An alternative home for your RootsTech playlist

If you are finding it difficult to navigate your playlist in the RootsTech site, or continually find that you are logged out of FamilySearch and need to log in again, it may be easier to create a YouTube playlist for future viewing.

Here's how to go about it. 

Sign in to RootsTech.org to view your playlist.

Right click to open any video in a new tab, this saves having to navigate back through your playlist to find where you were.

Scroll to the bottom to download the Handout.

If the presenter was from Family Search click the Watch on YouTube link in the bottom corner.

For some presenters you may need to start the video before the YouTube link appears in the lower left corner.

Making a Playlist

Once the video opens in YouTube click on the plus sign below the video to Add to a Playlist

If you are asked to login, go ahead and login using your Google account. If you already have a gmail account your YouTube account is linked to that Google account. If you do not have a Google account, now is the time to set one up.

Follow the prompts to set up a Google account when this window appears.

Once you have an account, sign in to YouTube to create a playlist.

When you have signed in and choose the Add to Playlist icon, the window below will appear.  I choose to keep all my play lists private. Give the playlist a name. Now you can add any video opened in YouTube to your newly created playlist. 

It is possible to have multiple playlists. You may choose to have a variety of playlists e.g. Photography, Family Stories, Australia/NewZealand etc. Decide what works best for you.

You will notice below the presenters' videos in YouTube, FamilySearch have chosen to make them Unlisted so you will not be able to use YouTube search to find them, the only way to add them is by opening them in YouTube from the RootsTech Connect site.

Finding your playlists - days, weeks or months later

YouTube usually opens to what it terms the Home page, showing popular videos and a range of videos that you may find useful based on your previous viewing habits.

To find your Playlists click the Library icon on the left hand side of the screen.

Now any videos you have viewed recently are shown at the top as History. Scroll down to see your Playlists. If you want to remove a video, hover over the three dot menu below a video for this menu.

When you choose to view a whole playlist, the three dot menu next to the videos in your playlist provides even more options. Explore!

This post first appeared on https://carmelgalvin.info

Virtual Bookshelves for Genealogy

Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay

Collections in LibraryThing

A lively discussion on #ANZAncestryTime about genealogy books prompted me to revisit a 2018 post Once upon a shelf wherein I discussed the use of LibraryThing and its associated OPAC TinyCat for listing both personal and institutional collections of books. Tim Spalding, the founder and LT guru, just mentioned this feature again on Twitter.

Secret: Every @LibraryThing account comes with a separate, "traditional" library catalog or "OPAC." It's better than most OPACs, and free for all personal use, very cheap for small libraries, schools and so forth. https://t.co/k7ZKhs6gie pic.twitter.com/3brBWcISZM

— Tim Spalding (@librarythingtim) February 2, 2021

In the last 12 months my local genealogy group, Cooroy-Noosa Genealogical & Historical Research Group, approved the move to to this online catalogue and one can now search the collection through the TinyCat OPAC. or view the traditional LibraryThing entries. Some other Australian groups I have found using LibraryThing include:

• Cairns & District Family History Society
• The Pioneers Association of South Australia
• Narre Warren & District Family History Group
• West Gippsland Genealogical Society
• Tamborine Mountain Family History Group

My own genealogy books and genealogy based fiction titles I have enjoyed, feature as links on my TinyCat page. If I have them stored in Evernote they have a tag to indicate that. I have very few paper books as I find membership at a range of libraries provides me with access to a wide range of both paper and ebooks. But what does one do with purchased or free ebooks once downloaded? 

Calibre

Calibre is a free, open source cross platform program for storing ebooks that come in a variety of formats. This is always my first port of call and books stored here can be read on the computer in a wide range of formats or transferred to other devices. There is a built in function for converting books to alternative formats, e.g. PDF to ePub is one of the many conversions available.

Calibre Companion app for both iOS and Android enables the transfer of ebooks to your device where they can be read with your preferred ebook reader.

Evernote 

When I wrote about Evernote in 2016 the basic version allowed one to sync notes across several devices so I put it on my Android phone, my iPad, and laptop as well as being able to log in to a web version.

The basic version of Evernote is still free but time moves on and now one needs pay $A89.99 per year to use Evernote on more than 2 devices. I am currently reviewing the frequency of my Evernote usage on various devices.

Evernote for storage of ebooks 

Evernote has an excellent search function which retrieves tags or titles of notes or words within notes.

3 methods of getting files into Evernote

• PDF ebook files can be sent to Evernote via one's own Evernote email address. 
• PDFs open on the web can be saved to Evernote via the web clipper extension available for most browsers 
• Files on computer - Start a new note then drag and drop the file into the note

Any other formats will need an additional app to open them but PDFs can be opened and searched within Evernote. 

Either allocate each book a tag of 'book' or place them in a single dedicated notebook, depending on your preferred method of working within Evernote. 

I have allocated a tag book so they are all easily retrieved.

Each book is stored within an individual note.

Each note has an individual address within Evernote so it is simple to create a separate Index note to list all the books stored within Evernote. 

• Create a new note, name Index Genealogy Books
• Go to the note where an individual book is stored
• On Desktop version choose Share and under More Sharing - Copy Internal link 

Desktop sharing options

• On mobile version go to share note and under More sharing options or the three dot (hamburger) menu choose - Copy internal link
• Paste the link just copied into  Index Genealogy Books note
• repeat for all the other books to generate a simple clickable list for quick access to any one title

Sample from my Index of Genealogy titles in Evernote

A brief list of free sources I find useful for family history and genealogy related titles

1. Local Library collection -  242 titles listed under genealogy Search by Family History, filter with topic History, sort by date latest, first or newest. 

2. NLA via Trove Digital Library, many historic digitised titles now available e.g. A Genealogical History of the Pioneer Families of Australia 

3. Internet archive - texts e.g. search genealogy or history, narrow by location - Free login to borrow or download depending on title.

4. BorrowBox for general limited time ebook borrowing- via local library Browse by category - History, many Australian titles

5. Google Books - Use drop down menu to choose Free e.g. Australian history then download as PDF or ePub

No matter the source of the book, I try to remember list it in LibraryThing with an appropriate tag so that I know whether I own it, whether it is an ebook or paper copy, where it is stored or whether I have just read it. 

How do you keep track of your family history/genealogy related titles and do you distinguish between those you own and those you have just read?

This post first appeared on https://carmelgalvin.info