New Tree Tool ???

[Inge]

How is it possible

....that everyone´s feedback is not noticed by relevant people at FTDNA? I know I sent emails and A LOT of other people did BEFORE the launch. Why ask for feedback and then totally IGNORE it?

The new tree tool works best (not to say only) if you add every person manually and you don´t add more than 5 generations or perhaps 6 at the most. It does not work with Gedcoms. There are many small things we the customers know, that would improve the new tool to a level of usefulness. But why bother talking to the wall of China?

For å quick fix if your trees now need a lot of manual editing, simply mark all three privacy settings Private while you work on it.

If your tree has a lot of ancestors that has now become Private change every privacy setting to "Matches" or "Public" and simply edit the first generations manually so they don´t contain the information you actually want to keep private. I have "baptized" the first generations Father, Maternal GFather etc. You can give them names like Private or whatever strikes your fancy.

Still, my trees will remain private till things change.

[cannonjt0621]

Step Matches

I have one Y-DNA111 match with a Genetic Distance of 7. When I go to the matches on the New Tree Tool, it tells me that I have no matches at the 111 level and, for all the Y matches, it only lists two with a Genetic Distance of 0 when I know that I have hundreds. Is there a Genetic Distance cutoff on the match tool on the New Tree Tool or is it still populating? Also, it tells me that I have no mtDNA matches when I know that I have 5. Still populating?

[Ann Turner]

As I was playing with the new tree, putting family profiles who have tested and match into the proper place, I wondered... What does this DO? Surely it has to DO something. Now I have a partial answer... and one that did not come up in the seminar or any discussion I have seen online yet.

When you place someone in your tree, an email will be generated and sent to them. At least I assume this is what others are seeing too. I'm not sure how useful this will be.
______________________________

[email protected] Today at 9:05 PM
To Me@my_address.net

NAME added you to their family tree on FamilyTreeDNA.com!
Click here to see NAME's tree now.
To modify your email settings or unsubscribe, click here.

Family Tree DNA
1445 North Loop West, 820, Houston, TX, 77008


-------------------------------------------------------------
This message was processed by the FTDNA Email System.

I received several such messages, but a cousin I added to my tree hasn't received a message like this (yet).

When I clicked on the link in the e-mail, it took me to another account where I happened to be logged in, not to the tree where I made the changes.

[Ann Turner]

My question is whether a person looking at my tree here at FTDNA would be able to find the collateral line. I filled in the line of descent for a second cousin who has tested here and dragged her name from the match list on to her icon. Then I logged in as my sister and looked at my tree. It doesn't show any of the collateral line. Is this by design? If so, I can more easily keep track of who's who in my Family Tree Maker file.

It looks like you need to work your way up to the common ancestor, then click on the descendancy icon to see the collateral line.

Also, I can see only five generations when I'm in Family View.

[Kathleen Carrow]

Something about this new "tool" seems to have made some things malfunction.

I had just gotten 2 Y transfers completed.. painstakingly I might add, as customer service were always unsure of what to do..

As of last night both transfers have reverted themselves to needing completion.. even the orders for the extra markers

This is on 2 DIFFERENT Groups that I Admin.. so am I going to have to go through all this again?
I am sure it must have something to do with the new software as hours before they were working..

[Rhea]

Where are the instructions for these tools?

Two questions.

First, can someone provide a URL or breadcrumb trail for the instructions on these new tools?

Second, how can I upload a revised GEDCOM? I can't find a link to do that anywhere.

Thank you.

[Táltos]

Two questions.

First, can someone provide a URL or breadcrumb trail for the instructions on these new tools?

Second, how can I upload a revised GEDCOM? I can't find a link to do that anywhere.

Thank you.

After you click on the box for the tree on the main page, it will open to the tree page. In the new screen click on the "cog icon" on the lower right hand side. It gives an option to upload a gedcom. I just uploaded my new one the other night, and I was surprised at how fast it uploaded. It seemed to take forever in the past...

Some things seem better, such as not having to delete your tree and upload a new one. You can just add, and delete who you want. I'm still playing around with this though, so I'm not 100% about it yet. Though I think it might be better. I know there are bugs, like where it will let me enter a birthplace, but it won't let me enter the place of death. Or like how in my new upload I can see my brother listed, but on his tree I'm no where to be seen. Also everyone is talking about how everybody is private. There are settings about people who are alive vs people who are deceased in the past 100 yrs being allowed to be seen. Not sure if the settings for this were mentioned yet in any of the threads. I haven't really read them all the way through.

