Open-Source Genealogy

Genealogy has a small open-source community. But its not good enough. Genealogy is a big-data problem. And the data is not freely available. The closest thing to freely available records is FamilySearch.org, but they have no APIs for searching their records. Most open-source genealogy software is tackling problems that have already been solved by PAF and RootsMagic. Genealogy data needs to be opened. FamilySearch began to share this vision during Jay Verkler's keynote at the 2012 RootsTech conference. When the open-source community gets access to data, without screen-scraping, we will see a surge of innovation.

Our Ancestors Need Me

I have always felt a yearning to do genealogy. I remember developing my own pedigree system in Excel when I was a child. Over 15 years later my desire to find my ancestors has only grown stronger. I feel my ancestors cheering me on and begging for me to continue researching and taking names to the temple. I also believe that I am among the "skilled men and women" that the Lord has inspired "in developing new technologies which we can use to our great advantage in moving forward this sacred work." Currently I am working on the 20 Minute Genealogist with Dr Knutson, Dr Zapalla, and 8 other students. Though my work on that project will cease when I graduate in April, I will continue applying my talents to genealogy. At RootsTech 2012 I caught a glimpse of the future. It looks bright, and I will make it even brighter.