Help:Ancestor Relevance Rating

This page describes a mechanism for denoting the degree of relevance an individual has to the family history recorded on this site.

General Relevance Score Concept

Each individual has a relevance defined by the largest of the following.

The children of Sean Marvin Cox have primary relevance.
A parent can get the same Ancestor Relevance Rating as any of their biological children. (Probably non-biological children should be considered as well in some cases of adoption, infidelity, etc. I'll have to figure that out when I come across a relevant case. Probably the husband of the mother at the time of the child's birth should be treated as biological, or the mother's first husband if the child is born out of wedlock. That still would leave other cases indecided.)
- eg. Jacob is a direct ancestor of Sean Marvin Cox. He has primary relevance. His father, John, therefore, also has primary relevance.
A child can get an ancestor rating less than their parent.
- eg. John Smith has two children, Jacob and Brett. John Smith gets his rating from Jacob, who is a direct ancestor of Sean Marvin Cox. Brett's relevance is less than John Smith's, while Jacob's is the same as John Smith's.
A spouse can get an ancestor rating less than their spouse.
- eg. John Smith gets his rating from his child, Jacob, and he has a wife that is not Jacob's mother, then that mother would have less relevance than John Smith, whereas, the mother of Jacob would have the same rating as John Smith.

Primary Relevance is denoted: O
A child gets the rating <parent_rating>C
- eg. John Smith has two children, Jacob and Brett. John Smith gets his rating from Jacob, who has the relevance, O. Brett's relevance is OC.
A spouse gets the rating <spouse_rating>S
- eg. John Smith gets his rating, O, from his child, Jacob, and he has a wife that is not Jacob's mother, then that mother would have the rating OS, whereas, the mother of Jacob would have the rating O.

Smaller number is higher relevance.

Primary Relevance is denoted: 0
A child gets the rating <parent_rating>+1
- eg. John Smith has two children, Jacob and Brett. John Smith gets his rating from Jacob, who has the relevance, 0. Brett's relevance is 1.
A spouse gets the rating <spouse_rating>+1
- eg. John Smith gets his rating, 0, from his child, Jacob, and he has a wife that is not Jacob's mother, then that mother would have the rating 1, whereas, the mother of Jacob would have the rating 0.