Comments on: The Ancestry Insider Discusses the New Search

By: kathleen Pitts carroll

kathleen Pitts carroll — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 22:45:15 +0000

I need to find something about my birth mother. I am 66 years old and have never eyen seen a picture of her. For some reason she gave me up. her maden name was Jeannie Milstead.
my dads name was Steven Pitts. He was away at war when I was born Oct.30, 1942. I was born in Jacksonville, fl. I think He was from Texas.

By: Josephine McClellan

Josephine McClellan — Sat, 26 Jul 2008 02:37:49 +0000

Type your comment here.
I do not like the alleged new and
improved ancestry.com program. Before I could type in a name and
birth years and look up information.
Now I keep getting messages sayind things are loading, but I do not see
anything. I am beginninw to wonder what am I paying all of this money for now?

By: Richard

Richard — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 15:16:03 +0000

Love the auto fill on new system,would like to keep that information and switch back and forth between new and old. I don`t use new system unless I reach grid lock (Looking for new source)with new system I can weed out unwanted info. I like both.It is Frustrating to enter a date or state and get ten pages to go through different states and dates. Thanks…

By: LWVanZante

LWVanZante — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 22:09:14 +0000

I too find it frustrating to enter dates and find them ignored. I have recently searched for someone with the new format and found nothing, later I was offered a choice of using the old format and was able to find the individual at once. However, when I first log on I am not offered this choice and I do not know how to bring up this choice. Please, tell me how to select the old format if that is the one I want to use. I am rather new at this.

Thankyou.

By: Sue Jones

Sue Jones — Sun, 20 Jul 2008 05:03:44 +0000

I would really like to see the filters work properly, and it not pull up everyone with that Surname, even after I entered information that should disqualify 90% of the names that come back as possible matches. I am fully aware that it takes time to work all the bugs out, just wanted to address this issue, thanks, Sue

By: Corra Ward

Corra Ward — Sat, 12 Jul 2008 06:11:59 +0000

I personally have had trouble using the new format for searching in ancestry.com. I also looked at someone elses home page and now when I open my ancestry.com her page appears at the top of the page I usually use to search. I can’t find a way to delete her homepage or tree. It is not of my line. No where in the instructions does it tell how to delete this information.

By: terence hotston

terence hotston — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 06:24:40 +0000

i wish you would take notice of the comments people have made, it all seems to be a masterpiece of obfuscation,please keep trying to remedy all the faults which prevent us from using this website properly

By: Charlotte Harrell

Charlotte Harrell — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 04:43:54 +0000

I too become frustrated when I put in dates that I know to be true and the search goes back and forward for many years.

The issue of searching for a married name and maiden name for a female is also frustrating.

I have found the new format more difficult and frustrating to use.

By: Jaems Robertson

Jaems Robertson — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 18:32:09 +0000

More follow up on the new search. There should be a way for us to indicate the confidence level we have for the various input data. For instance, I just searched for death and draft registration for someone born in 1913 (wihin 1 year) place of residence in 1920, 1930 (100% confident) and place of death with year (+/- 5 years).

ALL the returns were for people born before 1900. Most back in 1880s. That is 25 year off. This is useless.

The response of your data base is slow over the internet. When I use your service at the National Archives in DC, it responds instantaneously.

By: Holly M

Holly M — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 17:49:32 +0000

Still as frustrating as the old search. The search engine cannot seem to decide how to search for married women by both their maiden name and their married name with a breaking point. If I have a woman who marries and assumes her husband’s name in 1900, the search engine continues to look for her in 1910, 1920 and 1930 under her maiden name. Very time consuming to go through all the listings that don’t apply and there’s no way to go to the end of the list to search for misspelled names. You still have to scroll through pages and pages off bad hits. Whew!