Talk:Proposal for Transcript Management

Transplanted from the WaterCooler - Transcripts that are not owned [17 September 2011]

I have lately been reminded that a decision was taken that transcriptions of wills, interviews, and such materials belonged on a "MySource" type page. This makes a certain amount of sense, because the paper copy of a will or an interview transcript is in someone's possession, and the rest of the world doesn't really have immediate access.

There are other types of transcripts however, which do not fit the model of being "owned" as a standard MySource. I would offer for example, MySource:WeRelate/Tuttle, Charles W. The Tuttle Family of New Hampshire. While the transcription is my work, the original content is not especially owned by me. Further, if a defect were found, anyone should feel free to fix it. I noticed that I was able to create this non-named MySource by simply filling in the name on my browser URL and creating it without the "benefit" of the usual page creation wizardry. I can well imagine creation of similar transcripts of important published wills or other documents, where a user doesn't have particular proprietary access but there is great value in having a transcript (particularly if hyperlinked). I trust that Dallan will chime in on the legitimacy (or lack thereof) of the approach. --Jrm03063 18:30, 14 February 2011 (EST)

My thought is that it should be an article, more than anything else. It is not really a source since you would cite the original magazine article, not the transcript, and since it is in the public domain and viewable on books.google.com, it doesn't really fit as a mysource (and again you really wouldn't want to cite the transcript but the original). That said, if/since a separate source page was made for the article, similar to how some NEHGR articles have been handled, it doesn't seem completely inappropriate to put the transcript right on that page instead of creating a separate one to hold the article. --Jrich 19:57, 14 February 2011 (EST)

It was an article - but I was just lectured on transcripts being a MySource item. That's why I created it as the fictional/generic "WeRelate" user. As to placement in the body content of source pages - that's not a direction I would want to go. If sources are potentially meant for a wider audience than merely WeRelate, they need a simple and digestible form. I would also like to be able to do wills that are published elsewhere after the fasion that I used on the will featured this week - not simply those in my posession - and they are specifically inappropriate as "Source:". --Jrm03063 21:32, 14 February 2011 (EST)

I am not sure that I understand your objection to placing it on the Source page. Putting the transcript on the source page does not change the source citation, which is what gets exported in the GEDCOM, and so does not change the part that is, as you say, "meant for a wider audience than merely WeRelate". The narrative on the source page is intended to provide information about using a source and I don't believe the contents of this Source page narrative get exported at all in a GEDCOM export, and so don't understand how it is "meant for a wider audience than merely WeRelate"? Providing a transcript of a source with links to the appropriate WeRelate pages does not seem completely incompatible with this idea of a Source page. It is essentially a discussion of how this article pertains to the current contents of WeRelate. Some people seem to prefer spreading related information across a whole series of different pages, by this system or that. That is fine. I could live with the transcript in a separate article. But, spreading related information across multiple pages also increases the complexity of finding all the available information, or updating it all coherently, and so is not without its cost. --Jrich 23:03, 14 February 2011 (EST)

Perhaps I'm misunderstanding the issue here, but it seems to me that whether a transcript is or isn't a MySource or a Source Page item depends on all the factors described above and will, ultimately, be a judgement call that will have to be worked out with those that are jointly working on sources, families and persons, just as other content decisions are. Factors are size, convenience in updating, flexibility in formatting needed, efficiency in being able to stay "linked" to the correct person/page/source if their page name changes, and I'm sure other things as well.

In the case of a specific person's will or similar document, the transcript could be placed on the Person, Family or MySource page. Or it could be "linked" as a article to any of these pages. Or, it could be linked as an image file (a PDF or text .doc is now attachable using the image protocol).

In the case of a longer transcription of a source or sources, such as a book or a collection of wills/vital records, one could add the information to a source page directly, or link to an article, or link to an image file.

I've been entering tables of contents for some genealogical journals: I *think* they should be articles or on the source page or the source talk page, because the whole purpose to adding the list of contents is to allow a WeRelate search for a historical name or event to bring up this source in the results. But I'm also considering an image attachment for the document, just because the WeRelate pages start giving "you may be too long" messages after a certain file size. Either approach would work, and both have advantages and disadvantage.

I guess what I'm saying, similar to Jrich, is that I'm not sure there is a "right" or "wrong" answer to this. If someone objects to the format you've chosen, you can either agree to place the info in a different way, or make a compelling case for why your approach is more effective. I'd hate to see us spend lots of time having to set up rules for this kind of decision, because rules require an arbitrator(s) (and admin time) and jeez, it seems to me more content is a GOOD thing, not something to discourage. We should be so lucky as to have our servers overflowing with "extra" articles that have been created in order to add content to WeRelate!! --Brenda (kennebec1) 13:23, 15 February 2011 (EST)

Having looked at the Tuttle page, I think it is a perfect Article, and could also be on a Source page directly. I'm not sure I understand the argument that it should be a MySource, as it is clearly (and very nicely, by the way) linked to a great number of individuals and families. And, as Jrich says, it isn't a "source" or "mysource" by itself - it is a transcript, that has very useful WeRelate "people" links in it (and thus wouldn't work as an file attachment). I don't see what possible problem it could cause as an Article (except that you'll have to keep on top of the links to keep it active...)? --Brenda (kennebec1) 13:37, 15 February 2011 (EST)

This began with a discussion about the featured page this week, MySource:Jrm03063/Dennett, Helen Marion. Last Will and Testament (which was previously an article). It was my feeling that according to our guidelines at Portal:Article ("An article is a page that contains genealogical information not directly related to specific persons or families.") and Help:Person pages tutorial (MySources " can be used anytime you need a reusable source for a limited group of people. Examples would be for Interviews, Family Bibles, Transcripts of Wills or any other document which mentions multiple people.") that we needed to discuss it being a MySource instead. Then JRM brought up the point about other transcriptions and where they should be placed on WeRelate. --Jennifer (JBS66) 13:43, 15 February 2011 (EST)

It seems like transcripts are better on MySource's than articles. But maybe even better would be to create a Transcript namespace. We've been discussing the need for where to put documents/transcriptions for awhile but never came to a definite conclusion about it. Here are the issues to consider:

1. Some people have objected to putting transcriptions on MySource pages, saying that MySource pages should contain bibliographic info only. They've been asking for a separate namespace for documents/transcriptions. I don't see anything wrong with putting transcriptions on MySource's personally, but that's just me.
2. Some people believe that MySource pages give too much "ownership" to the author of the page, since the owner's name is part of the title. I believe that JRM's proposal that we adopt a convention of titling pages for "public" transcriptions as: MySource:WeRelate/whatever avoids this issue.

Since this isn't the first time this issue has come up, I'd like us to reach a decision on this issue soon. Thoughts?--Dallan 15:12, 16 February 2011 (EST)

If I post a will for William Jackson as a MySource, will it come up as a possible match when someone else uploads a GEDCOM using that same will as his source? If not, that seems to be an argument against using will transcriptions as a MYSource. Early wills will have a lot of folks using them as sources - not just the immediate family. If I post a transcription of a will it is not just for my use; I post it to benefit others who may want to read the whole thing and use it as a source when they can't see the original.

