egowen wrote:I guess my question was not quite as clear as I intended. I've noticed that using the web interface to update a member's address is not sufficient to cause their records to be moved from the ward even when the change in address put the family way outside the ward boundaries.
There is no way to update a member's address using the Maps website. I think you're assuming that changing the household marker's position somehow changes the address. That is not the case. Placing the marker is simply the way that you help make the geocoding of the address more precise. It does not change the address.
egowen wrote:Updating the family location in MLS under the Move Out link seems to be the only mechanism that moves families from one ward to another.
That's correct. After all, it is possible for a household to be outside your ward boundaries and still have records in your ward (this is completely within policy for moves that are shorter than 3 months, and can be for even longer moves with appropriate permission -- but that's another topic). So the fact that a household is outside your ward boundaries does not necessarily imply a move of records.
egowen wrote:Once that is accomplished and a Send/Receive operation is completed, the records are removed from the losing ward's MLS. The web based Tools / Leader Resources / Membership / Member List (Only available to ward leadership) is updated quite quickly but the Tools / Directory and Tools / Maps does not get updated at all quickly.
That's not my experience. The Directory gets updated very quickly -- I don't know precisely how fast, but it's much quicker than a day. I'm guessing it's a matter of a few hours or even quicker. I do know that the speed of the move depends on the specificity of the data that is supplied -- if you are pushing records out, the accuracy of the description of the new address and new ward makes a big difference, and if you are pulling records in, then the accuracy of identifying the person (supplying birth date, full name, and even MRN) also makes a difference. I don't look at the Maps nearly as often as the Directory, so I can't comment on that with as much confidence.
egowen wrote: I'd like to know is how frequently the member accessible directory and maps databases are updated based on changes to MLS.
We have had the following scenario several times. A diligent home teacher reports one of his families has moved and provides the new address. The MLS move out operation is completed and the home teacher is told that the families records had been moved. The home teacher looks at the member accessible directory or maps application and calls back to say that the family is still listed and the clerk didn't do what he said he had. Sometimes they are using a smartphone app and we remind them that their local copy of the database is only updated when they tell the smartphone app to fetch a new copy of the database but sometimes that does not work because the database that supports the web based access and smartphone apps has not yet been updated.
The scenario of the LDS Tools app on a mobile device seems much more likely to lead to out of date data than the online Directory. If the user doesn't do a manual update, then the data could easily be stale. And I thought that the webservices that populate the data were updated just as fast as the Directory, but I'm not certain of that.
egowen wrote:Technology is wonderful when it works the way we think it should.
Well said. Sometimes are expectations are the problem, and sometimes it's the technology.