Surname search, Include a location

+5 votes
239 views
When you enter a name into the search, at the top of the page, particularly if you are doing an open search for a Surname, you can come back with results listing in the thousands. At present I am looking specifically for a family in South Australia. It would great to be able to type South Australia in, and limit the search to anyone who comes up with a hit for a Birth or Death or Marriage in South Australia. I know, if I type in a first name and surname, it gives the option to type in a birth or death location at the bottom of the page. I am looking for a specific time period, and so I know I can put the search in order of date, which really helps. But I still have a list multiple pages long. In the list of Quick links for Members, at the top of the page, it would be great to have a text box, where you can enter a location, to limit the search to people from a place.

Just a suggestion which I feel would be handy. I'll let the team determine whether it is worth it or not. I think a simple one location, which searches for a match in either Birth Death or Marriages of each profile. It doesn't have to display the details in the search results, but limit the search results to those who match that location. Typing in Australia, would so often help us, particularly considering, there is often a massive number of people listed in the United States or the United Kingdom. But, I'm sure that this would help the US & UK too, giving people the ability to just search a single state.

Thank you for all the great work your team put in. As always, it is a fantastic community that you have helped create. Ben.
in WikiTree Tech by Ben Molesworth G2G6 Pilot (163k points)
To do this kind of search, I would use the wild card * in the first name field to search for anyone with that surname. Then narrow the results by date or location.

Not sure, if this will work for what you want but give that a try.

There's probably a way to do this with Wikitree plus but that's not my area of expertise.
Thank you Peggy. Perfect. That narrowed the search down from 15,000 to 31. Much more manageable. Although, I think what I am suggesting may still be a useful suggestion. But should do what I need.
Glad that helped!

1 Answer

+4 votes
When I have searched for a particular person and got far too many results, I often modify the search, removing the first name, but adding locations and parents names, it doesn't always give the desired results, but does enough times to use it as tool.
by M Ross G2G6 Pilot (748k points)

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