I think we may need to distinguish between

1. the *fact* of the will, which may only need to be cited on one person's page (the person who died) and is thus a MySource for citation purposes, meaning that somewhere, probably on a MySource page, but possibly in the text of the person's page, the specific name of the will and where it was found and where it can be found, etc. needs to be written out in order to document the source of the genealogical statement that has been made (i.e. William Jackson had a will, proved on such and such a date.
2. the *transcription* of the will. The will could be transcribed on the MySource page (which is probably best for a transcription of short document that represents a document with fairly limited scope/connection to other person or family pages). Or the will could be transcribed somewhere else in WeRelate, which would be especially useful if the will mentions numerous other persons on WeRelate and you want to set up links to those person pages in the document.

Meaning, the SOURCE for the will remains the MySource page (the documentation of the will). The TRANSCRIPTION of the will (its content) can be provided

• Directly on the MySource Page
• As some type of Article or new NameSpace
• Or as an image link on the person and/or the source page (images include text and PDF files).

The GEDCOM upload process matches SOURCES, I think. Thus if there is a source called "Wills of XXX County" where the Jackson will can be found, then it would behoove you to link your transcription of one particular will to that Source page in some way. Even then, someone else who is using that particular will would have to know what collection it can be found in, or they will probably make their own "MySource" page for their copy of the will.

BUT the Will for William Jackson will come up if someone searches for Surname:Jackson or "william Jackson" in the key word field, or in any number of other ways, and it will come up, I think, whether it is a MySource or an article or something else (as long as the search isn't limited to one particular namespace). --Brenda (kennebec1) 17:41, 16 February 2011 (EST)

Why shouldn't transcriptions be articles? The original Source page could link to the transcription. If a page is not a person, family, place, source or category, let it be an article. Too many other choices just make things complicated and the benefits of simplicity outweigh the arguments for more rules. IMHO! --Janiejac 16:11, 16 February 2011 (EST)

I'm wondering if we should broaden our definition of articles. The idea of adding another namespace seems awfully confusing. Also, at least for transcriptions of articles, these seem like community documents that should be editable by others (thus ruling out MySources). What is the background that caused WR to come to the decision that articles where only for non-person or family specific items? --Jennifer (JBS66) 16:20, 16 February 2011 (EST)

That works too. We could also allow anyone to edit MySource pages. We've talked about that in the past too. I think the reasoning behind saying that articles shouldn't be about individual people was to avoid having a lot of articles that were uninteresting to most people, which could drown out the more-interesting articles like research guides. But maybe we shouldn't worry about that.--Dallan 17:15, 16 February 2011 (EST)

I don't really like the MySource/WeRelate convention option, because it confuses the meaning of a MySource (i.e. a "personal" space for sources with limited community usefulness). To make WeRelate a generic MySource name is trying to be both public and private at the same time, and confuses the purpose of both things.

I agree with Jennifer and Janie that I'm not certain why transcripts of community resources (multi-person, multi-family) can't be articles, but I'd be fine with an additional namespace if that is preferred for some reason. The main disadvantage of leaving transcripts as articles is that articles are the only namespace *without* a leading indicator that describes the document to follow. A "Document" or "Transcription" name space allows for a distinction between original work/analysis and transcribed sources/documents.

I think we need to be careful in our discussion to distinguish between a WeRelate-based transcription (i.e. with links to persons and families built in) vs. a transcription available elsewhere (or even on a scanned document that is attached to a source page via an image link). The purpose of the solutions we are discussing is to accommodate the first option: content that is for the most part unique to WeRelate because it links to persons and families or other parts of WeRelate. Other types of transcriptions - created as a text file and linked to a source page or a person page, or a link to a website transcription of a book, include on a Source page in the text box or as a Repository, can be handled as they are now.

Moreover, we need to be sure we are clear about the difference, for WeRelate purposes, between the CITATION of a source (which may or may not be transcribed) via text on a person or family page, or via a Source or a MySource page, and a free-standing TRANSCRIPTION of a source, designed to provide alternate (WeRelate-linked) access to a source's content. Users still need a Source, a MySource, or a link in person or family page in order to document a particular genealogical fact. That's what generates a citation of some kind... But Users who are seeking to research related persons/families or search broadly for genealogical content relevant to their research area, would also benefit from access to (and the ability to edit and correct) WeRelate-based transcriptions of historical documents. --Brenda (kennebec1) 17:41, 16 February 2011 (EST)

Also, perhaps this discussion is not really so different from the MySource/Source guidance we provide; before posting a transcription of a document as an article (or whatever we call it), consider whether the document is of broad enough coverage (and long enough) to be a community resource, or whether it would be best transcribed as a part of the person/family page or the Source/MySource page. --Brenda (kennebec1) 17:47, 16 February 2011 (EST)

• I have my preferences about where transcripts go, but most of all I want to make sure we don't create convoluted rules about some transcripts going to one place, others going to another place, and so on. We need to PICK ONE.

• While transcripts could be articles, they are not original work - which is the sort of thing I would expect in article space.

• We could use "MySource" for transcripts. This has the advantage that they could be cited as usual, but some claim such citations would be improper. I disagree, since the transcript will obviously refer to the origin of the material, so no information is lost. On the other hand, there's no way to know that a single MySource page would be adequate or appropriate for a transcript. Transcripts have the potential to be very large. Pages and sub-pages may be appropriate.

• I prefer a transcript name space, where an appropriate source or mysource page refers to the page(s) associated with the transcription. "GENWEB", after all, exists mostly to serve up transcripts - and those transcripts don't have the opportunity to be easily reviewed and linked where appropriate. They certainly don't have a good way to refer to unique person or family specific pages. It is even possible that users may take advantage of WeRelate simply for the sake of the ability to host transcripts - if the requirements for doing so are simple enough.

--Jrm03063 20:39, 16 February 2011 (EST)

I've never really understood the extreme prejudice against MySources that I have encountered. They work! Why not use them? With the redesign, we no longer have the problem of them displaying the creator's user name in the citation. They are not "owned" by any one person. They can be used by anyone. They can be found in Search just as easily as articles.

I find them ideal for any type of source material that I want to share.

• Transcripts of documents such as deeds, wills, etc. (These keep the images, transcript and analysis in one place and can be linked as sources to all the people involved.
• An article which will be cited many times. (The fact that there is a source page for the Journal is irrevelant. You can point to it's source page in the text of the MySource. Using a MySource saves an incredible amount of retyping.)
• An extract of selected material from a larger source. (For example, a list of the Smith marriages for XYZ county.)

If other people prefer to use an article, I really don't care. It's just more awkward in that it doesn't work like a source. I really do not like the idea of creating a new namespace for Documents. It wouldn't add anything except confusion and lead to more debates about who is using the wrong namespace for a particular item. It would be nice, but isn't essential to have a field in the MySource to hold the link to the Source page just to standardize the presentation. It would then make it easier to find all of the MySources that have been created with material from a particular source. Judy (jlanoux) 22:19, 16 February 2011 (EST)

I certainly agree that MySource is more suited than article. I think MySource suffers from being the holding-pen for dubious stuff uploaded via GEDCOM as well as the implications of the prefix "My". I prefer transcript because I'm not convinced that MySource is the best way to manage all sorts of transcripts, and I don't want to create ambiguous guidance about where transcripts go. I also like the idea of a transcript space because I think there's a potential user community for that feature on its own. If buried in MySource, I don't think that feature will be seen to stand alone as well as it might. --Jrm03063 11:48, 17 February 2011 (EST)

I think this discussion is developing two or three separate threads which is making it hard to follow. Some of the answers seem to address just one of the threads, but it is hard to tell if that, or if they are giving a less common answer to the other threads.

