Collaborate and Share with a Kindex® Family Archive

Are you looking for an online space where you can share your trove of genealogical photos and records with family and friends? How about a space where you can easily transcribe and index your files, as well as enlist your family members to help you with this task?

Then a Kindex® family archive might be just the solution for you!

What is Kindex®?

Simply put, Kindex® is a website where users can 1) gather their photos and records into a single digital archive, 2) transcribe and tag their photos and records, and 3) search and share their archive with family and friends.

The inspiration for Kindex® came from the developers’ personal experience with genealogical documents. According to founder Cathy Gilmore, “While sorting and scanning our grandmother’s collection of personal papers, my cousin [co-founder Kimball Clark] and I [was] overwhelmed in a sea of letters, diaries, photos, and other personal documents. As we pored over the handwritten pages, we realized that we needed a solution beyond just digitizing.”

So, Cathy and Kimball decided to create a place where individuals, families, and organizations could upload and index their family history photos, documents, and other records in an accessible and searchable archive.

Incidentally, Kindex® was the winner of the People’s Choice Award at the 2017 RootsTech Innovators Showdown.

Types of Plans

Kindex® currently offers three different plans:

• Kindexer™ (free) – This plan is for the user who wants to transcribe, search, or browse records in the Kindex® public archives or collaborate on a private archive by requesting access from the archive owner. This account is also for family members and friends who want to view your archive and help transcribe documents. It does not include an archive.
• Kindex® Cloud ($5/month or $0 with Rewards*) – This plan creates a PUBLIC archive with unlimited records, collaborative tools, and full access to Kindex’s built-in indexing tools. Note: Records in this archive are searchable and accessible via search engines and can be indexed and downloaded by anyone with a Kindex® account.
• Kindex® Closet ($10/month or $5 with Rewards*) – This plan creates a PRIVATE archive. Invite anyone you choose to join, contribute, index, and search unlimited records. These records are not visible in search engines and can only be indexed and downloaded by the archive owners and collaborators who have been invited to the archive.

*Kindex® Rewards

For every 20 records indexed in your archive, you will receive a $5 credit toward your next month’s subscription. That means your Kindex® archive could be FREE (depending on your plan)!

Rewards details:

• Limit of one $5 credit per month per archive
• Credits do not accumulate or rollover.
• Credits cannot be redeemed for cash.
• Collaborators can earn credits for your archive, so get your family involved in transcribing!

To learn more about Kindex® Rewards, visit the website.

Adding Files to Your Archive

Once you log into your archive, hit the green Add Records button to start uploading photos and documents.

File formats currently accepted include:

• PDF
• JPG
• PNG
• MP3 (audio files)

Records may be added from your computer or imported directly from FamilySearch Memories using an ancestor’s FamilySearch ID.

You can also batch upload multiple files that are grouped together in the same folder. To do this, click on the first file, press and hold the Shift key, then select the last file of the group.

An unlimited number of records can be uploaded to your archive, but individual files are limited to 25 MB in size.

Records within your archive are organized into Collections and Sub-Collections (basically, folders within your archive). When you upload a new record, you will need to assign it to an existing collection/sub-collection or select “Add Collection” to create a brand-new collection.

Information (metadata) about the record may be added in the Record Info section at this time or at a later date. Metadata can be assigned to all records in a batch upload.

Transcribing Your Records

Transcribing your records is optional, but doing so will not only make your documents easier to read, but every word in the document will become searchable.

Click a record from your archive to open the transcription window. The record image will appear on the left and the transcription box will be on the right.

Now, start typing! Many text formatting options are available, including strikethrough, bold, italic, notes, and an ellipsis […] to indicate writing that is illegible. Images, hyperlinks, and HTML code can be added to the transcription.

Indexers can leave comments about a record for the archive owner in the box at the bottom right.

Searching and Downloading

Records in your archive are searchable by their transcription text and metadata (information in the “Record Info” section). Click the magnifying glass icon at the top right to begin your search. You can narrow your search by selecting a specific collection or sub-collection from the results window.

Need to download and share your records? You can do that!

• Select Indexed from the top menu. When the record opens, you can download a copy of the original file, download the “Kindexed” text as a PDF file (which includes a QR code and link to view the original file online), or grab a copy of the link to share.

• Click the gear icon on the top right to access the Manage Archive settings and select the Tools tab. From here you can download ALL of your archive data in a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet (XLS file) or download your archived records in a ZIP file.

My Impression

Back in early 2019, I purchased from eBay a box of about 100 or so letters and other ephemera belonging to my great-aunt Winnie Swanay. The items had been improperly stored for at least 40+ years (some papers have bite marks… eww!), so the first step was to get them organized and into archival sleeves and boxes before they disintegrated. After that, I would start scanning and digitizing, a step I’m still working on, unfortunately.

After reading through a few letters, I knew right away that I wanted to share them with my father… especially when I found letters written by his parents before he was born. I considered several options for online sharing, such as uploading the images to a private folder on Flickr or into a private Facebook group, but both of these seemed like an organizational nightmare to me.

So, I decided to give Kindex® a try instead. I’ve been a Closet subscriber (the private archive) for about 2 years, and I love being able to easily share documents and photos with my father.

Features I Like

• The transcription window makes transcribing a breeze. Sure, I could use a product like Transcript or Scrivener to do this, but I like having everything I need right there in one place.
• Transcribed text stays with the record and becomes searchable.
• Information about the record – including its provenance – stays attached, thus preventing “citation separation.” I hate when you find a photo or record – say, on FamilySearch family tree – and you have no idea where it came from originally. Grrr.
• Organizing records into collections is simple and flexible.
• Batch uploading. This saves so much time!
• Kindex® Rewards. Although I haven’t earned any rewards yet, I love the idea of saving money by transcribing records (c’mon Dad, let’s get indexing!).

Features I Would Like to See

• The ability to rotate images from within the archive. Once you add a record, there is no way (that I can find) to rotate it. I discovered this when my father uploaded a document that should have been rotated horizontally. I had to download the file, rotate it correctly, and re-upload it to the archive.
• Better separation of items in collections and sub-collections. When you first log into your archive, you see everything in every collection. To filter, you need to select a collection from the left menu, but be careful to deselect the collections you don’t want. This can be confusing.
• The ability to upload video. I’ve heard a rumor that this feature is coming, though.
• I really like the ability to download PDF transcriptions, but I would prefer that the text not be divided into columns. It gives the impression that the original document was also divided into columns.
• An integrated mobile app for scanning and uploading. Kindex® used to work with the Kinsnap app, but this no longer appears to be the case (unless there’s more than one Kinsnap app?).

For the record, I am not a Kindex® affiliate, nor will I make any money from this post. I’m just a happy customer who likes a product and wants to share it with my readers!

Since my plan is for a private archive, I am unable to share it with you publicly. But I do invite you to take a tour of the public archives to get a feel for what Kindex® is all about.

Resources

For more information about Kindex®, please visit the following links.

• Sign up as a Kindexer™ (free) or request an archive – https://app.kindex.org
• Getting Started for Archive Owners
• Getting Started for Kindexers
• Explore the Archives
• Get help digitizing and organizing your files

What are YOU using to collaborate with family and share your genealogy archive? Please tell us in the comments!

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