[Táltos]

What they should do to replicate the old aerial view is once you minimize the tree when it is in the "Ancestry View" (found on the lower left side of the screen). Allow you to hover over each box to see name, dates, and location. That would make me happy at least.

[melmoth]

Progress of a sort...

Looking at my GEDCOM, my 4xgreat-grandmother happens to enjoy the arbitrary distinction of being person #1; I am person #266. This appears to be why the new family tree 'feature' (and I use the term in the sense in which it is usually used by IT professionals, to mean 'disaster') was insistent on making me my 4xgreat-grandmother. So I edited the GEDCOM to transpose the keys (I had no idea what this might break, but I was driven by morbid curiosity). Then, however, my name as it appears in my family tree wasn't close enough to what FTDNA has, and it still precluded me from uploading it. Oh well, I thought, in for a penny, in for a pound... So I changed my name in the GEDCOM, and got it successfully uploaded. Then I changed my name in 'family tree,' not realising it would change the name on my account as well. So now I am 'Private Private.' I wonder if I'm obliged to list that under 'Other names or aliases used' on any future legal documents?

Anyway, it allowed me to explore the new 'feature' (vide supra). Needless to say, I'm underwhelmed. Simply put, what a genealogist needs is plain text with a maximum of information in a minimum of space; what we are given instead is a vaguely insulting collage of pictures and first names, rather like a nightmarish vegan brunch at a hippie diner where the servers all sit down at your table and introduce themselves (I'm a vegetarian hippie, by the by, so I can say that). I realise many of our ancestors were illiterate, but that doesn't mean we are. Oh, and nothing appears to work. Is something supposed to happen when one clicks on the name of an ancestor for whom a suspected match has been found? It doesn't, in my case, anyway. And it just assumes you have the window maximised and doesn't show you certain controls unless you do. I don't typically maximise windows, but to overlook the possibility someone might be viewing in windowed mode is typical of the blinkered and unimaginative programming that characterises this ... 'feature.'

Of course I promptly deleted my family tree and will invite any matches who wish to exchange info to visit me on Gedmatch where they have a usable interface.

[Rhea]

Thank you Taltos, that worked. It even found a couple of matches.

[Corbyguy]

I don't know if this is a bug or due to something that i need to do in order to occur. I have the Family Finder, YDNA and MtDNA icons by my name in the Family Tree however none of my parents or ancestors have any of the icons by their names.

Should the YDNA, MtDNA and Family Finder icons automatically appear next to my parents etc. or do i need to get my parents tested and add their match profile to the Family Tree in order for the YDNA, MtDNA and Family Finder icons to appear next to their names?

[Administratorx3]

I hate this. Everyone I talk to hates this.
Did I say I hate this? This ruins the ability for me to research efficiently and quickly as I previously could with the old gedcom feature which responded to the arrows, up/down/side to side. I can no longer transfer a gedcom to a private file to work on off line;

I co administer three surnames sites, one with 800 members. I can no longer help them navigate their trees or help them find matches. My own kits for my siblings are useless due to the amount of time it takes to move around in them, and without the gedcoms, the whole thing is useless for all I have invested, both monetarily and timewise.

What were they thinking? UGH!

[JohnG]

It would be great to see the date and location information when you hover over a name.

At first I was not sure this was an improvement, but the more I look at it I can see it going somewhere. I think having the matches I have identified in my tree will be useful.

I hope this is headed to where you get info on how matches in common are related and we get to build a DNA based tree.

[jbarry6899]

The report on changes made to date is helpful, but does not address the major design problems with the new trees. Some priority fixes:

1. Eliminate the icons.
2. Make the default view a pedigree
3. Redesign the boxes to display names, dates and locations without clicking
4. Resize the display to eliminate the need to zoom and move the tree

Jim

[Gugel]

We're listening and appreciate your feedback. We did so during the beta and we'll continue do so.

Since launching the Family Tree beta on Aug. 21, we fixed dozens of issues over the following few weeks. Some of them are outlined in this post: http://forums.familytreedna.com/showthread.php?t=35790

I can promise you that we'll continue to listen closely to your feedback, but I can't promise we'll get to everything that has been recommended. Feel free to continue to post constructive criticism on the forums or send an email to [email protected] to have your feedback considered.