The original question was, should complete transcripts of items that are cited as Sources (like the Tuttle article from NEHGR), be MySources. The source page must remain so people can cite this article. So it doesn't seem to make much sense to (1) also create a MySource page simply to hold the transcript, and (2) put it in a MySource page belonging to one user when anybody can access the original and correct or otherwise enhance the transcript. Another possible answer would be to post it on a Person or Family page, but this wouldn't work when it pertains significantly to multiple people. Another possible answer is to post the transcript on the source page, but this wouldn't work if the transcript is really long, or if it is not a transcript of the complete source. Another possible answer, which may not be efficient or simple for small transcripts, but will always be functional, is to post it in a separate article, or series of articles.

A second question was about the Will that started this whole discussion, but was not mentioned until later in the discussion. The details of this example were not explored much in this discussion, but if somebody holds a paper will, that seems to clearly require the creation of a MySource to cite and I didn't think there was much disagreement about that? (Hopefully the MySource page would discuss how the will came into the person's possession, was it recorded or superseded by another will, and other such provenance type issues.) It has been the practice to post transcripts of such items right on the MySource page, but as in the above paragraph, this could cause problems when the transcript is really too long for a single page.

However, if the will is taken from a citable source, like a FHL film of the probate office's books, then I would assume it is another instance of case #1. Now since a FHL film would probably hold many wills, and the transcript of just one will is not a complete transcript of the cited source, in this case it wouldn't seem appropriate to put the transcription on the source page. In that case, it seems it should either go on the Person page directly, citing the source page, or in an Article listing the Source page as the place where the transcription was based on or taken from, based on criteria mentioned above (pertaining to multiple people and length).

It is obvious there are many different preferences about the best organization. The question is whether this problem is helped by insisting on one organization in all cases (which would probably end up requiring use of an article, because that seems to be the only answer that is functional in every imaginable case), or whether we may relay on common sense (which isn't always so common) to choose the best of the many approaches, and hope that most of the time things are done reasonably. (I consider creating a new namespace just an elaboration of the article idea, and don't see any value in it unless transcripts are to be protected or handled differently than plain articles by the software)

The will example seems to have spawned a third thread to this discussion, about the prejudice against MySources. Certainly there are some valid, even critically important, uses of MySources. But the prejudice is natural because in practice, the most numerous use of MySources is to hold GEDCOM sources that never got converted to Sources, giving the impression MySources are simply improperly or incompletely cited sources (i.e., poor bookkeeping by a lazy researcher). And unfortunately, even in valid cases, MySources have some connotation of being unverifiable, and of unknown provenance. What access there may be would only be available while the user remains active with WeRelate and is willing to share/cooperate. If a person even bothers to look at the MySource page, they will undoubtedly be reassured by a discussion of the item's provenance, images of the item, etc. But there are so few MySources that fall into this category, one stops even looking? --Jrich 14:56, 17 February 2011 (EST)

Thank you; this is a very useful analysis of the problem created by the merging of these discussions. I vote for trusting common sense for now, until and unless a larger problem evolves. As I have noted elsewhere, we should be so lucky as to have enough user-created content like transcripts in ANY namespace... Although wikis are not without rules and structures, necessary when large groups of people must figure out how to work together, I don't think this is a case where a new structure for all possible cases (i.e. a transcript namespace) is necessary. There is a wide range of things that fall into the category "transcript," and I think most of them can be easily handled by our existing structures. --Brenda (kennebec1) 18:05, 17 February 2011 (EST)

I agree with Brenda. There are so many permutations of what could be considered a transcript -- and how many ways it could be presented -- that I think having a new namespace would only confuse the issue. I would like to see transcripts go in MySource or even Image (if it is connected to one). Articles, as mentioned earlier, would be better served staying as things of original creation. That's not to say that someone couldn't have a great write-up about a particular document -- explaining the origin, why it's important, how to get the most use out of it, etc -- and include a transcript. That, in my mind, could be a good use of the Article namespace. But for your average, run of the mill document transcript, MySource should suffice. -- Amy (Ajcrow) 08:24, 18 February 2011 (EST)

If we want to use MySources for this purpose, should we make that namespace editable by all? I'm thinking of cases like JRM mentioned where it is a transcript of an article, or other source more widely available then a will. If these go in the MySource space, only the original contributor can edit the document, which doesn't allow for easy collaboration. --Jennifer (JBS66) 08:31, 18 February 2011 (EST)

I don't see a problem with opening up MySources for collaboration. If an edit war were to break out, it could be locked down like any other page. -- Amy (Ajcrow) 08:38, 18 February 2011 (EST)

---

I'm glad we're at least starting to think in terms of a single place for transcripts, but I think we're still thinking too small. There are complete transcriptions of Savage out there - someone might want to take one of those and start hyperlinking it. While that would be an epic undertaking, it's the sort of thing that WeRelate is well suited to doing. A single page of any of the standard types just isn't going to be adequate. I think that pushes us to either a new Transcript space or article (probably with sub-pages in both cases).

I agree that, as an initial technical matter, "Transcript" would be little more than article by another name. So why go to the trouble? Several reasons:

• Transcript creation is a "product" unto itself. Think "GENWEB". There may very well be user communities that want to share creation of transcripts even if they don't care to work on a common tree. Providing a custom transcript creation wizard would be more friendly than just telling them to knock themselves out in the article space.
• Transcripts, as a body/partition of the WeRelate space, are an opportunity for WeRelate to partner with another organization who might support WeRelate in return for the ability to serve/host transcripts.
• Transcripts may develop their own features and tags over time - if they are intermingled with pages of any other sort - it becomes prohibitively difficult to tease them out for separate treatment.

I really think there's an important opportunity here - transcripts that cite WeRelate are a great way to get people coming to WeRelate. --Jrm03063 10:20, 18 February 2011 (EST)

I do agree with Jrm03063 that a significant advantage to a separate namespace is the marketability of it - there are people who are source-oriented (like I am) who spend inordinate amounts of time placing out-of-copyright genealogy works on the web as transcriptions/edited scans. WeRelate allows the addition of genealogy links to that content, a really interesting way to provide vastly enhanced content over the original work and any other transcription venue.

But in WeRelate's current size, we don't seem to have sufficient consensus that transcripts will or should need their own space.

Regarding the MySources proposal: on a practical level, can someone tell me how to tie to together (or if it matters) the SOURCE page for an item like MySource:WeRelate/Tuttle, Charles W. The Tuttle Family of New Hampshire to Source:Tuttle, Charles W. Tuttle Family of New Hampshire? User:Jrm03063 has used the respository link and the text box to make the connection to the MySource page on the source page, and the first line of the MySource page has the link back to the Source page? Is this what is envisioned and will this work? On the actual person page, does it matter if a fact is cited to the Source or the MySource?

I think if MySources are opened up for community editing, that might solve the problem of the need to for wiki-wide responsibility for a transcript. My main objection is that I don't like the idea of confusing MySpace with public space - it offends my sense of common English.

Would we use the WeRelate user proposed by User:Jrm03063? Does a MySource have to have a user name attached to it?

