Louis Kessler’s Behold Blog

I haven’t seen a list of 2017 Roots Tech Ambassadors anywhere. So here’s the people I’ve found:

1. Alison Taylor, USA – Pictures and Stories 
2. Allison Kimball, USA – Simple Inspiration
3. Amy Archibald, USA – Revealing Roots and Branches (Ambassador Coordinator)
4. Amy Johnson Crow, USA – Professional Genealogy Services
5. Amy Lenertz, USA – Raincross Information Services
6. The Ancestry Insider, USA
7. Angela Crookston – The Real Housewives of Riverton
8. Bernice Bennett, USA – Genealogy Live Talk Radio
9. Beverly A Harper, USA – Mississippi Ancestors 
10. Brandi Jeter Riley, USA – Mama Knows It All
11. Carissa Rasmussen, USA – Family History modernized
12. Carol Rice, USA – Family Storytelling
13. Cheri Hudson Passey, USA – Carolina Girl Genealogy
14. Christine Woodcock, Canada – Scottish Genealogy Tips and Tidbits
15. Dave Dowell, USA – Dr D Digs Up Ancestors
16. David Allen Lambert, USA – ExtremeGenes
17. Diana Elder, USA – The Family Locket Blog
18. Helen Smith, Australia – From Helen V Smith’s Keyboard
19. James Tanner, USA – Genealogy’s Star
20. Jana Greenhalgh, USA – The Genealogy Kids
21. Jen Baldwin, USA – ConferenceKeeper.org
22. Jenn Crookston– The Real Housewives of Riverton
23. Jennie Fairs, Australia – Family Leaves and Branches
24. Jennifer Alford, USA – Jenealogy
25. Jessica Taylor, USA – The Legacy Tree Genealogists Blog
26. Jenny Joyce, Australia – Jennyalogy
27. Jill Ball, Australia – GeniAus
28. Judy G. Russell, USA – The Legal Genealogist
29. Katherine R. Willson, USA – Social Media Genealogy
30. Kathryn Lake Hogan, Canada – Looking 4 Ancestors
31. Kirsty Gray – GB – Family Wise Ltd
32. Lara Diamond, USA – Lara’s Jewnealogy 
33. Laura Hedgecock, USA – Treasure Chest of Memories
34. Laurie Conklin, USA – Sharing The Past
35. Lynn Broderick, USA – The SIngle Leaf
36. Marie Cappart, Belgium – Histoires de Familles – Families Stories
37. Melynda Valgardson Fanene, USA – Every Second in Life is Precious
38. Michelle Goodrum, USA – The Turning of Generations
39. Nichole Dyer, USA – The Family Locket Blog
40. Paula Iniguez – The Real Housewives of Riverton
41. Pat Richley-Erickson - Dear Myrtle, USA
42. Peggy Lauritzen, USA – Telling my family’s history
43. Rachel LaCour Niesen, USA – Save Family Photos
44. Randy Seaver, USA – Genea-Musings 
45. Renee Zamora, USA – Renee’s Genealogy Blog
46. Richard Young, USA – Family History Tech
47. Robin Foster, USA – Saving Stories
48. Ruby Baird, USA – Ruby’s Genealogy Ramblings
49. Ruth Blair, Canada – The Passionate Genealogist
50. Shannon Combs-Bennett, USA – Trials and Tribulations of a Self-Taught Family HIstorian
51. Sunny Morton, USA – Writer for Lisa Louise Cooke’s Genealogy Gemss 
52. Tami Osmer Mize, USA – Relatively Curious
53. Terri O’Connell, USA – Finding Our Ancestors
54. Thomas MacEntee, USA – GeneaBloggers
55. Timo Kracke, Germany – Familienforschung fur die Ohren
56. Toni Carrier, USA – Lowcountry Africana 
57. Valerie Elkins, USA - Family Cherished
58. Wesley Eames, USA – Ancestor Cloud Blog

If I got any wrong or I missed anybody, let me know and I’ll update the list.

I’m pleased to say that I know or have met at least a third of the people listed, including several of those from Australia. I look forward to seeing them again and meeting some of those I haven’t met yet in February at RootsTech 2017.

Update: January 17, 2007:  I checked my list against the list the Ancestry Insider provided of 46 who registered to have their social media information shared. I added 10 from this list who I didn’t have.

When I think of something in the middle of the night, I just have to write it down as soon as I get up. My mind’s background processor has been absorbed in figuring out how to get the output from Double Match Triangulator to display the two halves of each Chromosome pair.

It’s tricky. Currently, DMT is determining Double Match Groups by looking for overlapping matching segments. These Double Match Groups themselves may overlap and you can have groups within groups. Any relative used as Person b in Double Matching may match to Person a on both halves, meaning they are connected in more than one way, both of them through both their parents.

What I realized last night, and what I’m going to present as a Theorem (going back to my mathematical days) is:

Double Match Theorem 1: Any segment where Person a and Person b Triangulate with any other person must be on the other half of the Chromosome pair of any overlapping Missing a-b segments.

Well that’s a bit of gobbledygook. What it means is that I might be able to start separating out Person a’s Chromosome pairs. Take a look for example at the following map produced by DMT:

To refresh your memory, the green X’s are Double Matches, where both Person a matches Person c and Person b matches Person c. The pink a’s are where only Person a matches Person c, and the blue b’s are where only Person b matches Person c.

The green X’s in the yellow line are where Person a matches Person b. Any Double Matches that overlap will have the third leg needed to Triangulate. Those that do are designated as “Full Triangulation”.

Notice there are 7 lines that are marked as Missing a-b Match. Their Double Match area (two green X’s) end in the 142,000,000 to 142,999,999 address range just before the Base a-b begins. Their Double Match area does not intersect with the a-b match and therefore they do not Triangulate.

