 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
||
 |
Lesser-known Tech Tools | |
 |
101 Best Undiscovered Web Sites 2005 | |
|
August 2005 issue | |
| . |  |
|
 |
||||
| Ethnic Toolkits Web Exclusive Forms Bookstore Soundex Code Generator Article Search Writing Workshops Newsletter |
||||
Lesser-known Tech Tools
A9 Answers.com Clusty Daily Genealogy News.com Family Tree DNA GenealogyBuff.com Genetealogy MacGenealogy.org My Family Health Portrait One-Step Webpages OurTimeLines.com Sorenson Molecular Genealogy Foundation TreEZy UKWizz Find news and reviews on more great Web sites in the August 2005 Family Tree Magazine.
Paid Content
a9.com
Looking to add new weapons to your Web-search arsenal? This slick search engine from Amazon.com can comb Web sites, books, digital images, reference works, movies and yellow pages all in one fell swoop. It then groups results by source (that is, Web, books, images and so on).
www.answers.com
This portal provides just what its name implies—on a million topics, covering people, places, words and names. It draws information from reliable sources, including online dictionaries and encyclopedias. Try drilling down through various topics to find handy reference material: For example, the places category serves up city and regional maps, currency converters, area codes, country flags, statistical data and more.
clusty.com
Clusty's worth adding to your bag of Web-surfing tricks because of its unique "clustering" of results. Search for your surname plus "family history," for example, then weed out the chaff and go straight to the good stuff by clicking on the hits Clusty groups under the genealogy topic.
www.dailygenealogynews.com
Find out what's new in searching for what's old. This site combines various RSS (Really Simple Syndication or Rich Site Summary) feeds, updated every four hours. There's also a genealogy search tool that lets you target online census, cemetery, obituary, land and other records with one search.
www.familytreedna.com
Among the many genetic-genealogy testing companies' Web sites, this one stands out for its wealth of free information, DNA forum, monthly newsletter, library of scientific papers and free FTDNATiP calculator that allows two matching individuals to estimate the number of years back to their shared ancestor.
www.genealogybuff.com
Search for your surname in dozens of family history databases with one click. Though you still have to visit each site to see the results (or find out your search came up empty), GenealogyBuff.com can be a good starting point for online research.
www.genetealogy.com
Megan Smolenyak Smolenyak, co-author of Trace Your Roots with DNA (Rodale, $14.95), is behind this new online clearinghouse for genetic-genealogy information. As DNA grows in importance for family historians, we bet you'll turn increasingly to Genetealogy's links to online articles, testing companies, message boards, surname projects and recommended books and videos. (You can read Smolenyak's plain-English guide to DNA testing—and what it means for family history research—in the February 2005 Family Tree Magazine.)
www.macgenealogy.org
Mac users who feel left out by the Windows-centric world of genealogy software can find solace and suggestions at this newsy site.
www.hhs.gov/familyhistory/download.html
Free genealogy software from Uncle Sam? This simple downloadable program helps you combine your family tree and family medical history, then print a chart you can take to your doctor's office.
stevemorse.org
End your frustration with popular genealogy sites' search limitations. Steve Morse, who made searching the Ellis Island database a snap, has applied his Web wizardry to other ports of immigration, vital-records databases and, most notably, the US census.
www.ourtimelines.com
Enter events from your ancestor's life, then let this site generate a timeline you can paste into your own Web site.
www.smgf.org
If you've had a Y-DNA test, you can use this nonprofit genetic-genealogy research organization's site to compare results with 12,000 genetic profiles, linked to genealogies of 480,000-plus ancestors that represent at least 7,900 surnames around the world.
www.treezy.com
Think Google for genealogy: TreEZy indexes sites with genealogical and historical content, not just lists of links. There's even a downloadable toolbar a la Yahoo! or Google.
www.ukwizz.com
If you're looking for British Isles ancestors or info, try this United Kingdom-centric search engine to dig deeper.
|
|
