Courtesy of A-Z 2026
I was not sure that I was going to take part in the A-Z Challenge this year, but suddenly found myself on the sign up page and thought as it was still possible to sign up that I would.
Over the years I have written about aims of surname studies, but this year I am going to share a more varied approach.
Our research needs to account for something, that means that there should be some plan at least, do we want to have a website, write a book, write blog posts, inspire people, or perhaps a combination of all of those, otherwise, we might just as well not bother.
My aims are at this point about ensuring that I have a sound database of material, properly sourced, all my references cited and my to do list up to date and for it to be accessible. My surname projects, are destined for a website, that provides the opportunity for others to view and find something of use for their research.
My current plan remains to dispose of the volumes of paper once I have added the material to my database. As part of that I am having a restructure of my digital files, with those that relate to individuals filed using the number that is allocated as soon as that individual is added to my genealogical software. Whilst that does not sound remarkable, it is a such a basic concept that I actually had not thought of it. I gave it a test drive and feel fairly content. All I now need to do is be more productive during the day, then by the time I am 102 I might have dumped all the paper! I know that I am likely to talk about this filing structure during the month, complete with images…
Julie Goucher ~ Anglers Rest 
Hi Chris,
Great to hear from you.
As I said, it is such as obvious filing system, I cannot explain why I missed it!
I have adopted the same system for my own family research and for my two studies. As my One-Name study website has my own family research I will have duplicates of each number, so I shall adopt a Name system in addition to the numbers, so it will look something like this
MF – this means Main File, it has my Mum’s family, including myself and my husband and then all my husband’s side.
OL – Orlando Line, this is my Dad’s side (Sicilian)
BONS – Butcher One-Name Study
OONS – Orlando One-Name Study
my husband’s Goucher study will be GONS – Goucher One-Name Study
I host my numbering system in Dropbox, using the same naming structure above and then inside that folder, in addition to the numbering system is a file Information document. This is written as though someone else is looking at the document, it explains the layout, the naming and numbering and also what software I am using.
I have some rudimentary explaining to the latest cohort of Pharos students, complete with images, so I will likely share that soon. I might even shoehorn it into the A-Z posts.
Best wishes,
J
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Good Morning Julie,
It looks as if we are at a similar point with the filing systems!
I have just taken a Y-DNA test and there were no matches. I have now followed-on with an autosomal test with Ancestry and inevitably some surprises have appeared! The findings have made me go back and review my original research/conclusions – they were obviously made when I had little or no experience in genealogy.
Whilst I’m doing this review of the data, I’ve also decided to update the filing system as well, so that it reflects my current system. As you say a major task, but, hopefully worth it. As I am working through the original data, I’ve also decided it would be a good idea to build a parallel tree on Ancestry. I’m going to go this by each generation rather than via the jecdom route.
Hopefully, all our efforts will ‘bear some fruit’.
Happy hunting with the spiders!
Regards,
Christopher Dallison dallison@one-name.org Guild of One-Name Studies Member 8177 Dallison Darlison Dalison Study
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