Genealogy Software

[webfrau]

What genealogy software do you use?

There are a lot of options available for storing and compiling your family tree using computer software. Share your experiences in this thread, what do you use and why? I will compile a list of the software used which might be helpful for those starting out in genealogy.

PC Software
Family Tree Maker
Personal Ancestral File
Brothers Keeper
Legacy
Roots Magic
Animap - A County Boundary Historical Atlas (USA) - not family tree software

Mac Software
ifamily for Leopard
Family Tree Maker

Online options
Ancestry
My Heritage
One Great Family

Mobile options
Mobile Family Tree Pro
Ancestry phone app

[PQ]

My brother completes all the genealogy research and then he emails it to me. He works on our family tree about 8 hours per day, seven days per week. (You can tell that he is not married, has no children, and is retired).

I am livin' in the lap of luxury.

[Abby]

You're very lucky PQ

[Lauren]

That would be good but I love being the detective myself!!

[shazzt]

I have Family Tree Maker (much neglected). I have also an app on my ipad (also much nelgected....) called Mobile Family Tree Pro

[Erica]

I think if I had that sort of available time I would be the same as your brother Fran When I retire I keep telling myself

I currently use Ancestry.com for research and for saving information online to my online family tree. But for off line work I use Family Tree Maker 2012, this also syncs to my online tree and is far better than having to save the GED file and upload to my pc software. I also have Legacy 7.5 Family Tree which is a good program and also links to research material but it's not as comprehensive as Ancestry and I had to insert the information manually and I didn't find it as easy to find my way around.

[Lynnie]

I operate the same way as Erica! Family Tree Maker 2012 and the phone app. I love the phone app :-)

[Lauren]

IM just using a free one I found online ( Myheritage.com) but its been enormously helpful so far already

[Elisabeth]

I have FTM 2011 and use Ancestry.com online as well as their phone app.

[JaeDee]

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (Mormons)have a great program that is free called PAF that I use. They also have a list of programs that work well with that system that you can download. Here is the link to that page.

https://familysearch.org/products

I know that PAF is free, not sure about the other products.


Poke around the rest of the site. https://familysearch.org/

[Lauren]

I now have Family Tree Maker 2012 and use it in all its versions - online, not online and as an android app -

[sandygb]

I finally got around to installing my free copy of FTM 2011 I got over a year ago. I can't say that I fully understand how to use it. It took me a while to get the hang of creating my tree in Ancestry.com. Not so much the creation of my tree, but adding and editing info, using accepted date formats, etc. Then understanding how to review the hints properly and choose which data to accept and which to ignore. At this point, I am more comfortable using Ancestry.com rather than FTM. I suppose that's ok.

I did buy the FTM 2012 upgrade, and the sync seems like it will be worth the price for that feature alone. I still feel lost using FTM though. I think it will take a lot more playing around.

[Lauren]

Yes its quite different looking than ancestry online isnt it - im slowly finding my way around it - and Ive had a few issues with the syncing now and then - when ive added someone in my puter and it didnt add online -and when Ive deleted someone on the puter and it didnt do it online.. not every time - just randomly - a little frustrating but all in all I like being able to use both. The online version feels more comfortable to me still but i guess thats because thats what i started using

[honeymoon]

I use Brother's Keeper which is genealogy shareware.

I like it because it has a really flexible database that you can add different fields to. So for example for an individual I can add details of the different census addresses, other residences and just general note fields. You can attach photos and files to the individual.

It has really good source files so that you can record where you found the information and these are stored as a database as well, so you can use the same source over and over again with the flexibility to add specific details for the particular individual.

It has a good collection of reports too.

For those from elsewhere, Brother's Keeper is available in: English, Norwegian, French (Canadian), French (Belgium), German, Danish, Icelandic and Czech and there are language files for Dutch, Dutch (Belgium), Slovenian, Slovak, Swedish, Finnish, Russian, Polish, Catalan, Portuguese, and Afrikaans (no foreign help files for those languages yet.)

[LauraLou]

Originally Posted by Lauren

I now have Family Tree Maker 2012 and use it in all its versions - online, not online and as an android app -

How do I find that? I wonder if I can put it on my Kindle Fire.