Thursday, May 10, 2018

Using FTDNA's API

Edit 1 5/11/2018: Note that this does not mean anything bad for you at all and you can continue using ftdna as normal, it's a fantastic site. Also, there is a possibility that the information I was sent regarding who was supposed to be able to use the API could have been incorrect, see the comments section for an interesting discussion on that. I think that the big takeaway from this post should be if you want to use the API for your company it is worth checking in with ftdna to ensure you have permission to do so.

Edit 2 5/11/2018: I have been looking into it more, and I believe that this is not in fact an issue at all which I am very happy about. I am still confused about why ftdna told me otherwise, and it may be that you are technically still not supposed to use it, but I'm really not sure at this time. Special thanks to the anonymous commenter for clearing things up!

Note: I actually wrote this all the way back on March 12th. I had notified FTDNA of the fact that their API was accessible by the public even before that. I am publishing this now because I feel it is my right/duty. They made the decision not to fix it or notify the public that they can use the API, so I think that somebody should. I'm hoping that this post will perhaps raise awareness about this and make FTDNA make a definitive choice about whether they want their API to be publicly available (which I personally think would be fantastic).

Purpose

This document will serve to explain the process through which I found a security vulnerability in the FTDNA web API, as well as the process I went through in reporting said vulnerability and what I would have done differently if given the chance.

Definitions

Some company names and terms used in this document will undoubtedly be unfamiliar to those reading it. This section will serve to clarify said terms.

How OneNote Can Help You Transcribe Documents

One Note Interface

OneNote is my program of choice for transcribing newspapers. It's OCR tools, instant copy paste photo insertion, and flexible formatting functionalities make it a breeze to transcribe documents in no time at all. This post will take you through my transcription workflow, allowing you to just as easily transcribe your source material in a matter of minutes.

What is OCR and Why Should You Use It?

OCR stands for Optical Character Recognition. A character is a single letter within a word. OCR programs will 'look' at an image and identify the characters inside, allowing you to copy and paste text from an image. Using OCR programs will make transcribing go much quicker since the computer does most of the work, allowing you to spend more of your time researching and making discoveries.

1. Insert Your Source Image into One Note

There are lots of ways you can do this, but I will just show an example of one. Much of the time I am not transcribing a full image, but just a portion of one. Thus I usually only want to import a portion of an image into One Note. Windows operating system has a nice little tool called 'snipping tool' which will capture just a section of your screen for you, which is exactly what we need.

For my main image, I will use page 40 from the 1931 Bethany Daisy, my largest currently ongoing transcription project. Here is the image if you wish to follow along:
Bethany Daisy
Page 40 of the Bethany Daisy
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