What's New
What's New on Histopolis - Q4 2009
Here are some of the changes that were implemented in October, November and December of 2009 (in reverse order):
28 November 2009
- Cemetery Locations. The source of much of the Histopolis data on cemetery
locations is the USGS GNIS database, most of which was manually digitized from printed maps 30
years ago, long before the general availability of high-resolution satellite imaging and GPS.
The Histopolis (GNIS) position is usually very
close but can be several hundred feet away from the actual position as viewed on a
modern, detailed satellite map.
Histopolis now enables registered users to correct the Histopolis
position for a cemetery by easily dragging the marker to the correct location on the
Histopolis map.
Please help everyone by correcting the location of cemeteries where you have personal knowledge or can determine the cemetery location from the satellite (hybrid) map view. - Database Refresh. The Histopolis database has benefitted from a significant
refresh of data from the latest USGS GNIS and US Census Tiger/Line databases (see
Credits) both
released in October 2009. The refresh includes some recent revisions to counties and
sub-county jurisdictions and many additional cities and cemeteries.
It is possible (likely) that some errors were introduced in the process of the database refresh. If you see something that doesn't seem correct, please contact the webmaster at webmaster. - Place Borders. Prior to this release, Histopolis displayed the border (outline) of a state or county only when displaying the specific page for that state or county. Histopolis now also includes borders for sub-county jurisdictions (townships, towns, wards, ...) where they exist and also for many cemeteries and most incorporated cities (unincorporated cities do not have boundaries). Additionally, the borders for all of the known encompassing jurisdictions are also overlayed on the map for all place pages. For example, the page for a cemetery may show the borders for the cemetery, the city containing the cemetery, and the township, county and state where the cemetery resides (if all are known in the database). Border information is currently available for over 80,000 places on Histopolis!
- Map Position and Zoom. The initial map position and zoom level is now much better in cases where the border of the place is known. The map zoom is automatically set to the highest level that allows the entire border to be visible and the border is centered horizontally and vertically on the map.
- New Hosting Provider. We have moved the site to a different hosting
provider to better accommodate recent growth of the site and the supporting database.
Please contact the webmaster if you have any feedback regarding the switch in providers. - There are now over 124,000 links to place-specific genealogy resources.
- Several miscellaneous improvements.
21 October 2009
- Histopolis now has more than 100,000 links to quality, place-specific genealogy resources. Many thanks to those that contributed to this achievement.
- Link Style. The display style of internal links has been changed to remove the underline resulting in a cleaner appearance with less clutter.
- The place detail section now contains the US Geological Survey (USGS) Geographic Name Information System (GNIS) Feature ID where available. The Feature ID is linked to the corresponding feature description on the USGS web site.
- The place detail section now contains the Public Land Survey System (PLSS) Section and Township identification where available (more to come).
- There are now over 101,400 links to place-specific genealogy resources.
- Several miscellaneous improvements.
14 October 2009
- Approximate Locations. When adding cemeteries to Histopolis, often the published
description of the cemetery location lacks sufficient detail to positively and precisely
identify the cemetery coordinates from available online maps and satellite imagery.
Previously if the precise coordinates could not be determined with confidence, no
map coordinates were associated with the cemetery and the map view would only show
the county (or township, if known) where the cemetery is located.
Now if the local area of a cemetery can be determined, the coordinates of the area are provided and an indication of the uncertainty is provided. For example, if the location description reads "On Hwy 123 1/2 mile north of county road K" we will indicate a map position that is on the indicated road about 0.5 mile north of the intersection but also indicate an uncertainty of 1,000 feet (for instance). A circular area with a radius of 1,000 feet will be drawn on the map indicating the area where the cemetery is believed to be located. See Beverly Cemetery and 130 other cemeteries in Horry County, South Carolina as examples. Feedback on cemetery locations is appreciated. - There are now over 93,100 links to place-specific genealogy resources.
- Several miscellaneous improvements.
6 October 2009
- In the News. Created an "In the News" Section to provide news summaries for places that have current news stories that may be of interest to genealogists and historians. There is also an In The News page that lists the places that have news on Histopolis.
- There are now over 78,500 links to place-specific genealogy resources.
- Several miscellaneous improvements.