Wednesday, April 28, 2010

In A Cloud of Genealogy

Day 1 NGS Conference 2010 - Cloud Computing and Genealogy

If you have been doing genealogy for awhile, you know that “In a Cloud of Genealogy” could have multiple meanings: 1) It could be the high we are on just for finding the elusive ancestor. 2) It could be the cloud your head is in while maneuvering the throng of people at the NGS Conference – estimated to be around 2500 participants. 3) It could be the clouds hanging over Salt Lake City right now, as snow flakes lightly fall in April. 4) or it could be Cloud Computing.

Clouds
So as you may remember I told you I was able to test some beta trials yesterday,. Well, the beta I played with yesterday, is being released this week during the NGS Conference: 300 million new records this week alone! Yes, 300 million new records can be searched using the new Beta.

The Historical Records Collections can be searched by Record Type, Date Range, or Region. This collection includes transcriptions of birth, marriages, new European Collection and other regions – births, baptisms, and more. Thanks to the 300,000 index volunteers who have worked on this digitizing project, have assisted with these records being accessed not only from the FHL library microfilm collections, but also by using my PC/mobile device.

Not yet coming off my cloud, having previewed this wonderful beta yesterday, I attended the seminar on Genealogy in a Cloud, by Craig Miller. Miller stressed the importance and advantages of collaborating efforts through the internet by using off-site services like Google Docs. He gave excellent examples of cloud computing being used: Salesforce.com, Amazon.com, Family Search Wiki, and of course the Family History Beta. That explains the magic of releasing 300 million new records.

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