Organize Your Family History

Stay focused and happy while exploring your roots

Back up to the rescue!

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I’ve blogged before about the importance of backing up your data. Since I organize all my genealogy files (as well as almost all of my business and personal files) digitally, a back up is essential. In this post from earlier this year, I detailed how I back up my hard drive to the cloud and to an external hard drive.

My back up was put to the test last Friday when my MacBook Pro stopped working. While I was using it, it turned itself off and refused to come back on. I called AppleCare (thankfully, it’s still under warranty) then went to the Genius Bar at the Apple Store where they spent two fruitless hours trying to revive it. So now it’s on its way to the Apple repair shop. Unless I decide to purchase a new MacBook with the intention of returning it (something I might end up doing), I will be without a computer for at least a week.

My husband has an iPad Pro that he’s letting me use. It has a keyboard case and I can also connect my Bluetooth mouse to it. I’m grateful for that, but the iPad has limitations. The whole thing is a hassle. But it’s nothing like the panic I would be experiencing if I did not have an automatic backup routine in place.

Since I back up to the cloud via BackBlaze, I am able to cherry pick files to download to the iPad. So I’m able to use key spreadsheets and documents to keep my business going. I have Reunion Touch on my iPhone so I can easily access my genealogy database and source documents. (The truth is that I’m not doing much research, though. Since everything else is taking me so much time to do I have no spare time.)

My backup routine has turned a potential calamity into an inconvenience. If you’re not backing up regularly, I hope this cautionary tale is enough to get you to start!

Edited to add: I received my computer back from Apple on Thursday (only two days after I originally wrote this post). The logic board was replaced and an updated operating system installed, which meant that I had to restore all files from my back up. My Time Machine back up on my external hard drive made that so easy. I was able to initiate the transfer of those files with one click and they were installed overnight. I was happily surprised to learn that the back up had been updated during the hour that my computer was plugged into the hard drive before it crashed. So I had an up-to-date backup.

My takeaway: Having both the Time Machine back up on an external hard drive and a cloud backup on BackBlaze is what allowed me to weather this situation without too much trauma or inconvenience.

Photo by Dallas Reedy on Unsplash

 

Quick Tip #24: Keep your folder structure simple

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Here’s the next in my occasional series of bite-size Quick Tips. Click on the Quick Tips tag for my other Quick Tips. Because I tend to write longer posts, I wanted to provide a quick-to-read (and quick-to-write) post every couple of weeks on a small topic that pops into my head. This one has saved me a lot of time in filing and retrieving documents from my hard drive.

Keep your folder structure simple

There’s a tendency to think a complicated organizational system is a good one. I think the opposite is true. The simpler we can make a system, the easier it is to maintain.

This is true for your folder structure for your genealogy source documents. There’s no best way to organize your folders. You could file documents by surname, location, type of document…whatever works for you. But I urge you to keep it simple. I file my documents by surname and have created a folder structure with individual folders for each ancestor within a single surname (with an additional layer for collateral relatives). I describe my folder structure briefly in Step 6 of this post and in more depth in my Orderly Roots Guide, How I Do It: A Professional Organizer’s Genealogy Workflow.)

I could have chosen to nest the folders by generation, which would have had me click my way through a family tree to find a document. But that is unnecessarily complex in my view. My simple folder structure allows me to file easily and find documents easily. (And that means I actually file!) And it allows me to see all the documents I have for a single ancestor in one place.

My goal for all organizing systems is to make them as simple and streamlined as possible. I think this definitely applies to the folder structure on our hard drives!

Photo by Sam Dan Truong on Unsplash

Should you color code your files?

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Let me preface my answer to this question with one statement: You do you.

If color coding is satisfying and sustainable for you, go for it. Color coding (either of paper files or digital ones) can help you quickly identify what you’re looking for. But it comes with a drawback, in my estimation: extra work.

When I first started with genealogy back in 2001 or so, I created a color-coded paper file system. I bought colored folders and color-coded folder labels. I used one color per line (so four colors, one for each grandparent’s surname) and I created folders for each couple, with the folders for each surname and each line filed together.

I wasn’t a professional organizer yet, but I found the color coding satisfying.

That worked nicely before I ended up abandoning my research because I hadn’t sourced things properly. One of the reasons it worked out well is that I hadn’t yet done a lot of research so I didn’t have a lot of files. (That’s a picture of my file cart from back in the day above.)

When I came back to genealogy a decade later, I slowly transitioned from paper to digital files. And I didn’t bother using colored dots or any other type of electronic color-coding because I didn’t need to. Instead, I created a digital folder structure and a file-naming protocol that meant that I don’t have any trouble finding any of my digital files. I had to train myself to rename my files immediately after downloading them and to file them properly as soon as I processed them. That’s a solid habit now and easy as pie. Color coding would have been an additional, unnecessary step.

Once I started working as a professional organizer, I discouraged most clients from using color-coded files for fear that they wouldn’t have the right color handy when they needed to file. When that happened, they couldn’t file and piles would form.

In my view, if color coding impedes your ability to actually file, it’s not worth it. But if you love color coding and it works well for you, go for it.

If you’re interested in learning more about my folder structure and file system, check out my Orderly Roots Guide, How I Do It: A Professional Organizer’s Genealogy Workflow.

Trying to stay laser focused this month

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Sample from my genealogy follow up notebookIt’s less than a week in, but I’m really enjoying this month’s 30 x 30 challenge. My goal is to get through as much of my backlog as I can. On April 1, I had 112 files in my backlog waiting to be processed, but many of them are newspaper articles, which come in pairs (a jpg with the whole page and a pdf of the clip). At minimum, therefore, I have 56 source documents to process. In reality, it’s more than that.

I’ve tried this in the past and failed. I would end up allowing myself to do further research if questions came up during the backlog busting. That would slow down the elimination of the backlog, for obvious reasons. But this month, I’m trying very hard not to do any research; I have a laser focus on processing files. (By that, I mean I’m analyzing each document, creating a source citation and attaching it to all the facts I glean from a document.)

I created a note in my Evernote research log called, “Follow ups from April 30 x 30 backlog busting.” And when I come across further research I need to do, I note it there. That’s a picture of it above. Like the rest of my research log, my follow-up notes are very casual.

My intention is to turn my focus to this follow-up note when this month’s 30 x 30 is over. I’ve set a reminder in Evernote to look at that note on May 1. (I felt like a genius when I thought of the reminder!)

In six days, I’ve processed 25 documents. If I can keep this pace up I should be able to get rid of my backlog by the end of the month. I’m feeling really productive and I’m really enjoying myself. I think the key, right now, is my determination to not add new documents. Of course, if I don’t succeed, I’ll cut myself a ton of slack because I know that any progress I make is good.

I hope your 30 x 30 is going just as well!

Join the mailing list!

When you first join the list, I’ll send you a few emails to help you organize your family history. After that you’ll hear from me at the end of every month when I send an email with links to that month’s posts. And every now and then, I’ll let you know when I have something special to promote.