Organize Your Family History

Stay focused and happy while exploring your roots

Back up to the rescue!

By 8 Comments

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

 

The keyboard shortcuts I use most in my genealogy research

By 4 Comments

There are certain keyboard shortcuts I use all the time when I’m doing genealogy research. They save time and effort. I bet you’re using some, if not all, of them too. The list below is Mac-specific, but the ⌘ key (the Command key on a Mac) is the same as the Control key in Windows in most of the browser and text functions described below. I thought I’d share them here in case they’re helpful. I figure everyone can use some time-saving tips!

In Finder:

⌘-D: Duplicates the selected file

⌘-delete: Deletes the selected file without having to confirm

⌘-I: Opens the Get Info window, giving me a backend look at the selected file. (This is where I paste the source citation I’ve created for this document, in the Comments section. See step 5 of this post for more information on that.)

Spacebar: Uses Quick Look to preview the selected file

⌘-N: Opens a new finder window (very handy when you want to drag a file into another folder)

In a browser:

⌘-T: Opens a new browser tab

⌘-N: Opens a new browser window

⌘-F: Find text

When dealing with text (in Pages or Reunion or elsewhere):

⌘-C: Copies the selected text

⌘-X: Cuts the selected text

⌘-V: Pastes the selected text

⌘-B: Bolds the selected text

⌘-I: Italicizes the selected text

⌘-Z: Undoes the last command (on a Windows computer, it’s Ctrl-Y)

Shift-⌘-Z: Redo the last undone command

⌘-K: Opens a pop-up window to add a link to the selected text

fn-delete: Deletes one character to the right

I think I used half of these while writing this post! If I’ve missed any favorites, please share in the comments.

 

Quick Tip #15: Resist the urge to print

By 10 Comments

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 changed my genealogy life.

Resist the urge to print

As a professional organizer, I know what a problem paper clutter can be. And I know how hard it can be to access unfiled paper (and so much paper is unfiled!). So I am a huge proponent of not printing genealogy documents I find online. Instead, I encourage you to download and file them.

The key to feeling confident about downloading, rather than printing, is to have a reliable file-naming protocol and folder structure so that you can find the documents. Mine is detailed in this post, but yours might be different. That’s great, as long as it works for you. When you download and file digitally, rather than print and file or put into binders, your documents are always at your fingertips when you’re at your computer, even if you’re at a library or repository. It can be a mindset shift, but I think it’s worth it.

It’s important to mention, as was brought up in the comments to this post, that it’s absolutely essential to backup your hard drive if you’re going to store your documents digitally. I wrote about this in my last quick tip.

For extensive information on going paperless in your genealogy research, check out the Paperless Genealogy Guide I wrote with scanning expert Brooks Duncan, available for purchase at his website, DocumentSnap.

Photo by Sam Dan Truong on Unsplash

Quick Tip #14: Back up your data!

By 8 Comments

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 is brief but very important.

Back up your data

If you’ve embraced digital file organization, as I have, it’s absolutely imperative to back up your data. And it’s a good idea to do it in multiple ways. I store my genealogy source documents on my hard drive and I back up my hard drive continuously through Backblaze, an automated cloud-based service. (That’s a referral link; I’ll be compensated if you use the link to sign up for BackBlaze.) I’ve been very happy with Backblaze but there are other cloud-based backup services, like Carbonite and CrashPlan, that you might consider.

I also automatically back up hourly to an external hard drive via the Time Machine program on my Mac. (I keep my external hard drive plugged in via a hub whenever my computer is at my desk, which is most of the time.) Finally, my Reunion database is stored on Dropbox, so that I can access it, via ReunionTouch, on my phone. So that’s another place the files exist. I have confidence back up system and, best of all, it’s all automatic–I never have to think about it!

Those are just the ways I back up. There are lots of other ways to do it. The important thing is to feel confident that if your hard drive failed or your computer were stolen or damaged you would not lose your precious genealogy data. If you’re not as confident, I urge you to take some steps to explore how you might improve your situation!

Photo by Sam Dan Truong on Unsplash