Here is the system that I recently created for myself. It works for me, maybe it will help others, I do not know though as we are each such unique individuals and all think so differently.
Like others, I have trouble keeping up with all my documents and correspondences. This really created a huge mess for me and I became very determined some 8 months ago to get this under control. This is what I came up with and so far it is working extremely well. ______________________________________________________________________ 1. I had my computer guru and certified to build and repair PC's son custom build me a new "super" computer. In other words, one that will have plenty of ram and 2 large hard drives so that when there are issues with the main C drive requiring reformatting, it will only be one hard drive and not the one with all my research data on it. We also put in the top of the line in graphics card to handle reading census images without hiccup, superb when photo editing, burning DVD's etc. It was very expensive, between 2 and 3 grand but that also included a new larger monitor for my very aging eyes. It is far more of a system then I will ever really actually need but it works fantastic for me. He put in a lot of goodies I will likely never use. 2. I am currently scanning all my documents, having taken a break from the actual research part for a while to get caught up with my source documents as most of what I have still needs to be gleaned and sourced into my data. I store the images into a master file on my second hard drive, labeled as the Master Genealogy Research File, and into individual sub files beginning with tiles such as 1790 Fed Census, 1800 Fed Census, 1810 Fed Census, etc. Birth Records, Death records, Marriage records, Directories, Cemetery Records, so on and so forth. 3. I also back this up to individual CD-ROMs labeled in short form such as for the birth records it says ID: BthR1. 4. I created an Excel spreadsheet where I list each document as such: Number (just to show how many I have recorded); Title of document: Example: Certificate of Baptism; Date (date document created or date discovered); Names in Document: These are the surnames I list that were located in the document; CD-R ID: (the CD-ROM I have stored it to); File ID (My physical paper file storage which has a master file Example: labeled such as Birth Records with two individual sub files marked as sourced and un-sourced to be placed according to whether I have recorded the info in my family database. Since my first priority at this time is getting my sources scanned and preserved right now, many of my documents are going in the un-sourced files until I can get back to them at a later date.)Also, I gave each census year it's own master file with the two sub files, eventually I will store the sourced one by state as well within each years master file.; Drive and File location: My hard drives are partitioned so it is important for me to know which partition my master genealogy file is located on and what subfolder as well to get to it directly if I need to without having to go to my physical paper file and handle each document again. Example of how this would look is; Drive P; Master Genealogy Research File/Marriage Records. Sourced: and this is a yes or no question for obvious reasons. Also, My Excel file is my temporary PC file system as I am working on creating an MS Access database to record all this to so that I can post queries to it and have it bring up results of all documents with a certain surname in it and linking me directly to the actual images within my comuter. Ultimately I will use the Excel file to help me get my data into the MS Access database rather quickly. The CD's I am burning are strictly insurance for backup just because we all know just how fickle computers can be. I apologize for the length of this message but wanted to share my system in case it may help others in creating their own. Andrea Legacy User Group Etiquette guidelines can be found at: http://www.LegacyFamilyTree.com/Etiquette.asp To find past messages, please go to our searchable archives at: http://www.mail-archive.com/legacyusergroup%40mail.millenniacorp.com/ To unsubscribe please visit: http://www.legacyfamilytree.com/LegacyLists.asp