I recognize the desire to distinguish between articles and transcripts in some way, but I do think that's a distinction with little significance today, at least, when we need more of both to be a lively and dynamic genealogy site. I also see that a transcript is more like a source (i.e. it can be cited) than an article might be. So I can live with the MySource solution in most cases.

Based on the above discussion, can we live with an "In general" rule that states

• Brief transcripts may be integrated directly into the relevant Person, Family, Source or MySource page
• if a transcript is too large or too widely significant, or just desired to be kept separate from the relevant Person, Family, or Source page, it may be either

1. Added to the MySource namespace and linked to the relevant pages (which enables Person and Family links to the content of the transcription)
2. Added as an image file to the relevant pages

• A transcript can also be acceptably integrated into an Article (namespace) when the transcriber is adding additional content about a particular document -- explaining the origin, why it's important, how to get the most use out of it, providing analysis, comparison with other sources, etc.

We might consider whether use of the word Transcript or some other code should be suggested to be intergrated into the page name so that if we later decide to create a Transcript namespace it is easy to extract these items. --Brenda (kennebec1) 11:23, 18 February 2011 (EST)

Why should an item in the article space be limited to that containing original work? --Jennifer (JBS66) 11:35, 18 February 2011 (EST)

Before I offer yet more opinions - thanks to everyone for contributing and helping move this along to some sort of conclusion.

• There's no technical reason why an article should be limited to items that are original work, however...
• A transcript space might be well served by copyright information such as that currently available for images
• The term article is rather more suggestive of original work than a copy.
• I'm not averse to a psuedo namespace, though I expect that a quick "TRANSCRIPT" name space - with nothing but the features of the current article space would be easy enough to create that there's no point in doing this.
• I agree that we don't have a lot of transcripts as yet, but I am optimistic!
• Images are fine for dealing with PDF and similar information - but that's not really addressing the ability to do a long transcript within the framework of WeRelate. The point of a transcript very often is the ability to link to people and family pages in the WeRelate space.
• I agree that transcript fragments can be incorporated anywhere that it makes sense - but my experience has been that the fragments tend to grow and I'm often caught between wanting a longer transcript and not wanting to put too much on the page for a particular person or family or whatever. Having a separate transcript page lets me tighten up pages that reference the transcript while still letting the overall transcript be presented completely.
• In the case of the Tuttle article, I've created citations that BOTH point at the source page AND point at an anchor in the transcript (see "Transcript" in the citation on page for Person:George Meserve (2)). If I was not referring to a particular section of the transcript, I would be happy with simply pointing at the source, and having the source point at the werelate transcript as an instance on the WeRelate repository.
• I agree that "MySource:WeRelate/<item>" is a byzantine way of saying "mysource....not so much!" - but something like that is needed if MySource becomes the choice for hosting transcripts generally. For example: MySource:WeRelate/Tuttle, Joseph S. Family Bible Entries. While the content is very interesting to me, I obtained it from the public domain. The same content was originally created (and remains) at SourceTranscript; Tuttle, Joseph Sherburne. Family Bible Entries and pointed at by Source:Tuttle, Joseph Sherburne. Family Bible Entries.

--Jrm03063 13:26, 18 February 2011 (EST)

My preference would be to put documents that have wider appeal in the Main/Article namespace. I think that we need to extend our definition of the term "article". This is just a term that came with the MediaWiki software that runs not only WR, but all of the Wikipedia sites. If we look at a site like WikiSource, they have some nice examples of articles, books, etc that are transcribed and placed into a main namespace. One such is the 1922 Encyclopædia Britannica with subpages for each topic. We may need to work on some titling guidelines to avoid duplication.

We could add copyright templates such as those in use at WikiSource.--Jennifer (JBS66) 14:53, 18 February 2011 (EST)

After reading through the above I have a couple of observations and a proposal. First, I don't think we have enough consensus to say that transcripts can only be entered a certain way. There seem to be good reasons for various approaches. Also, although I think that having a separate Transcript namespace would be a good way to go long-term, I agree that we can put that off. We have more pressing things to implement right now.

Here's what I think I'm hearing based upon the discussion above - that we allow people to use common sense for where to post the transcript using the following guidelines:

If the transcript is short, post it directly to the Person/Family page

If the transcript is in a Word, Excel, or PDF file and you don't want to re-type it, upload it just like you would upload an image; and link to it using a [[Media: link instead of an [[Image: link

If you just want a quick way to post the transcript as wiki text, post it in the text of a MySource page

If you think others would also be interested in this transcript and you are willing to put in a little extra time to make it useful to them, post it as an Article. If you do this, we ask that you do the following:

• add a link to the Source page that this transcript comes from
• add links to the Person pages of people mentioned in the transcript
• add notes (if you have them) about the origin, importance, and use of the information in the transcript
• add [[Category:Transcript]] to the bottom of the article

The reason that I don't mention posting the transcript to a Source page is I assume that Source's are generally too large to be transcribed, and that if someone did transcribe one, they'd want to post the transcription as an article or series of articles.

Having the Transcript category at the bottom of the page allows us to identify transcript-articles and move them to a Transcript namespace if we decide to go down that route in the future.

Does this generally satisfy the points mentioned in the above discussion? If we go with this approach, do we want to allow MySource pages to have sub-pages? Do we want to make all MySource pages to be publicly editable?--Dallan 16:27, 19 February 2011 (EST)

When I refer to a transcript, I mean a semi-complete item. Either an entire section, an entire work, an entire will, etc. Absent a transcript name space, I would be inclined to always create these as articles following the guidance above. Perhaps a few interested parties should work this as a project, see if a template or two make sense for tagging these and whether there are different types of transcripts that really need different treatment and so on.

With respect to the question of Source versus MySource - everything seems like an artificial effort to carve out a purpose for the namespace. I would rather create genuine source pages in all cases, and leave MySource solely in the historical role of a source upload limbo. --Jrm03063 12:32, 20 February 2011 (EST)

If you think that creating a transcript namespace is something that may be implemented in the future - why put it off? If we did this now, it would involve creating a namespace - in the future it will also involve moving articles, re-doing help pages, etc.

Regarding opening up MySources, they may already be open to edits based upon this recent edit. --Jennifer (JBS66) 08:37, 20 February 2011 (EST)

Typical example of MySource in real life.

According to books.google.com, there is Durbin-Logsdon genealogy; and related families from Maryland to Kentucky, publ. 1993, by Betty Jewell Durbin Carson, and Durbin-Logsdon Genealogy with Related Families, 1626-1998, publ. 1998, by the same author. The second books is shown with about twice as many pages as the first, so represents a significant expansion of the first. There is no way to tell from the citation which version is being cited, but one might be disappointed to go to their library, look up page 54-55, and not find Ann Logsdon covered (she being the only Person who links to this source) because their library has the wrong version.

Of course, if one happened to recognize that "Pamona, California" is really Pomona, California, one can go to that library's website, and one finds that they have the 1991 edition.

Yep, 1991. There are actually more editions, not listed on books.google.com, namely a 1991 and 1994 edition. According to the FHL catalog, Source:Carson, Betty Jewell Durbin. Durbin and Logsdon Genealogy is a CD version of the 1994 book that is available on computer in Salt Lake City, Source:Carson, Betty Jewell Durbin. Durbin and Logsdon Genealogy : With Related Families, 1626-1991 a 1991 version of the book, and Source:Carson, Betty Jewell Durbin. Durbin and Logsdon Genealogy : With Related Families, 1626-1994 is the book the CD was based on.

