AutomatedGenealogy.com

The LAC have announced they will soon be launching a new easier-to-navigate website. URLs will likely all change. What impact do you think this will have on Automated Genealogy? Will all the linking that has been done over the years be inaccessible? Is continuing to link records such as WWI attestations and War Memorials an exercise in futility? I would like to continue my Covid project of linking the war dead to their census records, am currently doing names starting with Dix, but is it worth my time to continue? I'd appreciate your comments.
Judy

Hi Judy -

Excellent questions. We won't know for sure until we see the new format, but LAC has made several significant changes to the access to digital images since AG was launched, and each time either the links continued or were easily retrieved with a little programming on our end.

There is however always a risk linking to external sites. We had negative experiences with lost links to the victims of the Halifax Explosion and to FamilySearch's 1881 census, but even with these, the broken links at least flag the existence of an external record for the individual.

With respect to your project more specifically, while the attestations are on LAC, the war memorial is managed by Veterans Affairs, so the latter shouldn't be affected.

Thanks for all your diligent work! Mark

Thanks, Mark.
British Home Children links were also lost, sadly. I'll continue my project to link WWI dead with their families. Often, the War Memorial listing does not give biographical details, and so I need to access the attestation papers to be sure that I am linking the right people. And then it seems only logical to do that link as well, even though it no longer displays unless you open in a new window. Perhaps I'll finish off names beginning with DIX-Y-Z, then take a break for a while until the new site is up and running. And keep my fingers crossed that all links will continue to work!
Judy

Well, Mark, the new LAC website is up and running. Took a while to figure out that entering the soldier's full name was the easiest way to find his military records. While it may be easier to find the soldier's name, I can't see a way to link his attestation to his census records. The War Memorial link is straightforward as it comes from Veterans Affairs, not LAC. I have started to add a line note "WWI regimental number --- (LAC)" to the census record. Can you find a way to actually link the attestation record?
Thanks again, Judy