A big thank you to the team at Roots Magic for your continued innovation, and it’s particularly pleasing to see the program progress down the path of DNA information capture. I’m excited to see the future developments.
I’ve been playing around with the program for a very short while and have these initial questions / thoughts:
It would be great if we could attach media within the new DNA section on the Edit Person screen. I usually attach the DNA Match report and DNA ThruLines report from Ancestry and it would be great to be able to continue this process.
In the notes section I added the most recent common ancestor(s) (MRCA) and the relationship path. However it doesn’t seem as if the “find everywhere” function captures anything contained within the notes. I suppose this leads to a two pronged enhancement request:
i) could we please have the “find everywhere” function identify text within the notes on the DNA section, and
ii) could the main DNA screen include a column to capture the MRCA?
The relationship between the DNA matches is displayed, however it does not indicate if this is paternal or maternal relationship. Is there a way that this information can be included? Or could there be a separate input field where we enter this information in order that it may be captured in a separate column?
Could it be confirmed that the information entered into the new DNA section will export with a Gedcom?
Thanks so much once again for a terrific product and helping us enhance our genealogy endeavours! Cheers Jill
Can I echo the request for a Most Recent Common Ancestor (MRCA) column with the ability to group matches having that MRCA. I tend to use DNA matches to “prove” my tree. If I can follow matches’ trees back to identify common ancestors (without relying too heavily on Ancestry’s occasionally “iffy” suggestions) then there is a good chance I’ve got my tree right back to that point. Where there are no common ancestors beyond a certain point, within the first few generations at least, then it suggests I might need to check the records I have relied on very carefully to ensure I haven’t made any mistakes. I can obviously add the MRCAs in the DNA note but it would be very useful to be able to see them within the table. Thanks
I currently use in the Prefix field to mark my MRCA, in the Prefix field of my Match and on the Suffix field in all persons in between.
I would like to use a Color Set as a trail to and from the MRCA and the Match. But it is a pain to keep switching the colors back and forth. I did request an update to add more color bars to the person bar on the main page.
I agree with others who have requested that MRCA be added to the DNA section. Finding the common ancestor(s) of DNA test takers is the main focus of genetic genealogy.
I currently use colour codes with one colour for MRCAs, another for intermediate people and another for matches so that the ancestral line is clear visually but having the MRCA alongside the match on the table as well would be extremely useful. At the moment I have both an extra fact type for individuals and an excel spreadsheet that might now become redundant with a bit of tweaking to the new DNA facility.
I agree that the MRCA alongside the match on the table as well would be extremely useful. I would love to see a tool that would color-code the path back to the MRCA.
Confirming being able to open the Edit Person screen from there has been reported to development. Since more than one Edit Person screen can be opened at a time, while on the DNA tab you can move to the index and select another Edit Person screen to open. The only time that is locked is when the “Shared DNA Matches” form is open.
According to Bruce this will be fixed in a future update. Some people seem to have this issue, some don’t but if Bruce says it will be fixed, then he likely knows what caused it. Personally I think they need to get rid of the slider bars, it is a lot easier to type in the field and it would give additional real estate to expand the entry boxes.
The slider bar defaults are all too small but all you have to do is enter in the number field and the sliders expand to accommodate the data. Not having 2 decimals would be nice.
On the person’s DNA page, an option to sort on the RM name (or RM ID) instead of Lable 2 would be helpful. Example: If Ancestry’s DNA match is named janedoe1953, FamilyTreeDNA is named Jane Doe and MyHeritage is named JaneDoe. You can not sort by the name column to combine all matches. Sorting by the RM Name would be a better option.
on the Suffix field in all persons in between.