Procedures

PROCEDURES

Now that people other than me are working in the MasonicGenealogy space, it's necessary for me to describe how we are going to update information on the site. This page describes procedures when new or revised information is obtained.

DON'T PANIC

The good news is that, first, most of the information already in place isn't going to change over time. There are only so many years in our history and they're only added one at a time, once a year. The districts are similarly bounded, and unless a future Grand Master decides to completely redraw them as was done in 2003, we're unlikely to have to do any major reconstruction. And as far as deceased brothers go . . . anyone who's dead will remain that way. Similarly, lodges are a relatively stable list; we need to concern ourselves with mergers and surrenders, but not so much with new lodges, and they usually appear one at a time, with lots of warning, and over the course of a few years.

Our main concern is with people: people being added - Past Masters, District Deputies, new Permanent Members - and dying off and being marked appropriately. When someone dies - particularly if it's recorded in the Proceedings - we need to update the entry in a number of places. It should be done by a script, but the level of sophistication is not that great. Sue me.

NON-PEOPLE UPDATES

These fall into general categories: Annual maintenance; Quarterly maintenance; and Events.

ANNUAL MAINTENANCE

Every year the Grand Lodge publishes its Proceedings for the preceding year. In 2012, the Proceedings appeared in July; when they came into my hands I updated the current Year Page. Until things become more distributed, I'll probably be handling this task myself. It involves selecting information from the Proceedings, including Quartrly