One of the problems with MySources is that since somebody is citing their source in vacuo, not only are they doing things different, but they lose the opportunity to discover there is a newer edition of the book they are using.

I believe the Pomona library is listed because the user in question happened to use the book there, and is documenting that fact, which is great on their home system. Of course, this is probably not where the creator of the page used the book. And if someone was interested in helping another user locate a convenient copy, they wouldn't name one library, but direct someone to worldcat.org. --Jrich 10:02, 20 February 2011 (EST)

Here's a MySource that somebody renamed to remove their user name from the page title: MySource:New England Historical and Genealogical Register: A New Look at the Corwin and Shatswell Families, Volume: Vol 150. One must assume they didn't consider this source unique to themselves (I agree), but why not create a Source, or use an existing one? (I.e., Source:New England Historical and Genealogical Register, with Macdonald, David A. "A New Look at the Corwin and Shatswell Families" in the record field.) It seems like creating editable MySources is (or does) essentially make them the same as Sources. If the Source and MySource spaces aren't going to be handled differently, why have both? As long as MySources are effectively a way to avoid the formality of Sources, and do whatever somebody wants, there will continue to be prejudice against them. --Jrich 11:17, 20 February 2011 (EST)

A published paper in NEHGR rates a source - Tuttle above is just such an example. The efforts to re-purpose MySource really seem very forced to me. I'm not even sure that it makes sense for a source where the creator has unique access. For example, the will that is this week's featured page is in my custody, but I've provided good readable scans. What else is there really to know? A follow on researcher could go to the county and get whatever was really filed. I've also got interview transcripts which obviously exist no where else, but I have provided good scans there as well. --Jrm03063 12:12, 20 February 2011 (EST)

Wow, you're right - MySource's have been publicly editable for awhile now and nobody has complained or noticed. So let's keep them publicly editable.

Regarding posting transcripts as sources, my reasoning against this has been my assumption that transcripts would usually be things like individual wills, which we wouldn't want to create Source pages for since they apply to just a handful of people. I know it's a fuzzy line. I just don't want lots of Source pages showing up containing transcripts that are of interest to only to a handful of people.

I'm not against creating a separate Transcript namespace and encouraging people to post their transcripts in that namespace. The Transcript page could have a "Source" field where you would enter the title of the Source page that the transcript was found in. In that respect having a Transcript namespace would be nicer than using the Article namespace, since the Transcript namespace format would include a field for entering the Source page title.

I assume people would still use a Source or a MySource for the bibliographic information -- the book/film where they found the will for example? I agree with Jrich that the "New England Historical and Genealogical Register" example ought to be a Source with Macdonald... in the record field. If we had a separate Transcript namespace, we could tell people to put the title of their transcript page in the record field of their citation and we'd link to it.

I'm also not against people putting transcripts in MySource pages. It's quicker than creating and linking to a separate page if you're already using a MySource. So if we created a separate Transcript namespace, I'd propose that we alter the above instructions to say that you could use a MySource if you were so inclined, but that we encourage you to use Transcripts (and not articles) especially for items that you wanted to link to Source pages.

How about that?--Dallan 14:46, 21 February 2011 (EST)

I like this proposal, Dallan. -- Amy (Ajcrow) 15:08, 21 February 2011 (EST)

I like the idea of transcripts with links to WeRelate pages. There is one case of a death date estimate being based on a deed where the land is bounded by the heirs of so and so. Researchers of so and so normally wouldn't look at that deed since he was not a grantee or grantor.

Lots of info lurking about in some of those old documents - witnesses for example.--Jrm03063 16:32, 21 February 2011 (EST)

I wonder if the transcript could be accessed using a link from the source page. This would help leverage source naming conventions and avoid multiple transcripts of the same source. It just seems like it would add some management for nearly no operational cost.

Why not? Isn't it just another copy of the source? Why wouldn't you put it in the table of available copies - indicating "WeRelate" as the repository?--Jrm03063 16:32, 21 February 2011 (EST)

Also, most multi-page transcripts are probably want to have tables of contents pointing to multiple pages, perhaps create their own category, or other ways to tie them together for easy finding and navigation. Wonder if some of these features could be built-in (subclassed form category so to speak)?

--Jrich 15:53, 21 February 2011 (EST)

I would think that large scale transcripts would be done as a hierarchy of a page for the overall series/table of contents and an appropriate set of sub-pages - perhaps volume, chapter, section, etc? --Jrm03063 16:32, 21 February 2011 (EST)

I would be thrilled to see a transcript name space. I would not be inclined to use MySource to host a transcript, though I don't have a problem with it. The normal evolution of a transcript might be person/family -> mysource -> mysource + transcript.

The question of use of source/mysource-user/mysource-werelate remains a separate one. If we're going to use MySource as the bibliographic tag for all wills, then it seems absolutely necessary to pay attention to the MySource/User and MySource/WeRelate issue. As observed above, it's all sort of legal already. I'm pretty sure you can rename a mysource to any user string you want. --Jrm03063 16:32, 21 February 2011 (EST)

I've been following this discussion with interest for the past week, waiting to see if anything popped up that I (strongly) disagreed with. Nothing has -- which may be a "first". I've been doing, I think, pretty much what ya'll are saying we ought to be doing:

I'm putting short transcriptions involving not too many people (wills, deeds) right on the Person page of the person most centrally involved, often with embedded links to the other people mentioned.

If it's a long source with lots of names and no "central person" (like the Texas Revolution militia muster rolls I've begun uploading), it goes in a MySource with the full transcript -- and then I add links to the people listed as I get pages made for them. And I try to remember to include a note in the little text box that appears with the MySource citation, to the effect that there's a transcript available if you "click here" and go and look at it.

The only thing I'm putting in Articles is (a) reference materials and associated information & discussion (like the list of dates and requirements to qualify for the various classes of Texas Republic headrights, which can tell you when a person arrived), or (b) explanations of projects (the Louisiana First Families project), or (c) explanations of brick-wall problems and suchlike (partly as an exercise in research and evidence interpretation, partly in hopes some reader will actually have a suggestion to make). In other words, I only put things in an Article that are never going to want to be cited to on a Person page.

I have no object, per se, to a Transcripts namespace. We have so many namespaces now, I don't think one more makes a difference, and I can see the logic to it. The only thing I might raise an eyebrow at might be the necessity of citing a MySource which itself would have to cite (by linking to) a Transcript. That seems like an unnecessary additional layer. (Or maybe I'm not visualizing a "Transcript" page the same way everyone else is.)

Also, pending the eventual creation of a Transcript namespace (there's no need to rush it), I think a Transcripts category is a good idea -- to provide a set of pointers that can then be easily gathered up and auto-processed when the shape of things to come reaches fruition. --Mike^Talk 17:22, 21 February 2011 (EST)

We could come up with a convention for titling transcript pages, something like "source page title, record name if you're transcribing only one record out of a collection"; e.g., Transcript:Hopkins, Kentucky, United States. Wills, John Doe. This would reduce naming conflicts, but the titles would get kind of long. At the other end of the spectrum we could not have any titling convention and let people title transcripts however they want, like we do with Images currently. Between these two endpoints we could say something like "document-type of person name, birth year"; e.g., Will of John Doe, 1850. I don't have a strong preference.

