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looking for clues
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Joined: 04 Apr 2015
Replies: 122

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Post Posted: Sat Jul 31, 2021 6:04 pm      Post subject: Genealogy software recommendation needed
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Advice is needed on genealogy software.

I have used The Master Genealogist - tmg. On the plus side: it gave many choices regarding how to display data, it had good report option and the ability to create custom narratives and had a good online support community. On the negative side: the program was discontinued a number of years ago, sourcing was not intuitive and as I discovered Polish records online the lack of the ability to use Polish characters became a big drawback. Currently my system revolves around saved records and detailed notes.

Here are some of the priorities I am looking for:
• The ability to enter characters from the Polish alphabet
• The ability to publish including customized narratives in a storytelling fashion
• The ability to import and export to other programs
• A program that will store the data on my computer rather than entering data online, that said, I would like the option to publish online in the future if I want to

What genealogy programs do you use to compile and share data? What are the pluses and minuses?

Thanks,
Diane
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Henry Soszynski



Joined: 24 Jun 2019
Replies: 92
Location: Brisbane

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Post Posted: Sun Aug 22, 2021 2:19 am      Post subject: Re: Genealogy software recommendation needed
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looking for clues wrote:
Advice is needed on genealogy software.

I have used The Master Genealogist - tmg. On the plus side: it gave many choices regarding how to display data, it had good report option and the ability to create custom narratives and had a good online support community. On the negative side: the program was discontinued a number of years ago, sourcing was not intuitive and as I discovered Polish records online the lack of the ability to use Polish characters became a big drawback. Currently my system revolves around saved records and detailed notes.

Here are some of the priorities I am looking for:
• The ability to enter characters from the Polish alphabet
• The ability to publish including customized narratives in a storytelling fashion
• The ability to import and export to other programs
• A program that will store the data on my computer rather than entering data online, that said, I would like the option to publish online in the future if I want to

What genealogy programs do you use to compile and share data? What are the pluses and minuses?

Thanks,
Diane


Hello Diane,
Brother's Keeper has a Polish language file, enabling input and display in Polish. I haven't used though with Polish language enabled so I can't guarantee whether it's adequate or not. Your second option I don't know about, but the next two options are okay. The program has a fairly gentle learning curve, but doesn't have all the bells and whistles other programs have. See http://www.bkwin.com/ for further info. You can try before buying.

Cheers,
Henry
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Henryk
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Joined: 05 Dec 2008
Replies: 313
Location: London ON, Canada

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Post Posted: Sun Aug 22, 2021 5:39 pm      Post subject:
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Personal Ancestral File
https://personal-ancestral-file.software.informer.com/5.2/

Here are some of the priorities I am looking for:
• The ability to enter characters from the Polish alphabet=======yes
• The ability to publish including customized narratives in a storytelling fashion=====no
• The ability to import and export to other programs =======yes
• A program that will store the data on my computer rather than entering data online, that said, I would like the option to publish online in the future if I want to=======offline and export

Drawback: no longer updated, supported.
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rsowa
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Joined: 09 Nov 2013
Replies: 177
Location: Dundee, Michigan, USA

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Post Posted: Mon Aug 23, 2021 5:05 pm      Post subject:
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There are a lot of good programs out there, and you will probably get a lot of opinions. I happen to use Ancestral Quest. One of the early versions was used to make the LDS program Personal Ancestral File. All it's data is stored on your computer. For Polish alphabet, I switch my keyboard to use Polish characters (there really aren't that many). Ancestral Quest accepts whatever characters I use. Another advantage to it is that it lets you sync with familysearch.org and you can upload anything you have, and download sources and anything stored at familysearch. Sharing data with other programs is done by creating a standard GEDCOM file, that the other program ought to be able to import.

Ancestral quest's word processing capabilities are not very robust, but you can enter text narrative notes about each person or family. I often create notes to explain inconsistencies in sources, or unusual events. For longer stories and narratives, I compose them in Notepad or Word and then copy/paste them wherever I want.

Hope that helps,
Richard
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namowionka



Joined: 14 Dec 2022
Replies: 4

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Post Posted: Sat Dec 17, 2022 2:02 am      Post subject: RootsMagic 8
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I ran a software company with a client base of multi-national firms. I get really frustrated with many software suites because they are not immediately intuitive to me. I learned of RootsMagic 8 through FamilyTree magazine. It runs on your computer. I started with the free version but then immediately took advantage of their current $29.95 special. I have been using it for only a few days and have entered about 100 family members into my family tree. It is very forgiving. Cleaning up my few mistakes was very easy and I was able to easily remove bad entries from the People and Places tables.

To answer your questions:

• The ability to enter characters from the Polish alphabet - - - Yes. The stored city names do NOT use the special characters. It will let you enter whatever you wish and then bring them up in a popup.
• The ability to publish including customized narratives in a storytelling fashion - - - Yes. The sentence template is changeable for each event (birth, marriage, death, etc.) allowing you to include the Place and Date anywhere in the sentence. The sentences are well constructed. I would recommend getting your data in the program and see if you really need to change it after using their canned reports. They also sell a "Personal Historian" program for about the same price. I don't know anything about it but they do have a trial version for that as well.
• The ability to import and export to other programs - - - Yes
• A program that will store the data on my computer rather than entering data online, that said, I would like the option to publish online in the future if I want to - - - Yes
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aleksanderz
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Joined: 21 Jul 2017
Replies: 56

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Post Posted: Wed Oct 18, 2023 11:31 am      Post subject:
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When it comes to computer-based software, I am personally using mostly Ahnenblatt. You can save the results as Gedcom files and then export them to other programs or upload them online. Polish letters are also available. You can also add narrative forms there. The only downside is that the graphical design could be improved.

Some of my colleagues at PolishOrigins are using MyHeritage which is an online tool but it also allows for saving the results to your computer. It also has Family Tree Builder software you can download to your computer, which allows you to generate automatic reports that can be seen as a semi-narrative form.

Other than that, we mostly use online Ancestry, which also allows you to save your tree in an offline form on your computer.

Note: we are not affiliated with any of these companies Smile.
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