Free training · Using FamilySearch · Beginner · 18 min
It Is One Shared Tree
The thing that confuses everybody about FamilySearch: one shared tree, the change log, merging duplicates, and how to disagree with a stranger without starting a fight.
Free FamilySearch training from Stuck in the Branches on the shared Family Tree: why anyone can edit a deceased ancestor, how the change log protects your work, privacy for living people, explaining edits, contacting other contributors, merging duplicates safely, following ancestors, and reading the fan chart for gaps.
What you will learn
- Explain why FamilySearch has one shared tree instead of private trees.
- Use the change log to see what happened and restore earlier work.
- Make an edit that nobody reverts, by sourcing it and saying why.
- Merge a genuine duplicate and recognise when two people are not the same person.
- Read a fan chart for the gaps and turn them into a research plan.
The full written guide
Chapter 1. Welcome
One entry per ancestor, worked on by everybody.
It Is One Shared Tree.
Welcome back. This is the guide that explains the thing that confuses everybody about FamilySearch, and it is the single biggest difference between it and every other genealogy site you will use.
There Is Only One of Each Ancestor.
On most sites you build your own private tree and so does everybody else, so the same ancestor exists in nine hundred separate copies. FamilySearch is the opposite. There is one shared tree, and one entry for each deceased person, which everybody works on together.
Which Means Strangers Can Change Your Work.
Yes, a person you have never met can edit your great grandmother, and will. This horrifies people at first. It is also the reason the tree gets better instead of multiplying errors, and once you understand the tools it is a strength rather than a threat.
Chapter 2. Why it is safe
The change log, and privacy for the living.
Nothing Is Ever Actually Lost.
Every change is recorded in the change log with who made it, when and why, and any previous version can be restored. Nobody can permanently destroy your research. If you find your work has been changed, you can see exactly what happened and put it back in a few clicks.
Your Living Family Stays Private.
Living people are not part of the shared tree. They exist only in your own private space, visible to nobody else. So the sharing applies to deceased ancestors, which is where collaboration helps, and not to your household, which is nobody else's business.
Chapter 3. How to edit
Read first, always say why, and talk before you undo.
Before You Change Anything, Read.
When something looks wrong, open the sources and the change log first. Very often the other person had a record you have not seen, and they are right. Changing a well sourced entry because it contradicts a family story is how good work gets undone by a confident stranger.
Always Say Why.
Every edit has a reason field. Use it, every single time, in a full sentence. Changed the birth year to eighteen ninety one based on the baptism register, see the attached source. An explained change almost never gets reverted. An unexplained one is an invitation to a slow argument.
Talk Before You Undo.
If you disagree, use the discussion and the message link to contact whoever made the change. Most of these people are relatives of yours who care as much as you do. A short, friendly message solves it nearly every time, and you frequently gain a cousin with records you do not have.
Chapter 4. Duplicates and merging
The real problem, and how to merge without damage.
Duplicates Are the Real Enemy.
The common problem is not vandalism, it is the same ancestor sitting in the tree two or three times, each with half the sources. FamilySearch finds these for you and offers to merge them. Clearing duplicates is the most useful housekeeping you can do for your line.
Merge Carefully, and Only When Sure.
Compare the two carefully before merging: the dates, the places, the spouses, the children. Two men with the same name in the same county are not the same man, and merging them creates a mess that is hard to unpick. When unsure, leave them and write a note saying why.
Chapter 5. Watching and viewing
Following ancestors, and the views of the tree.
Watch the Ancestors You Care About.
You can follow a person and be notified when anybody changes them. Do this for the dozen ancestors you have worked hardest on. Then you hear about a change when it happens, instead of discovering six months later that a line you proved has quietly been rerouted.
The Tree Has Several Views.
The tree can be shown as a landscape or portrait pedigree, as a fan chart, or as a descendancy view that works downwards through the generations. The fan chart is the fastest way to see which branches are empty, and the descendancy view is how you find living cousins.
Chapter 6. Using the gaps
The fan chart as a research plan.
Use the Gaps to Decide What Is Next.
Open the fan chart and look at the holes. The empty wedges are your research plan. Rather than drifting towards whichever ancestor is most interesting, work the gap that is closest to records you can actually get, which is usually the most recent one.
Your Work Helps the Next Person.
Everything you add with a source attached stays there for every descendant who comes after you, including ones not born yet. That is the actual bargain of the shared tree. You inherit other people's work and you leave yours behind, and it only functions if the sources go in.
Chapter 7. Wrap up
Read one change log and follow that ancestor.
Explain every change, follow what matters.
Go to one ancestor, open the change log, and read what has happened to them. Then follow them, so you hear about the next change. Explain everything you do in the reason box. We are here when you get stuck.