Let's talk about how a transcript page might be cited on a Person page. I can think two options:

1. You would link to a Source/MySource for the bibliographic information as usual. If you linked to a Source (say a collection of wills), then you would enter the Transcript page title in the "record name" field so the citation linked to your transcription. If you entered a MySource and the MySource page linked to the transcript, you could omit entering the transcript title in the citation.
2. In the "Source namespace" field I could add "Transcript" as a third item in the drop-down (in addition to Source and MySource). You could select "Transcript" from the drop-down and enter your transcript title. The Transcript page would have a Source/MySource field that would link to a Source or a MySource, and the bibliographic information displayed on the Person page would come from that Source/MySource. As an option, I could add a "citation" field on the Transcript page, and if you filled in that field, that citation would be displayed on the Person page instead of generating a citation from the Source/MySource.

--Dallan 18:19, 22 February 2011 (EST)

I really like JRM's idea that a transcript should be a repository. You still cite the Source page. If you go to the source page to find out about the source, you find out there is a transcript right on WeRelate. That seems to me to be the proper relationship. You don't cite the transcript, it is a facsimile, not the real thing. --Jrich 22:11, 22 February 2011 (EST)

I certainly think that a transcript and it's associated source should reference each other. For the source/mysource, the transcript is perfectly reasonable as an instance of the source with WeRelate as the repository. For the transcript - being a wholly new sort of thing - a tag would have to be invented. Still, it would be sort of nice if they were done as one of those semi-smart mutually referential links such as that used to stitch together families and people.

If the Transcript page linked to the Source page, then you could see the transcripts for the Source by clicking on the "what links here" link. In the case where the transcript contains the entire source, I could see adding a link from the Source page to the Transcript page. But when the source may have multiple transcripts associated with it, such as a book of wills, I think using the "what links here" functionality would be best. For that reason I wouldn't want to automatically add links from the Source pages back to the transcript pages - let people do this manually if they have a complete transcription.

I would claim that every transcript (even large collections) - should have a single top-level or root page. If the transcript fits on one page, that's it. If the transcript is much more involved, such that it requires multiple pages to represent, then the collection of pages is created as a hierarchy of sub-pages beneath the root/base page (see the example of Savage in the proposal document). So you would always have, at most, a one to one correspondence between transcripts and an associated source/mysource.

There is a weird situation that is perhaps not obviously handled by the tree representation. What if a particular will is both a MySource, and the transcription of the will is part of both the MySource for the particular will and is also an element of a collection (which itself has a transcript). We wouldn't want to duplicate the will transcription. Neither would we want to create a template that would be included by both. In that situation, I would expect that one of the two locations would be selected to host the content (presumably the MySource attached transcript) and the secondary collection transcript would reference the MySource-attached transcript instead of a sub-page of the collection. --Jrm03063 19:12, 23 February 2011 (EST)

The case that I'm trying to cover is when I transcribe an individual will for my particular ancestor from a source that is a collection of many wills, as in the wills Source page mentioned above. Over time many different people will transcribe wills pertaining to their specific ancestors. Since the transcribers won't be working together (they may not even be aware of one another), the Transcript pages won't all appear under a common root/base page. We could force them to, but this seems like a lot of extra work.

If on the other hand we're thinking that transcripts for individual wills (i.e., transcripts that do not cover the entire source) should be on MySource pages, and that Transcript pages should be reserved for complete transcriptions of a Source, then maybe we should allow people to create transcripts as sub-pages of the corresponding Source page, and let people reference the sub-page in their citation? That would certainly simplify things.--Dallan 19:27, 23 February 2011 (EST)

My feeling is that if we're going to have a space called "Transcript" we need to open it to all transcripts, regardless of whether they are for an individual will or larger source. Do we really want to monitor this space and make decisions as to if a particular transcript qualifies as a "transcript" or not? --Jennifer (JBS66) 19:39, 23 February 2011 (EST)

I think I've addressed this. Please look at what I wrote in the proposal document about naming conventions Proposal for Transcript Management#Naming Conventions. I'm for all sorts of transcripts - small, huge, partial, etc., etc. - and I don't see why that all can't be handled nicely. --Jrm03063 20:03, 23 February 2011 (EST)

I think transcripts have a place in citations - especially if they have useful HTML anchors that you can point at to get someone quickly to the right place. For example, the first citation in Person:John Tuttle (12) uses both the source and a bit of wiki syntax that points at an anchor in the transcript (see "Transcript"). I'm not sure if there's an advantage to putting in both the source/mysource and transcript page plus anchor - or if it's just as valid to put in the transcript and anchor and presume that implies the corresponding source/mysource. Use of the latter form as offered by Dallan may be a little simpler for users, but I wonder if it implies less useful information in an exported GEDCOM.

Good point. The content of the Transcript page probably wouldn't be included in a gedcom export. What I'd have to do is turn the link from the citation to the Transcript page into an export of the Source referenced by the transcript, plus a link to the Transcript page inserted into the citation text. So we could go the transcript+anchor route and still get the bibliographic fields from the source. Or we could ask people to reference both the Source and the Transcript pages in the citation. Both are technically do-able.

Allowing people to link to just the Transcript page in the citation and picking up the bibliographic information from the Source referenced by the Transcript will mean that users need to enter the source title just once: on the Transcript page, instead of twice: on the Transcript page and again in the citation.--Dallan 18:34, 23 February 2011 (EST)

I like the convenience of being able to point at the transcript and having the originating source/mysource information be "found". For the example of a complex transcription (various pages and sub-pages), this might require a level of indirection. If a sub-page of a transcript were pointed at, the URL could be truncated back to the base/root page of the transcription. From there, the single source/mysource page could be found. --Jrm03063 19:12, 23 February 2011 (EST)

Transcript Help [17 September 2011]

Maybe I missed it, but is there a Help page for the Transcript namespace like there is for Person? Point me in the right direction, because it would be pertinent to add that if the transcript text is surrounded by <onlyinclude></onlyinclude> tags, then that text can be transcluded wherever one wants it. (see What links here on Transcript:Mexico Independent/Lewis Probate Notice 24 Dec 1879--Obstinatesnooper 11:38, 17 September 2011 (EDT)

No such page(s). I'm starting one, but it's morbidly thin. Feel free to flesh it out, add a portal or video, create a theme song, etc... --jrm03063 13:25, 17 September 2011 (EDT)

Two options [10 March 2011]

It seems like it boils down to one of two options:

1. Create a separate Transcript namespace, and encourage everyone to put all transcripts, from individual wills to entire documents, on this namespace. I can see the value of if we're going to have a separate Transcription namespace, that we encourage people to put transcriptions of any kind in this namespace. We have a page titling convention for this namespace as described in Proposal for Transcript Management#Naming Conventions.
2. Tell people to add transcripts to MySource or Source pages. Small transcripts could be placed directly on the MySource/Source page. Large transcripts could be created as sub-pages. The guideline for Source vs. MySource would be: If the transcript is of interest primarily to yourself (e.g., a single will) then put it on a MySource. If you think the transcript would be of community interest, (e.g., an effort to transcribe an entire book, even if you've only transcribed a few pages of it) then put it on a Source. If you referenced a sub-page of a Source or MySource in a citation, we'd display the citation information from the main page, but link to the sub-page. If source searches get overloaded with transcripts, I'll add a checkbox to omit sub-pages from search results.

