I’m here to show you how I’ve become a complete organization addict. I’ve been doing really great at setting my organization up for my Genealogy Do-Over. I am still working on that and still working through Mastering Genealogical Proof by Thomas W. Jones. It’s going against everything in me not to follow some leads that I see in my head as I look at some of my old blog posts.
Speaking of old blog posts. I am re-organizing them. I never really used a consistent organization method with them and that’s what I’m going back and changing now. I have a lot more time on my hands while I work through my other tasks. The most important reason is I want to be able to find what I’m looking for easier. I use the blog as a way of talking things over with myself or others. I think this will help me to remember what I’ve already said on a subject before and to easily find past entries.
Meet my new Blog Tracker. I am tracking the date I posted, the title, names I mentioned, tags I used, categories I used (some are changing as I go), whether I added SEO data, if I want to re-visit that entry, if I have links to my database website to fix, if I want to go back and add source citations, and if a family member commented.
All that is the data I want to track. Oh boy, it’s a lot. It doesn’t take me more than a couple of minutes to actually log this information. I like that I am using the filters feature, because I can see at a glance all my entries for Lewis Thorward or George Thorward.
Most of the information I am logging, is actually view-able at a glance on my post listing. There isn’t a really efficient way for me to view 62 pages (!!!) of information and cut through it. Unless there are some great search tips that I don’t know about.
There isn’t anything changing in the old posts. I am just adding Tags for the family names discussed and making a shorter category list for now. Later I will go back and fix links, once I am into my research again and know what numbers to use. I will also make links between entries that ended up being a part of a series.
Hopefully, this won’t take me 8 years to do, but I have a feeling it will go quicker than I think. Are you going through an organization overhaul? Is it kicking your butt too?