Grandma's Window Help
Log-In Procedures | How to Search | Printing Pages | Date Ranges | Advanced Searches

Log-In Procedures.  The log-in screen asks you for your username, provided to you when you were registered for this service, and a password, initially provided to you but which you can change (through the Set Password option on the Database Selection screen).

Usernames and passwords are not case-sensitive; that is, it does not matter whether you enter your username in capital letters or in lower case letters.  Also, unlike requirements on some computer systems, the password does not expire.

If you are working in the database and do not request a new page for lengthy period (set at this time to 120 minutes), you will be required to log in again.

If you forget your password, click on "Lost your password?"  Enter your email address that was entered when you set up your account.  If it matches, your username and password will be emailed.

How to Search.  If you know the exact given name and surname, enter them in the appropriate boxes and uncheck the checkbox which reads "Search all known spelling variations."  Capitalization is not necessary.  The search will find individuals whose given name matches exactly the exact letters you entered and whose surname matches exactly the exact letters you entered.  The resultant matches will be placed in a pull-down list, ordered by birth date (if available).

If the checkbox is checked, the search follows a different procedure.  Mennonites in Prussia and Russia were not rigorous about how they spelled names, resulting in many variations.  Therefore, Grandma's Window will attempt to determine a name code and use the code for the search.  First the 3-digit GRANDMA surname code is found which represents all common Low German alternate spellings. The given name is converted to a 2-letter code. For example, if John Claassen is entered and the box is checked, all entries with a surname of Claassen, Classen, Klassen, Klaassen, etc., will be included under a single code (036), and Hans, Johann, and John, etc. will be covered with a single code (jo).  Then, using the resultant name code (036jo), all of the entries with variant spellings will be included in the results of the search.

You can search for a woman by entering the married name.  Indicated that the name is the married name by prefixing it with a left curly brace ({).  To search for a woman whose married name is Katherine Thiessen, enter {Thiessen for the surname.

The GRANDMA name code will be shown on the screen.  You can use it directly for subsequent searches.  Enter it in the surname field, prefixed with a back-slash (\).  For example, entering \036jo in the surname field will result in the entire Hans/Johann/John Claassen/Klassen (etc.) list.

Each individual in the database has a unique number, the GRANDMA number, which is prefixed with the # symbol. To use the GRANDMA number to search for an individual, enter #number in place of the Surname.


Printing Pages.  Your printed page will look a little different from the page on the screen.  Interactive information is shown in white characters on the screen and therefore will not be visible.  However, all of the information in an individual profile or a pedigree chart will be visible.


Date Range.  There are two ways to narrow the search by date.

You can select the century by setting one of three options.

You can also select a specific date  with a margin.  That is, if you know that the birthdate is within 15 days of 1/22/1814, you could enter 1/22/1814 for the date and 15 for the margin.  Results would have dates between 1/7/1814 and 2/6/1814.


Advanced Searches.  There are some other techniques and information which may or may not be useful.

For exact searches (checkbox unchecked), you can enter the first letters of a given name or surname and add a % symbol to return any name that starts with those letters. The surname entry, Sm%, will return Smith, Smyth, Smithson, etc.

If the checkbox is unchecked you could even enter only % for the given name, though you are likely to get a huge result.  For example, if you enter % for the given name and enter Peters for the Surname in the master database, you will get over 6,000 names in the resultant list!  Enter just j% for the surname and simply % for the given name, and you will get over 11,000 Janzs, Johnsons, Janzens, Justs, etc.  The lists of results is capped at 25,000 at the present time, but be aware that your download time could be rather lengthy.

You can substitute the underscore (_) for a single character so that any character will be legal in that position.  For instance, the spellings Kopp and Koop have been interchangeable among Russian Mennonites.  If you enter Ko_p with the checkbox unchecked you will get the results from both.

With the checkbox unchecked, there are even more interesting possibilities.  You can use the underscore (_) for characters and numbers in the Grandma name code.  For example, the Grandma name code for Gerhard Ratzlaff is 193ge.  Entering \193ge in the surname field will yield 13 entries in the GRANDMA 3 database.  Change the code to \193__ (that is, two underscores to replace the two-letter given name code) and you will get all 2848 Ratzlaffs (and Ratzloffs) in the database.  Now, change the code to \___ge (that is, three underscores to represent the surname code), and you will get all 5079 Gerhards, Georges, etc.

More information will be added here as we find other special searches helpful.