A bit of background about me and my interest in genealogy

I have been employed as a software engineer since 1984 and have been keenly interested in genealogy since the birth of my son in 1985.  Organizing the large amount of data one accumulates from genealogical research is a task that is well suited for computerization.  My personal genealogical hobby has therefore been a marriage of these two passions and over the years I have used my genealogical hobby as the impetus for learning the seemingly endless stream of new software technologies that are needed in my career as a software engineer.

While working at Digital Equipment Corporation in the late 1980s and early 1990s I came into contact with other Digital employees around the world who shared my interest in genealogy.  I developed a set of applications for the OpenVMS operating system that allowed users to enter and organize genealogical information for their direct line ancestors and then shared this set of programs with this group of Digital employees.  Then I set up a method via which users could submit their data to a central database and built a server application that ran under the VAXeln operating system via which users could search the central database in an attempt to find ancestors shared by other Digital employees.

In 1992 I left Digital and began working for Corning, Incorporated, and in that position I began developing work-related applications that ran under Microsoft Windows NT.  Corning purchased a subscription for me to the Microsoft Developer’s Network and once again I fell back upon genealogy as a driver for learning this new set of software tools.  So I wrote a C++ application called GART (Genealogical Archive and Research Tool) that used Microsoft Foundation Class library functionality to allow users to enter and modify genealogy information that I had imported from the previous VAX-based environment.

In 2000 after moving to the Atlanta, Georgia area and taking a job with yet another software development company, I created the first version of the Genealogy at Holly Mill Run web site.  By this time, the data which began as a binary file on a VAX back in the 1980s was resident in a Microsoft SQLServer database and was displayed for web site visitors using a series of Active Server Pages (ASP).  If a user “logged in” to the web site they were able to see information for people who were currently living and were even able to enter data for new people.  I also eliminated the requirement that a person in the database be a direct line ancestor of my son.  In about 2005 an enterprising hacker was able to corrupt the database by taking advantage of the way I let logged-in users add or modify data in the database.  Ultimately I got the web site back on line albeit without the ability to add or modify data.

In early 2015, I moved the web site from a server in my house to a server operated by GoDaddy in Arizona.  Currently I am developing a Windows desktop application that will allow trusted users to enter data into the database.

Over this 30 year period (as of 2015) the Internet has taken off and the process of doing research has become much simpler.  In the 1980s the proximity of a researcher to a regional branch of the National Archives was a key to success.  And even with proximity to the National Archives, a researcher was still obliged to correspond with libraries, court houses and genealogy clubs by US mail.  Patience was indeed a virtue!

During this 30 year period I became familiar with a lot of genealogical resources and developed some very successful methods for extending my own research.  I am not a professional genealogist, but via this blog it is my intention to share the knowledge I have and the methods I have developed for myself in the hope that others who might be just beginning their research can benefit from the experiences I have had.