Saturday, April 4, 2009

My Little Nook of the House - Sat. Night Fun - Genealogy Space

***Genea-Musings Saturday Night Genealogy Fun Challenge - Show us your Genealogy Space***

Okay - I can do that.

This is where you'll find me when I am in the Genealogy Zone. I have found it useful to use two computers simultaneously (the desktop and the laptop to my right) so I can browse the internet on one and key in information on the other without switching back and forth between screen views. I then back up on a jump drive and on both computers to have three current copies of my data in case I have an 'oops' or other traumatic event on one computer.

What you do not see is the bookshelf and cabinet full of notebooks and papers of genealogy quests gathered from pre-internet times to present. I have made good progress in organizing much of my loose papers this past year by creating a drawer of hanging file folders all labeled with a surname or region of study. Over time I go through the papers one by one. If the data has been entered into my genealogy program (I use The Master Genealogist) then I put a green highlighter check on it and file it away. I have the usual 'to do' pile and a 'need follow-up on' pile, and a 'someday I'll get to this' pile; plus a cabinet full of stuff not yet assigned to a pile. This is definitely a long term project - but then again so is genealogy!

3 comments:

kinfolknews said...

Love the two computer idea. Wonder if my husband will go for that?? Thanks for sharing! - Regina

footnoteMaven said...

I have been a two-fisted computer user for sometime. I always thought people would think I was strange.

Now there are two of us.

-footnoteMaven

Greta Koehl said...

Here's another two-computer user, or at least since last Christmas, when the youngest daughter got a new laptop so that I got the hand-me-down.