I'm still new at this (started a few months ago)and I'm wondering about indexes. I've had a couple of microfilms sent to a local FHL and so far haven't found what I was hoping to find. I realize that's natural to often not find anything, but I'm wondering how complete an index is compared to the original records. If, for example, I look at birth records for a city in Indiana and don't find my ancestor should I assume he wasn't born in that city or go to the city and search original records (after calling ahead). How do others determine this?