Downloading A GEDCOM File From An Ancestry Member Tree

The previous article in this series is Introduction To Genome Mate.

Some of the most useful features of Genome Mate require a GEDCOM file of the ancestors of the person who took the DNA test. In preparation for learning to use these features, we need to get a GEDCOM file of the test taker’s ancestors imported into Genome Mate. In this post, I will show how to generate a GEDCOM file from an Ancestry.com Member Tree, since I’ve found many people don’t seem to be aware this feature exists.

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An example of why Ancestry DNA shared ancestor hints need to be verified

To better illustrate why the Ancestry DNA shared ancestor hints should be used only as a suggestion of where the possible connection may be with your DNA match, rather than something taken at face value as confirmation of where the connection is with your DNA match, I wanted to create an example to show how a shared ancestor hint can be completely wrong and misleading. As you can see, in the list of matches for my maternal grandmother’s brother (R E H), he has a shared ancestor hint with both myself and my mother, as indicated by the leaf next to the number of people in our respective trees.

How To Upload Your Ancestry DNA Test Results To GEDmatch

The previous article in this series is How To Download Your Ancestry DNA Test Results.

Now that you’ve successfully downloaded your Ancestry DNA test results file, this file needs to be uploaded to the GEDmatch website (http://www.gedmatch.com). The purpose of this post is to show, in easy to understand steps, how to take the test results file you downloaded to your computer and upload it to the GEDmatch site. My next blog post will be the first of several posts I have planned in which I will begin explaining how to start using the GEDmatch site and tools.

How To Download Your Ancestry DNA Test Results

The previous article in this series is Chromosome Mapping And GEDmatch: An Overview Of What They Are And What The Benefits Are.

After they learn of the benefits of using the GEDmatch website, I am frequently told by my Ancestry DNA matches that they would like to use the GEDmatch tools, but are unsure how to get their Ancestry DNA test results to the GEDmatch site and how to interpret the data the site provides. The purpose of this post is to show, in easy to understand steps, how to get your Ancestry DNA test results downloaded to your computer so they can then be uploaded to the GEDmatch site. My next blog post will show how to take this downloaded file and get it properly uploaded to the GEDmatch site. Then, I will begin a series of posts showing how to start using the GEDmatch site and tools.

Chromosome Mapping And GEDmatch: An Overview Of What They Are And What The Benefits Are

As I’ve been contacting the Ancestry DNA matches of the tests I oversee, I’ve found many people are interested in chromosome mapping and/or GEDmatch, but have questions about what they are, what the benefits are, and what the privacy implications are. My goal in writing this post is to address these questions and offer some simple, easy to understand answers.