Many of you already know that the findmypast Australia website (findmypast.com.au) has been up and running for some time now … but what you probably don’t know is that a lot of work has been going on behind the scenes to rework the way that the website works, and the BIG, EXCITING news just in, is that the brand-spanking-new findmypast Australia website is live, and officially launched.
Here is the announcement of it from the findmypast.com.au Facebook page:
“Welcome to our new site! Visit
www.findmypast.com.au to see our fantastic new website including an exciting blog and findmypast family tree so you can build your family tree online! You also now have more choice with our 6 and 12 month subscriptions and credit packages available. Stay connected with us on social media for updates about brand new records and features coming really soon!”
The new website includes the addition of a number of new features as well as more new records, a new way to search, and a new design. One thing you will notice is that they have sorted the records into collections, making it easier to search. The collections include:
- Armed forces & conflict
- Census, land & surveys (incl. electoral rolls)
- Churches & religion
- Education & work
- Institutions & organisations
- Life events (BMDs)
- Newspapers, directories & social history
- Travel & migration
You can refine your search a number of ways including by collection, event year as well as keyword and there is a search guide on the website which explains the best way to search the vast collection of records.
New records
Over 60,000 new records have been added to the Life Events (BMDs) collection. The latest additions to the growing collection include headstone transcriptions for Waverley Cemetery and South Head Cemetery in Sydney’s eastern suburbs, monumental inscriptions for Minden, Tarampa and Vernor Baptist Cemeteries and Coleyville, Engelsburg (Kalbar), Boonah & Highfields Baptist Cemeteries in Queensland.
More than 4,000 new records have also been added to the Education & work category. The Coffs Harbour District Schools Index Part 1 was developed from School Admission Registers and contains details on schools from the Coffs Harbour District of New South Wales. Dates range from 1891 to 1981 and includes some schools that no longer exist. Information includes the pupil’s name, name of the school and date of submission.
And as a teaser Findmypast advise that many new records will be published soon.
findmypast family tree
This is the first phase of the new findmypast family tree. Building your family tree online is the perfect way to bring your past to life. The free findmypast family tree is very easy to use. Whether you’re a novice family historian or an experienced genealogist, this free software stores all the names in your tree securely in one place, allowing you access from any computer at any time.
Features coming soon to the findmypast family tree:
- Import trees from other sites/software
- Search other trees
- Append records and pictures to the tree
- Create multiple trees
findmypast.com.au Blog
The all new findmypast.com.au blog includes interesting stories focused on Australian and New Zealand family history research. Included are many guest blogs written by some of Australia & New Zealand’s leading experts in genealogy. This will be updated regularly and will keep you well informed.
New subscription & PayAsYouGo credits
Findmypast.com.au have introduced a new 6 month Foundation Subscription and PayAsYouGoCredits. These are available along with the existing 12 month Foundation Subscription and represent fantastic value for money.
Coming soon
Look out for more additions coming in 2012 as well as a brand new world collection. Some of the new records you’ll be able to find on findmypast.com.au as part of the world collection later this year include:
– Brand new forums
– 55 million new records from Australia and New Zealand
– Irish Prison Records and other great Irish records
– Life Events (Births, Marriages, Deaths and more)
– The British Newspaper Archives
– 40 million parish baptisms, marriages and burials from across England and Wales dating back to 1538
– Passenger lists of ships leaving the UK 1890-1960
– Rapidly growing collection of local UK records dating back to 1700, including school admissions, workhouse registers and apprenticeships indentures
– 1 Billion Records from the British Isles
– Military Records
– Immigration / emigration records
– Rapidly Expanding US Records and Newspapers
Want to win a Flip-Pal Mobile Scanner?
For your chance to WIN a Flip-Pal mobile scanner valued at $219.50 thanks to our friends at Gould Genealogy and History, Findmypast.com.au invite you to complete a survey about the new site. Visit findmypast.com.au and have a look at the new site and added features then complete the survey where you will have the opportunity to voice your feedback, make suggestions and help us improve the service. A winner will be chosen at random on June 8, 2012. Click Here to Start the Survey.
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I have had a detailed look at the new website and have found it much harder to use than the previous one. It takes longer to load and some functions of the previous site are no longer available.
The first and most glaring omission is the facility to limit searches by state at the beginning of a search. With the addition of more sources searching will become increasingly cumbersome.
Some of the categories of documents include a catch-all sub-group of “Documents” which is an extra barrier to arriving at the documents you are seeking. In most cases all this has doubled the time and number of actions required to achieve the same result as the old site. A good search function should be intuitive, which the old one was but this is not.
Items that I was able to locate under the old site are now not appearing. It is of concern that some of the indexing seems to have failed in the change to the revamped site. Ticking the variants box made no difference.
One other change that I think is a step backwards – there is no longer the option of jumping to other pages within a document. Now we can only move one page at a time either backwards or forwards.
I am hoping that the new site is a work in progress and that some of these problems will be rectified. I have contacted findmypast.com.au to draw their attention to these issues but despite their claim to respond within two days, nearly three weeks on, I have heard nothing back.
Anne, I thank you for your comments and I’m sure that FMP Australia do too. We thank you for taking the time to look and comment on their new site.
In answer to my queries findmypast.com.au have advised me that they are refining their search engine and we will be able to search by state, country, address and page (soon hopefully). Once this is done, and all the new records are added, it will certainly be an invaluable resource.
That’s great news Anne. It seemed inevitable that it had to happen, but its great to hear that it WILL happen. Thanks for the update. 🙂