Check your myDashboard!

[phje]

There are definitely some new features as of today. Login and check it out. Also, it looks like there are a few things that need some ironing out as far as the display goes.

[phje]

The display issues have been corrected.

I'm really enjoying the search for relatives feature!

[LynCra]

They seem to have messed about with the menu structure and colour schemes to add to the general confusion, but is there actually anything new and useful?

[Petra]

I don´t think so, for me it works. I am using the IE 11 and Windows 7 on my computer.

Besides I think the new search for family names which shows familytrees and Projects, where the names are in, very comfortable. I think this is a good step they have done with the new Interface.

I just found sb with the rare surname NIETHE, whom I did not match with FF, but where I possibly can connect the trees. We are minimum 10 generations away from each other... But: I have no option to write this person, because of his/hers privacy settings.

Perhaps, one day more people will be open to show their trees and contact data to People on FTDNA. For sure, I would not want to see my tree public for anybody outside of FTDNA...

[rivergirl]

"Besides I think the new search for family names which shows familytrees and Projects, where the names are in, very comfortable. I think this is a good step they have done with the new Interface"

FTDNA are showing the FamilyTrees of people with a certain surname in them and DNA Projects that has that surname, but that does not mean that the two are the same.

ie; it does not mean that the person with the family tree posted is actually in that Surname Project.

eg; I checked out the surname of one of my Projects, and there are many trees listed, from people who are not in that Surname Project.

I hope this does not mean Surname Project Admins are going to be flooded with emails asking for information on the person in a particular tree, if they cannot get in connect any other way.

[larzus]

New Family Search Option

I love it! I've found second cousins for my mother who we had completely lost contact with. Unfortunately they haven't come up as matches so I can't get in touch. But so nice to know that my great grandfather's sister lived to adulthood, got married and had a whole lot of descendants.

I've edited my own profile by reducing information and have set it to public to see if anyone wants to contact me. This option is still showing as 'not recommended' so maybe I'm about to get spam, but it's worth it if a long lost relative gets in touch .

[travers]

Meh. 90% of the trees that do show are listed as a "Private Member's Tree", so you don't know who submitted the tree. This is because FTDNA has the default profile set to "Private: Do not show any information" even though they recommend this setting "Basic profile: Only show my name, picture and birth year (recommended)." If they recommend the basic profile setting why isn't it the default? What is the point of this new feature if we don't know who submitted any of these trees and there is no way to contact?

[WCoaster]

Tree privacy: all or nothing?

No warning was issued that trees would be made searchable to non-matches, with no way to opt out. Profiles can be private, but trees can't? Seems to me the reverse would make more sense.

I just hope this isn't going to have the unintended consequence of discouraging the few people who have been willing to post trees from doing so.

[WCoaster]

On second thought, I hope I've misunderstood. Does the "matches only" option under the Genealogy tab in Account Settings still work under the new search system? I hope so!

[larzus]

Private trees are still private. In the search results, every so often I am finding one that says: Private Family Tree - You need to be a DNA match to see this result.

I can't see anything at all about these trees and I don't even know if my search surname is an exact hit or a similar name.

The ones we can see are the ones set to allow viewing. A few different levels of privacy are evident even among these. Some show the name of the tree owner, for instance, whereas some have that tree name set to 'Private Member's Tree' while still having a tree available to view.

When we can view a tree, the original privacy settings still apply so living people are private, people deceased within the last 100 years are private - all the same as before.

[WCoaster]

Thanks, larzus. That's good news!

[Katydid]

I suspect that there are quite a few people who have no idea that their family trees, with them at the root, are now fully on display to the general public.

I thought I had all my trees private to non-matches, but I guess I missed a setting at some point. I've fixed that now. However, an email should have been sent out to all kit owners about this upcoming change (with instructions about setting tree privacy settings) before this went live.

[Darren]

Let me check with management regarding this, I agree some kind of announcement is needed.
-Darren
Family Tree DNA

[Katydid]

Thanks, Darren.

Let me check with management regarding this, I agree some kind of announcement is needed.
-Darren
Family Tree DNA

[dna]

I suspect that there are quite a few people who have no idea that their family trees, with them at the root, are now fully on display to the general public.

I thought I had all my trees private to non-matches, but I guess I missed a setting at some point. I've fixed that now. However, an email should have been sent out to all kit owners about this upcoming change (with instructions about setting tree privacy settings) before this went live.

My project members had received e-mail notifications after 15:00 (3PM) Houston time. That is at least six hours before your post.

Let me check with management regarding this, I agree some kind of announcement is needed.
-Darren
Family Tree DNA

As a project administrator, I got an email notification one hour before your post Darren.

W. (Mr.)