Find a Grave

Neither one of these suggestions helped on both an iPad mini or large iPad Pro. The problem started immediately with the February 2 update on both devices. Dropped this review down from 5 stars to 1 because the latest update has caused text to be written over other text both on an iPad Mini and the large iPad Pro. Just sloppy programming. First programming assignment is usually some type of output alignment. No excuse for this. The app is virtually unusable now, Old review.. First of all I want to say how helpful Find a Grave has been for me over the years. I’ve found many ancestors because of it. The history it provides is priceless. There is an issue with searching that just started this past week. I’m a student of President Harry S Truman and I’ve used Find a Grave to learn more about many of the people I learn about through my research. I first noticed this problem when I searched on Harry S Truman a few days ago. He started not showing up on searches. Neither does Richard Nixon or John F Kennedy. Other searches appear to be okay. And, if you search using the website the searches do work. The one common denominator I’ve been able to determine is famous people using the iOS app.

The basic functionality of the app is definitely there. You can search by individuals or find cemeteries based on simple data searches. You can create new memorials and upload their pics to fill in gaps in a given cemetery’s entries. It’s basic functions are all there and all sound. However if you don’t type the name of the cemetery the same way it’s formatted in the app, this causes failed searches (ie “Greenlawn” vs “Green Lawn”). It needs to be a more flexible search parameter setup. Ideally what I would really love would be ability to ultimately take my saved virtual cemeteries and the saved favorite gravesites buried there, and have the app generate a basic map of the cemetery with a simple line route connecting them, so when I visit I can most easily visit all the notable graves I don’t want to miss. Maybe even tie it into Google live GPS services so we can actually track where we are in the cemetery as we move about. THAT would be the best and most logical extension of all our curated and stored cemeteries and favorited graves.

Find a Grave is a great to in our ancestry. If used correctly. Since it’s all volunteers, you depend on the accuracy of hat they put on the site. The biggest downfall with this is people only caring about their numbers. They get information from funeral homes and create memorials immediately. This leaves people who want to manage close friends and or family members outside the guidelines unable to be the manager. Many of these “numbers” people copy and paste obituary, which includes names of living relatives. They also use the pictures provided to the funeral homes. To me find a grave is exactly that- finding the grave. Not create a memorial. Just wish there was a cap or something to keep these people from grabbing all memorials. Or at least not make them immediately upon publishing.