FamilySearch Wiki:WikiProject New York

Wiki community members, and member of US/Canada Reference at the Family History Library will work to improve the New York related pages on the FamilySearch Wiki from September 2011 through January 2012 to help educate genealogists how to find ancestors who lived part of their lives in New York State.

Schedule
2011 26 Aug begin recruiting WikiProject New York members 7-10 Sep invite FGS Conference to join the WikiProject New York 21 Sep show and tell US/Canada Reference WikiProject New York plans 22 Sep initial Project NY Meeting to


 * approve overall agenda
 * select future meeting times
 * choose a project leader
 * approve a Wiki site for Project NY meeting agenda and minutes
 * approve a tentative Project NY schedule
 * approve or begin approving proposed project rules
 * approve or begin approving a proposed project model county style page


 * In subsequent meetings finish any business from above, and:


 * adopt the existing task list for modification, or create a proposed alternative task list
 * approve a project completion measuring tool (possibly modeled after the one for Illinois)

2012 31 Jan WikiProject ends

Participants
List of participants of FamilySearch Wiki:WikiProject New York:

We ask that each participant paste the following code on their user page:



Overall Objectives
Improve or create New York related Wiki pages:


 * Top New York introductory page
 * Statewide topic pages
 * County pages
 * Repository pages
 * Migration pathway pages
 * NYC passenger arrival list search strategies page(s)
 * NYC big city research strategies page(s)

Next Scheduled Meeting

 * Next meeting: Thursday 1 December 2011 from 1:00 to 2:00 p.m. (Mountain Time)
 * Format: MeetingPlace Meetings ID 7717. Click to Attend or Dial in Number: 801-240-2663. MeetingPlace ID 7717. Anyone interested is invited to attend!
 * Contact David Dilts telephone 801-240-3477 for details.

Meeting Agendas
See Meeting Agendas.

Meeting Minutes
See Meeting Minutes.

Progress Chart &amp; Graph
See New York Progress Chart and Graph

Framework
Proposed subject to community approval: The following rules will be adopted by the WikiProject New York members until end of the project tentatively schedules for 31 January 2012.

1A. Project Goal: Concentrate on adding new content that teaches readers how to use well New York genealogical search strategies, records, or repositories. 1B. Benchmarks: Create content for New York Wiki pages with a balance of these four hierarchical factors in mind:


 * a. Genealogical Pedagogical Purpose. Be able to explain what the reader can do genealogically that they could not do before reading your words or seeing your images or tables.
 * b. Clarity. Make sure everyone understands your meaning and the pedagogical purpose of your words.
 * c. Brevity. Be succinct as possible without sacrificing pedagogical purpose or clarity.
 * d. Documentation. Footnote(s) revealing the source(s) of the content you are creating.

2. Vetted content. Before you add similar words to more than one New York Wiki page your words must be vetted and approved by any two other team members who are guided by rule #1 and agree with you on that way of presenting it.

3. Style. The first few days of the New York project we will agree on a model style, and create at least one example page of it. Team members must follow that style during the project. After that agreement NO style changes will be allowed for the remainder of the project (tentatively until 1 February 2012). No discussion of changing the style will be allowed. Style includes but is not limited to:


 * Words used in headers (anything that would appear in the table of contents if there were one) Match with FHL Catalog subject headings as much as possible.
 * Heading levels three, four or five; avoid one and two
 * order of presentation
 * Table of contents style or position (or lack of TOC)
 * image, table, or template positions or size; prefer sharp images relevant to the topic on the page
 * font
 * bold
 * italic for titles of published books
 * underline
 * indentation
 * bullets
 * numbering
 * citations in footnote style
 * Please use the full Chicago Manual of Style footnote style (modified):
 * - Author(s), followed by a comma
 * - Title (book titles in italics)
 * Publication data in parenthesis:
 * - Publication place, followed by a colon
 * - Publisher
 * - Year of publication
 * - comma, and the the page number(s) followed by a period
 * Access information:
 * - link to free online copy, if any. IF a free online copy is available no further access data needs to be added. IF NO free online edition is available, then add:
 * - WorldCat template:.
 * - FHL template:.
 * - Brief annotation explaining the content, or why, or how a reader would want to use the source.
 * image, table, or template style
 * internal link style
 * external link style including brief annotation. Prefer http:// links over https:// links.
 * use, or lack of use of standard templates

4. Wording changes. Before changing the saved wording of another team member who followed these rules you must get their consent (except for obvious minor typos).

