Problems to Solve
1. GEDCOM family tree files need to be backed up regularly because they contain important data and are a lot of work to assemble, but they can be large
2. It is not easy to share family tree information with the Internet, get it into search engines and find other people interested in the same ancestors
3. After family history data is published, it is difficult and time-consuming to update (ie. exported static files)
4. It is difficult to share portions of a family tree with other people, like by email
Ideas to Solve the Problem with Web Application Software
1. Store and manage large GEDCOM family tree files online as backups
2. Easily publish parts of a family tree to the Internet
3. Make it easy to update published portions of the tree from GEDCOM sources
4. Let people create "private" links to portions of the tree to email to others
Research Goals
- GEDCOM
- Rails 2.0.x
- Capistrano 2.x
- Amazon S3
- Amazon EC2
- Don't Make Me Think!-style usability
Features of the Deployed Implementation
Nothing deployed yet
Possible Extensions
- merge with work done on layeredgenealogy.com
- release Ruby/GEDCOM work as open source