However, notice that 5 of the matches have those pink a’s extending to the right into the Triangulation area. This means that Person a matches Person c over that area. But Person b does not match Person c over that area or those would not have been pink a’s but green X’s. Yet, we know that Person a matches Person b on one of the Chromosome pair over that region. Therefore, these matches must be on the other Chromosome of the pair.  Q.E.D.

(Wow. I don’t think I’ve used Q.E.D. at the end of a theorem in like 40 years)

As a result of this, I am going to separate the Full Triangulations from the Missing a-b Matches prior to the determination of Double Match Groups. This will result in pure Triangulation Groups and pure Double Match Groups. I’ll have to see what this does and how it works and after a bit of experience with it, maybe it will lead to the possible enhancement and ultimately to full identification of both halves of each Chromosome pair.

And while I’m at it, let’s bring up another term from my early mathematical days:

Double Match Corollary 1: Any segment where Person a and Person b Triangulate on both halves of the Chromosome pair will not have any overlapping Missing a-b segments.

For example, for siblings. Each matches half of their father and half of their mother. When comparing one with the other, they will on average not match each other over 25% of their DNA, they will match on one parent over 50% of their DNA, and they will on average match on both their parents over 25% of their DNA.

This also can apply to anyone who matches someone else through their father AND through their mother on the same segment. Cousins can fully match just as siblings do, but the double match area would cover a much smaller percentage of their DNA.

GEDmatch for example, color codes these:

Matches to one parent are colored yellow. Matches to both parents are colored green.

What this Corollary really means for Double Match Triangulator is that some Triangulation Groups might be triangulating to two different ancestors, one on Person a’s father’s side, and one on Person a’s mother’s side.

If there are any overlapping Missing a-b segments, then the Triangulation is guaranteed to be on one half only.

If there are not any overlapping Missing a-b segments, then the Trangulation may be over both halves.

This Corollary will provide additional help in identifying the matches that belong to each of half of the Chromosome pair.

I’ve been watching with much interest on the RootsTech Devpost site, some of the great programs that are being submitted to the showdown. Prior to the submitted programs being announced, I was able to find many of them because of the videos they produced on either YouTube or Vimeo, or through their entries as participants on the Showdown site.

On Dec 5, all the official submissions were added to DevPost.

The programs that are entrants for 2017 include, in alphabetical order, with the 10 semi-finalists highlighted in yellow are:

1. autodotbiography - Online website – Bryher Scudamore
2. Champollion 2.0 – Windows program – Christophe Marin
3. ColorFuel – Online website – Oliver Nina
4. CSI: Crowd Sourced Indexing – Online website - Banai Lynn Feldstein
5. Cuzins – Android app - Jonathan & Joshue Fowlke
6. Deep Sense – iOS app – Ahmed Bekhit, Fabian Vergara and others
7. Double Match Triangulator - Windows program - Louis Kessler
8. DoubleSHOT Glare-be-Gone with SHOTBOX – Windows program - Michael Hohl & Aaron Johnson
9. Emberall – iOS or Android app – Karen & Kyle Corbitt, Sam Nelson
10. Famicity - Online website - Jerome Blanchard and many others (2016)
11. Family-History – Alexa devices – by Iayne Moessing
12. FamilyHunt – Chrome extension – by Nandamuri Srilakshmi
13. genealogyDOTcoach - Online website - Janet Hovorka and Kim
14. GenerationStory - iOS app - Shannon Uschold (2016)
15. GenQuizitive - Online website - Melissa & John Finlay
16. greetingStory – Online service – Christopher Cummings
17. Innovative Genealogy Charts – Online service – Doug Butts
18. Irish Family History Centre - Online website – Irish Family History Centre
19. JoyFLIPS – iOS app – Ken Leonard and Tami Osmer Mize
20. Kindex - Online website - Cathy Gilmore (2016)
21. Lifeblink – Android app - Dave Girgenti
22. Lifey – Online service - Adam Balinksi
23. Little Family Tree - Android app - John & Melissa Finlay (2016)
24. Long Lost Relatives – Online service – John DeFour
25. Memory Book - Online website - Chijioke Esedo, Gloria Miao and others
26. OldNews USA - Android app - Bill Nelson
27. Pass it Down – iOS app - Christopher Cummings & Rodger Maarfi (2016)
28. PetFamily – Online website – Anand Rajan
29. PostcardTree – Online website – Neil Saunders (2016)
30. QromaTag - iOS app - Tony Knight
31. Rendez-Vous – Android app – Noureddine Amri
32. RootsFinder - Online website - Heather Henderson
33. The Diderot Network – Cross Platform – Paul Fraser
34. The Family Nexus - iOS app - David Taylor
35. The Project Life App – iOS app – Becky Higgins
36. ThereForYou – iOS app - Ashish Ranjan
37. TSOLife - Online website - David Sawyer, Stella Parris (2016)
38. VR Tag Room360 – Online website – Tom Nguyen
39. VyTräd - Windows program - Steven Larson
40. weGather – iOS & Android app – Rachel & Andrew Niesen

From the above, you’ll see 15 are online websites, 15 are iOS or Android apps, 4 are Windows programs, 4 are online services, 1 is Cross platform and there’s even 1 for Alexa devices and 1 Chrome extension so there’s quite a variety. Many of the videos are superbly done.

7 of the programs were submitted to the 2016 Innovator Showdown. They will have gained in the experience from that and their programs will be more polished and should have a better chance this time around.

It’s going to be really tough for the judges to pick the 10 semifinalists from among these. I’m hoping DMT will impress them enough to make the first cut. There will be some good programs that won’t.

The following programs didn’t make the deadline:

1. Carbon Copy – Online website – Cassidy Williams

1. frontfamily – Online website – Bassem Chagra and others