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Archiver > AUS-QLD > 2005-05 > 1115092568
From: "Meg" <>
Subject: Re: [AUS-QLD] Re: [Gen-QLD] more cemeteries and other memorial photos
Date: Tue, 3 May 2005 13:56:08 +1000
References: <002f01c54d69$665ad1e0$3c13a8c0@cabernet> <00d501c54df4$391ba840$8100a8c0@EdnaSabato> <003a01c54ed2$599828d0$3c13a8c0@cabernet>
thank you very much for the explanation Kerry.
I am sure it will be very helpful looking for female names. We have trouble
finding the women :((
Regards
Meg
----- Original Message -----
From: "Kerry Raymond" <>
To: <>
Sent: Monday, May 02, 2005 2:49 PM
Subject: Re: [AUS-QLD] Re: [Gen-QLD] more cemeteries and other memorial
photos
>
>> Strangest Alphabetical Lists I ever saw, but, I guess everyone is
>> entitled
>> to an opinion.
>
> What Edna was concerned about was entries that appeared to be indexed by
> given name instead of surname, which (if true) would indeed have been a
> very strange way to do it. So, let me explain ...
>
> Each entry is indexed multiple times using all the names found on the
> headstone. So, the surnames and given names are all there in alphabetical
> order (plus other random words, because it is machine indexed from the
> photo captions). If you take a look at the smallest of our cemeteries,
> Bunya which has 1 readable headstone for Thomas Broad:
>
> http://www.chapelhill.homeip.net/FamilyHistory/Photos/Bunya-cemetery-Pine-Rivers-Shire/NameIndex.html
>
> you will see that the entry for his headstone appears twice in the list,
> once indexed by Broad and one by Thomas.
>
> We choose to construct the index in this way for a few reasons:
>
> * machines are good at indexing but aren't good at telling the difference
> between a surname and a given name, so it was simply easier to do it that
> way
> * sometimes people want to look up using given names, particularly for
> women whose married names are not always known
> * some headstones don't give a surname (or at least not one we could still
> see) so a given name is all we have
>
> So, having all names indexed gives greater flexibility in finding someone,
> but has the downside of increasing the size of the WWW page.
>
> Thank you for Edna for explaining the issue; we'll add some words to the
> WWW site to make it clearer how the index works.
>
> Kerry & David.
>
>
>
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