5. Links with purpose. The Wiki is not a links repository. It uses links to support the genealogical educational purpose of a page or section of a page. Show and explain links with an educational purpose in mind. Annotate each external link briefly but well enough for the reader to realize what they will be getting if they click that link.

6. Seek out local and unique genealogical search strategies, records, or repositories and explain them to readers.

7. Describe each edit in the Summary field before clicking the Save button.

8. Non-compliance will result in work being reverted, or changed to follow these rules.

Model New York County Style Page
See Albany County, New York.

Templates for WikiProject New York
We have decided to use templates for narrative text that will be used on multiple county, town, or other pages (such as Courthouse pages). This will allow changes to be made across all pages simultaneously. Check first to make sure that a template filling your need does not already exist by clicking on the category link listed below. If a template fitting your needs does not already exist, follow the steps below. If you wish to edit an existing template page, make sure to contact the team member(s) who created the original before making your changes.

To create a new narrative template for the pages of the NY WikiProject:

1. Create a new page with the following name: Template:NY[record type], for example, Template:NYCourts 2. Type the text for your template. Make sure that all concepts, sentence structure, and grammar are independent and can stand on their own if need be. 3. At the end, add the category by inserting the following phrase:    (If the category is added to the template without the, the category will also appear on all pages that use the template.) 4. Ask two other members of the New York WikiProject Team to review and approve the wording in your template. 5. Add the template to appropriate county pages by inserting the phrase  , for example,   . To see a list of current existing narrative templates, see Category:Templates for NY pages.

How to Use the FHL Catalog Template
See FHL Catalog Entry Template _______________________________________________________________________________

Welcome
Welcome to the New York WikiProject! We welcome contributors here. We are focusing on the county pages for the 62 current counties of New York. We have built a foundation for a county page, with record type headings.

We are in process of adding town (city) pages. Some of larger cities and towns now have their own Wiki page. We will be adding information about records specific to those towns and cities, as well as cross-linking to larger cities and towns and to the counties where additional records for the residents of those localities may be found.

In a few cases, we will add pages for towns of historical interest which may no longer exist (ghost towns). For the most part, that is a future part of the project, but you are free to add information you may know about such localities and their records.

We invite you to add whatever you know about the records of the county or counties and/or the towns or cities in which you are interested. Working together, we can all benefit from the knowledge of community members on the Wiki.

If you have questions, or need some guidance on what to add or how to do so, feel free to contact the project leader or other team members.


 * W. David Samuelsen, moderator

The Tasks
The tasks as of 17 October 2011:


 * 1) Correct the subject headings: In progress
 * 2) Census info link - completed
 * 3) Search for potential duplicate pages already existing.
 * 4) Fix attributions/sources to Chicago manual of style.
 * 5) Locate county courthouse address. Will be absorbed into Infoboxes, time permitted. - In progress.
 * 6) Courthouse pages created - in progress
 * 7) Create and install Muncipalities/Communities templates for each county. - complted 17 Oct 2011
 * 8) NYGenWeb in progress
 * 9) NYGenWeb Archives in progress
 * 10) Rootsweb Not started
 * 11) My New York Genealogy Not started
 * 12) Cyndi's List (Scroll down or search for county name on the page) Not Started
 * 13) ancestry.com (Need ancestry.com US subscription) Must add this style Ancestry ($)
 * 14) US Gen Net (Only some counties, also many regionial societies)
 * 15) D'Addezio.com Not started
 * 16) Find a Grave Cemetery Map by County Not used at county level. List at town/village/city level.
 * 17) Hometownlocator New York Gazetteer Not to be used any more as Infoboxes are being developed for the town/city/village with Coord template included. Contact the moderator for assistance. Remove all traces of Hometownlocator links -Coord template take care of this.
 * 18) Linkpendium - check further sources, list at subject heading at appropriate level (county, city/town/village)
 * 19) Images of records and localities: in progress
 * 20) Check the Unassigned Links for new sources to add to county/city/town/village pages as needed.
 * 21) check New York Gravestone Photo Project for cemetery listings. Contact the site admin if you believe there is/was a cemetery but not listed for direct record link.
 * 22) Create list of towns/villages/cities and list of counties for each of the routes as listed in New_York#Migration Routes
 * 23) Add attractive images to most NY topic pages
 * 24) Add a list of National Archives and FHL film numbers to NY Passenger Arrival Lists, Jason
 * 25) Create good pages for extinct NY counties (red links)
 * 26) Create good pages for NY major repositories (red links), NY State Archives Patsy
 * 27) Create good pages for NY migration routes (red links), Chambly Canal David
 * 28) Create a page showing NY Soundex National Archives and FHL films, Tim

Userboxes

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