The second option seems a bit simpler. We could promote the idea of people transcribing sources by adding a "Transcriptions" link to the left-hand menu of a Source page, which would list the existing transcription sub-pages for the Source and give people a box to create a new transcription sub-page. The list would include instructions to place small transcriptions directly on the Source page, and to place transcriptions of interest primarily to yourself on a MySource.

Thoughts?--Dallan 12:12, 28 February 2011 (EST)

I just don't like mixing of transcript and bibliographic content as suggested by option two. There's no objective way to know what is transcript and what is bibliography - even if you happen to know that a source has an associated transcript. As it is, we havn't even solidified how to organize and use Source/MySource pages consisting only of Bibliographic information - mixing in content would complicate matters.

Still, rather than simply requesting the first option, a hybrid approach might serve.

Whatever choice we make, we're on the hook to start using sub-pages to organize large transcripts anyway - why not make all transcripts simply be subpages of their associated Source/MySource? Source and MySource pages would continue to serve for bibliographic and about/how-to content for the source. A transcript, if any, would be rooted in a sub-page below that. Moreover, the first/top-level transcript page would always be called "transcript" (so the relationship between a transcript and its source would be explicit in the name - starting from either side). If the entire transcript fits on that single page - that's where it can go. If the transcript is extensive enough to require being split into subpages - or even a tree of subpages - then the "transcript" page is simply the root page of that organization - referring to the pages at the next level of detail. So a will's transcript (where a single page of transcription is sufficient) would be found in "MySource:user/Lname, Fname. Will/transcript" or "MySource:WeRelate/Lname, Fname. Will/transcript". If the transcript is more epic, then a tree of transcript pages can be organized, such as that described in Proposal for Transcript Management#Naming Conventions, but with the tree rooted on the source/mysource "transcript" sub-page. For example, see Source:Savage, James. Genealogical Dictionary of the First Settlers of New England/Transcript/Volume 4/turney-tyrrell. Of nearly equal importance, the ability to jump to HTML anchors in the citation, such as that used for the Savage citation in Person:John Tuttle (12), which is Tuttle, John of Dover --Jrm03063 10:07, 1 March 2011 (EST)

In my opinion, the method that is easiest for users would be option #1. Option #2 concerns me because I think that will cause merging complications. We have many duplicate sources now, and some duplicates are still being created that need to be merged. I don't like the thought of having to worry about potential subpages as well. --Jennifer (JBS66) 07:00, 2 March 2011 (EST)

I prefer #1 too because I really feel like a transcript is a different sort of thing, and always making use of sub-pages is a trifle obscure (for the common simple things like wills and short papers). Sub-pages of a source/mysource also throw up the same standard content menu that you see for the corresponding source/mysource - which presumably isn't what we want for a transcript (though perhaps that can be disabled). I'm not sure I follow the merging complications argument though. The transcript is going to be fundamentally attached to the source/mysource by use of a common name, or name prefix, for all the ideas in play (1, 2, and the 1-2 hybrid). Aren't they all subject to that problem approximately equally? --Jrm03063 18:38, 2 March 2011 (EST)

Well, I played around a bit in the sandbox... say you have Source A and Source B/subpage. Source B is a duplicate and inaccurate title for Source A, but a user didn't know that and created a subpage anyway. When I am on the Source B page, I don't see that there are subpages, so I put the #REDIRECT on it to redirect it to Source A. That part works, but then Source B/subpage doesn't get redirected in the process. Our Source space is still pretty messy, with a lot of duplicates, I just thought that putting the transcripts here (in the form of subpages) adds to the confusion.

I still wonder why we aren't considering the Article namespace for this. One of the arguments against it was because putting them in their own Transcript namespace would add functionality that doesn't exist elsewhere. However, if we're even considering Option #2, then do we really need that functionality? --Jennifer (JBS66) 06:08, 3 March 2011 (EST)

I think there's a notion that a transcript will fundamentally be associated with one, and only one, source or mysource page. That isn't true for article pages in general. I think Dallan is looking for a way to concretely find his way from a particular transcription page to the corresponding source/mysource. --Jrm03063 11:24, 3 March 2011 (EST)

Ok, it sounds like we'll create a separate Transcript namespace. Making a separate namespace isn't that difficult, and it will allow me to add a "source/MySource" field at the top of every Transcript page, which should point to the corresponding Source/MySource. I'll do this sometime next week.--Dallan 17:56, 10 March 2011 (EST)

Cool. I'm interested in starting a Savage transcription project. It would have to be able to handle lots of additions over time as well as sub-page structure. ASCII transcriptions seem to be easy to get - but I want to start systematically hyperlinking that stuff in a consolidated way - instead of scattering bits and pieces of it all over the place. --Jrm03063 21:30, 10 March 2011 (EST)

How do we like our shiny new transcript functionality? [3 August 2011]

My standard example transcript has now been converted:

• The Source Page: Tuttle, Charles W. Tuttle Family of New Hampshire
• The Transcript: Tuttle, Charles W. Tuttle Family of New Hampshire

Is there supposed to be some clever interaction between these pages? Or are we just declaring that consistent names are a convention?

I also made use of headers/HTML anchors to provide very specific citations into the transcript. See the Transcript link in the following examples:

• Person:Joshua Roberts (1)
• Person:John Tuttle (12)
• Person:Sarah Tuttle (6)

Do we want to provide more explicit support for doing this sort of thing? Or is the method I used adequate to the task?

Finally, I don't exactly recall where/how we left it for MySource items.

• Are their transcripts meant to be hosted by this as well?
• Are they elevated to full scale sources if they have a full scale transcript?

--Jrm03063 17:58, 18 April 2011 (EDT)

I'm glad you're trying it out! There are still two improvements I want to make, hopefully later this week or next week:

• On the Add page screen, you'll see two fields: one for entering a source, which will have an auto-complete drop-down, and another for entering a "record name" or "section" in case your page is not a complete transcription. If you enter something in this field, the system will title the page Transcript:source name/section.
• On the person/family page, I'm going to add "Transcript" to the Source/MySource menu in the citation field. Then you'll be able to cite the transcript, and the source citation information will be picked up from the source cited in the transcript. That way you won't need to cite the transcript and source separately.

I'm thinking that consistent names are just a convention, but it should be helped with the source field on the Add Transcript Page screen.

I honestly don't remember either about where we left it for MySource items. If someone creates a Transcript page I don't think it makes sense for it to link the Transcript to a MySource. So either we say that transcripts for personal sources stay on MySource pages, or we elevate them to full-scale sources. Not sure.--Dallan 16:31, 19 April 2011 (EDT)

I like the idea of being able to reference the transcript as - effectively - an alias on the source. It would be nice if transcripts also had a field to drop in an HTML anchor value that can provide a more specific destination for a transcript link. It's easy to put anchors into a transcript but the syntax to put an active link in a source record is sort of annoying (as I think my examples above show). --Jrm03063 19:38, 19 April 2011 (EDT)

Since the transcript field will essentially be the title of the transcript page, how about if you enter the #anchor right in the transcript field after the transcript title?

Sure - so long as the formatted result still shows a separate link to the source page and the trancript.

