Gesher Galicia is happy to announce that the All Galicia Database
(the AGD) has just been updated with new content. This is Gesher Galicia's
free public online multi-database search engine, available at
http://search.geshergalicia.org/ .

The following new databases have just been added:

- Grodek Jagiellonski School (1916) -- (now Horodok, Livivska oblast,
Ukraine)
- Husiatyn School (1912) -- (now Husiatyn, Ternopilska oblast,
Ukraine)
- Jaroslaw School (1919-1921) -- (now Jaroslaw, Subcarpathian
Voivodeship, Poland)
- Kalusz School (1911) -- (now Kalush, Ivano-Frankivska oblast, Ukraine)
- List of Rabbis in Galicia (1868)
- Nadworna Tax List (1932) -- (now Nadvirna, Ivano-Frankivska oblast,
Ukraine) -- our first tax list!
- Tarnobrzeg School (1915) -- (now Tarnobrzeg, Subcarpathian
Voivodeship, Poland)
- Tlumacz School (1920) -- (now Tlumach, Ivano-Frankivska oblast, Ukraine)
- Zolkiew Jewish Death Records (1855-1870) -- (now Zhovkva, Lvivska
oblast, Ukraine)

You might have noticed that a number of these new datasets are
transcriptions >from early 20th Century school records >from Galician
public schools. We'll have an e-mail update sent out soon about where
these new records came from, and how you may be able to find similar
school yearbooks for your own Galician towns of interest. The good
news: the original record sources were typed/printed (not
handwritten), they're already online, and they're out of copyright and
freely available! More details soon...

There were also major updates / record additions to these existing
databases:

- Lviv Jewish Birth Records (1805-1868)
- Lviv Jewish Death Records (1805-1870)
- Lviv Jewish Marriage Records (1801-1860)
- Zbaraz Jewish Birth Records (1815-1876; 1897; 1899) -- (now Zbarazh,
Ternopilska oblast, Ukraine)
- Zbaraz Jewish Death Records (1804-1858; 1894-1907; 1912-1942) --
(now Zbarazh, Ternopilska oblast, Ukraine)

Note that updates to the Lviv birth, marriage, and death records
databases are ongoing and will continue throughout 2012.

And there were minor updates to this existing database:

- Mielnica Jewish Marriage Records (1858-1876) -- (now
Melnytsya-Podilska, Ternopilska oblast, Ukraine)

There were also some code tweaks behind the scenes to improve the
loading time of the AGD website. (In geek speak, the PHP files are
now gzipped and I added some new .htaccess rules to manage "expires"
headers.)

This brings the current record totals for the All Galicia Database to
192,268 records >from 60 different data sources. Profound thanks go
out to all the transcribers, project managers, data donors, and
financial donors who helped make this database possible!

This will be the last content update to the All Galicia Database for
2011. We'll pick up with not only more content updates, but also some
very exciting new website features in early 2012. The source code
powering the website will also be released to the public in January
2012 as a new downloadable open source software project, so that other
organizations (or individuals) wishing to use or adapt the software
for their own projects may do so -- free! More details will come next
month.

I'm also happy to announce that I will be presenting a session on the
AGD code at the 2012 RootsTech genealogy/tech conference, which will
be held in Salt Lake City >from February 2-4, 2012. The talk is
formally entitled "Building an open source genealogical search engine
with Apache Solr" and it's on the developer track. I am hoping to
hear soon whether or not it will be livestreamed and/or video
recorded.

A very happy Hannukah and happy new year to everyone!

- Brooke Schreier Ganz
Los Angeles, California