How I am using Ancestry's Network Tool

I have access to the Beta of Ancestry's Network Tool.  At this point, it's only available to those with the ProTools add-on.  Since my main research block is my Cook ancestry, I've created several networks dealing with William Clifford Cook to try and pull together what I have and hopefully make some discoveries.

William Clifford Cook(1811-1882) Networks

• Purchasers at the Estate Sale of Jos S Cook 1838
• Involved in Robert Williams vs Wm Putman et al
• 1830 Bedford County TN Dist 9 Neighborhood
• W C Cook Deeds--Note Involvement Regardless of Role

Within those networks, I use the Stickies to make notes.  In the W C Cook's Deeds network, I create a Stickie for each transaction, which allows me to tag people from the network involved in each record, along with the date and location. The Stickies remind me of Trello (I have used Trello for some genealogy projects to organize my work)

I'm continuing to add people, events, and notes to the network, but the image above is a screenshot of what I have done as of this date. As I add people to the networks, I will need to research them and use the protools tree checker to merge duplicates and check for other errors.  

I've already discovered some overlap and new information because of using the network and working to learn more about the connections. When you review your notes, you can sometimes discover that you have errors, and correcting those will help to clear the picture.  

I love the ability to focus on a Network with the Tree Mapper.

Things I'd like to see as far as improving the Networks

• The ability to move, sort, and save how I view Stickies.  
• An +ADD A PERSON button at the top AND the bottom of a list
• The page view amounts(10 is the default) seem too small, which can hinder productivity (it does in other areas of the site--list of people, DNA match list, etc.)
• The SORT of the items in the Tree Mapper is done by Fact or Event type, but I'd like to be able to arrange that by date overall or at least by date under each Fact or Event.

The Networks tool is a great addition. I truly wish they would work on a Find & Replace tool for locations. That would not only help to improve Ancestry Trees but also the functionality of tools that rely on those trees, such as Thrulines and the ProTools Tree Mapper.