I have a transcript/notes page that I added before knowing about this issue (even though the issue and decision existed before I created the page yesterday). How do I move the page in a way that all fields will be filled? The source page is for Rensselaer Co. NY's Surrogate Court Records 1786-1917. The transcript/notes is for Daniel Sackett, 1845 (and also includes his probate transcript, which was not obtained through the source), which is currently in the Article space. Thanks, Obstinatesnooper 14:50, 31 July 2011 (EDT)

I'm sorry, you'll need to create a Transcript page and then copy and paste the information yourself. Very nice page by the way!--Dallan 23:42, 1 August 2011 (EDT)

Thanks--Obstinatesnooper 09:58, 2 August 2011 (EDT)

How would I deal with needing to name the trascript the same as the source, since Daniel Sackett's record is one of thousands?--Obstinatesnooper 10:03, 2 August 2011 (EDT)

I tend to take a more liberal view of transcript page naming and some may not agree with this... In general you can just name the page as "Transcript:Source Name/Subject Name" where the subject name is the title of the document or section of the document that you are transcribing. However for some documents which come from a collection (and could possibly be referenced by multiple sources), I may use a name which fits the document better than the general rule. An example would be ships' transcripts (eg. 1 or 2). In another case I chose to use the shortened form of a source's name: Transcript:American Historical Register/Some Stories of Colonial Families: Stuart of South Carolina. -Moverton 11:52, 2 August 2011 (EDT)

The transcript namespace is still pretty new and nothing is set in stone, but I believe the Proposal for Transcript Management describes a reasonable approach for naming transcript pages. In general, something along the lines of "Transcript:source title/subject or section", using a / to separate the source part vs. the subject/section part allows transcripts for the same source to be subpages of the same page.--Dallan 19:10, 3 August 2011 (EDT)

The difference between the article and transcript namespaces is there are no fields on the transcript pages for Surnames, Places, and Year Range (all of which Obstinatesnooper has filled in on the article page). Are these fields that we'd want to consider adding to the transcript namespace? --Jennifer (JBS66) 05:53, 2 August 2011 (EDT)

Oh, I'd definitely like to see those fields on the transcript namespace, though, there is of course, the probability that on large volumes, they will be very large themselves; maybe hide the categories at the bottom of the page (Smith in Oz), or put the categories on another page?--Obstinatesnooper 09:58, 2 August 2011 (EDT)

Could some flexibility be added into it for different types of documents? Perhaps there are too many possibilities to consider for these fields. Since it currently doesn't have any fields to fill in, I have just been creating my own boxes manually. You can see examples here, here, here, and here. If you add a limited number of fields, the rest of the info could always be moved over to a template or displayed in some other fashion. -Moverton 11:52, 2 August 2011 (EDT)

It's no problem to add fields for surnames, places, and year range if you want them. The difference between adding them as fields vs. in a template is if you add them as fields the page will show up when someone searches for one of the surnames / places in the field, and we assign the page to categories based upon them (though the surname-in-place categories are going to be re-worked sometime in the next few months). Would you like me to add fields for surnames, places, and year range to transcripts? I could go either way.--Dallan 19:10, 3 August 2011 (EDT)

I think it's a good thing, because I like seeing the fringes of my ancestors' activities (like if they were administrator of someone's estate).

I just added them.--Dallan 13:24, 23 August 2011 (EDT)

Customs for the handling of Obituaries - Seeking Discussion [1 December 2011]

Recent discussions of transcriptions didn't explicitly cover customs for obituaries, which seem like something we should think about. Susan Irish recently uploaded an image of an obituary long past copyright, so I decided to create an example for purposes of discussion in MySource:WeRelate/Obituary of William Montagu, 5th Duke of Manchester. Since the subject is relatively limited, I think our custom would be to place this in a MySource. Further, that transcriptions of MySource items generally reside on the MySource page proper (not separately on a transcript page). While MySource items generally belong to a particular user, that is not the case here, so after creating it I renamed it with the non-user "WeRelate". Comments?

I worry that if we have "Transcript:" and "MySource:Username/" and "MySource:WeRelate/" options, it will get confusing for a newcomer to determine where to post their source text. What about directing people to post small items primarily about a single individual, like obituaries, directly on the Person page, and to post large items covering multiple individuals on Transcript pages?--Dallan 01:18, 26 November 2011 (EST)

That sounds like a reasonable standard. -- Amy (Ajcrow) 06:31, 26 November 2011 (EST)

I wouldn't suggest singling out obituaries for special treatment. I think that Help:Transcript pages covers the generalities nicely. If the document is short and pertains to one person/family then post it directly on the Person/Family page. If the document has more general appeal, post it on a Transcript page. In this example, I don't see the problem with having added this as MySource:Jrm03063/... or a Transcript. I don't think that we want to advocate the use of a WeRelate subdirectory for MySources. In fact, we may want to disallow MySources in both the WeRelate subdirectory and those without a Username like MySource:title of page. --Jennifer (JBS66) 07:01, 26 November 2011 (EST)

I agree that the selection of Source and Transcript, MySource:user and MySource:WeRelate is a little confusing (part of my motive in re-opening this discussion) - but I think this is an implication of the guidance we've given so far. Posting small scale transcripts directly on Person/Family pages is a fine initial step but it is not ideal. Such documents/transcripts are important precisely because they refer to adjacent family relationships and facts, so you really want the information available for use as a conventional reference item. The example above, MySource:WeRelate/Obituary of William Montagu, 5th Duke of Manchester) is used by eight person pages, and could probably be usefully added to more.

I really wish that we took the view that transcripts MAY be placed on Person, Family and MySource pages as the user finds convenient. Never the less, the PREFERRED approach being that transcripts of any length are best placed on a transcript page (or pages), and referred to by an appropriate Source, MySource:user or MySource:WeRelate depending on what the item is and where the original resides. This would produce the best referencing practice and allow the WeRelate TRANSCRIPT space to evolve toward being a useful collection unto itself. I suspect that, in fact, most of the items that are transcribed for genealogical purposes are actually MySource.--jrm03063 10:37, 26 November 2011 (EST)

In some publications one could think of the obituary column like an article with each person under a subtitle and structure it in the Transcripts name space appropriately. Alternately if this particular publications is in the habit of writing long obituaries, it could appear as its own subpage. So for example, the obituary may be located at Transcript:Gentleman's Magazine/Obituary/William Montagu (with a date in parenthesis if necessary), and an index of obituaries could be created at Transcript:Gentleman's Magazine/Obituary. -Moverton 13:56, 28 November 2011 (EST)

I'm fine with not being strict about where to put transcripts - on Person, Family, or Mysource pages as the user finds convenient; my only disagreement is having a special MySource:WeRelate area. To me, that sounds like what the Transcript namespace was intended for. I'm with Jennifer in that I lean toward not allowing people to create MySource's that aren't prefixed by their user name--Dallan 23:43, 30 November 2011 (EST)

I thought we previously decided that stand-alone obituaries couldn't be sources - but rather - they needed to be a MySource. If so - and the obituary is published and not in my care - it doesn't make much sense for it to be a jrm03063/MySource. Likewise a bible marginalia transcript where the bible proper isn't in my care. Again, this was supposedly meant to be a MySource (relating to a relative handful of people) - but it's not something proprietary to me.

As I noted above - I would love to put all transcripts - large and small - in the transcript area (I don't want to ENFORCE that - it would be my preferred way of working though). Last I knew, transcripts only were able to be linked to Source pages. Can they now be linked to a MySource? --jrm03063 00:40, 1 December 2011 (EST)