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Help for beginner - Please
Hi, I am new to using Zotero and I am trying to figure out how to workflow To-Do lists. I understand the concept of the three subcollections in the Research To-Do collection. To start, should I add a note for each task I want to accomplish in the Answer Questions folder until I find the information? For example, for each ancestor I have a basic list of questions, What is full name, DOB, place of birth, parents' names, spouse name, marriage date, siblings, DOD, place of death? Would each question get a note and then the note would be attached to the source once I find it? Thanks in advance!
Hi, Helen, and welcome to Zotero. For any who have joined this forum without access to the Zotero for Genealogy book, Helen is referring to Chapter 13, where I describe a method to replace research logs and to create to-do lists.
Helen, sorry I took so long to respond. You can design the to-do flow to work with your own way of doing research. But I do think the ideal way to do it is, as you say, to have a quick note for every unanswered question or thing to do. Even in looking back at the book, I see something I'd do differently than the example I offered there. I named the notes "To-do list for Michael Mayberry," etc. It would be more useful to label it "Mayberry_Michael TO DO" or something similar to get a growing stack of to-dos to sort in order. Doing the items in separate notes allows you to drag each note also into the person, place, topic, and/or repository folders that relate to the task at hand. Whether you keep them there after the to-do research is done depends on their later value to you. If the to-do is a question I want to answer about Michael Mayberry, I might decide that the question needs a research plan. In that case, the research plan becomes the way I save that question and its eventual answer for future understanding. In other cases, a research plan might be overkill, but you want to keep a few notes about the answer you found to your question or a statement of how you completed the task, if of future value. You could keep a folder under the ancestor's collection that holds all of the answered questions or attach the question to the source that answers it. Some questions are very basic and ordinary and might not need to be saved, once the information is in your family tree. But if you think that your research took twists and turns you will need to be able to restore to memory later, by all means, keep the audit trail in this note and put it where you are likely to look for it again.
Please let me know if you think of other questions or come up with methods that could be of use to others. Thanks!
