes lunch. If you wait until March to register, the fee goes up to $30 and lunch is not guaranteed. Two SAGS members will be presenters this year – Paul Howes and Denise Olson. Once again the Amelia Island Genealogical Society sponsors their Brick Wall Help sessions and the Family History Center will be open for walk-in support throughout the day.
FamilySearch has recently released a new feature they call Calendars. It creates and displays a timeline of family events. The timeline is beautifully simple yet makes it easy to see how each of these events are part of your family history.
Have you ever wanted to “capture” a fascinating or useful webpage so you could easily access it whenever you wanted? If so, you need Pocket. Pocket is a free service that makes it possible to capture and save interesting articles, blogs and news sources found online. How does it work? First you need to install the Pocket app on your mobile devices and add the Pocket button to your web browser. Once installed in your web browser, you will see the Pocket icon in your browser’s toolbox and a link to your Pocket lists. Now, when you visit a website containing information you want to keep, just click on the Pocket icon and it will save that page to your Pocket account.
This example shows the main screen in a user’s Pocket account in the Firefox web browser. Notice the red Pocket: My List icon in the browser’s saved links bar. Clicking that link takes me to my saved articles. You’ll also notice the black and white Pocket icon in the address box. When I visit a page that has content I want to keep for later reference, I just click on that icon and Pocket does the rest.
Want to learn more? Visit Pocket’s Get Started page and see how easy it is.
Final Notes
Each new post published at SAGS Support is automatically emailed to member subscribers and/or delivered to their newsreader. Research Notes is published every Monday morning and other articles are posted during the week. Subscribers have the option to control how often these updates are delivered. Look down at the bottom of this message and you will find a Manage Subscriptions link in the fine print as you see in this example. Click it and you will be taken to the WordPress.com Subscription Management page. Use the Delivery Frequency column to change your delivery options from “Immediate” to either “Daily” or “Weekly”.
Sample of the “fine print” at the bottom of each post.
Also down at the bottom of each delivered post is a Comment button. If you would like to comment on something discussed in a post or ask a question, just click the Comment button and you will be taken online to the comment section of the post where you can share your thoughts and read what others have shared.
To learn more, download a copy of the SAGS Support Guide.