Genealogy Software and Backups.

[Biggles50]

Currently we have Roots Magic, Family Historian and Reunion on our PC and iMac (RM and Reunion only).

Only really used the apps for making charts from Gedcom files but I really have wanted to improve my Backup routines.

Recently I upgraded to v8 of Roots Magic and thought that I would set up the Tree Share feature with my main trees that are on Ancestry.  Very simple to do and we now have all the Ancestry Family Trees together with all the associated media files that are linked into the Ancestry Trees now downloaded automatically and stored on my PC.  Make changes on either Ancestry or within Roots Magic and Tree Share to sync.

A useful feature on the Roots Magic app is the error checking, Problem List, Duplicates, Tree Count (unlinked individuals and small floating trees) etc can be called up and worked through to clear errors.

Surprising just how much errors can creep in especially the Baptism before Birth where an estimated Birth Date has been used then a Baptism found which pre-dates the estimated Birth Date.

So it has turned out to be a very useful exercise and I now can be sure that all of my trees are as error free as they can be.

Where in the past I built un-attached trees in my main tree with the DNA match as the base person, all these that are still un-attached have been removed to their own separate tree.

Next step is to create Roots Magic On The Go on a pair of USB memory sticks as a backup and to place all the documents, photos, media etc there as well.  Cannot have enough backups.

Talking of Backups, I am four drive person, main PC, Laptop and two portable USB hard drives each have the same data and I use FreeFileSync to copy data between the drives and then I keep the two USB drives in different locations well away from each other.  Most importantly, I record what I have done and when in an old Filofax wallet so it is easy to look up what and when.

Not tried to produce charts with RM as previously we used Reunion for them as it was far superior.

There are quirks and in the case of multiple links (I know the culprit for these and, well I just ask to be told if new people are added) and I find it is easier to correct in Ancestry than in RM.

Other software is available, this has been a small slice of my usage of this particular App.

[Biggles50]

Today has been a tad frustrating.

I have tried printing a Pedigree chart using Roots Magic 8, selecting A3 as the paper size and looking at a preview, the results are probably best described as what we used to get using a dot matrix printer in the 90’s.

Switched over to Reunion (iMac) and tried that but again it will not do what I want it to do since the data box for each person is very small and practically unreadable.

Previously with Reunion I have found that grabbing a screenshot of the chart showing on the 5k resolution screen on the iMac and then manipulating the file in Photoshop yields the best results.

I do have Family Historian so I will have a play with that.

Self printing ones own charts is not a topic that has had a great response to on this forum.

What I am after is a six or seven generation Pedigree chart printed on a single sheet of A3

If anyone has had any success printing a pro looking chart do please comment as to how and what software you have used.

[mckha489]

I’ve done one  on Reunion BUT no way does it fit on an A3.
The first one generated by Reunion was Massive, so I grabbed all the little boxes and moved them around. Eg squeezed up all the ones who married but had no children.  Rewrote those from one family who had no children and put them into one box etc.  (I manipulate and edit on the resultant chart in in Reunion itself - I don’t see why you would need to use photoshop for that)
but because I have an aversion to a tree being just names and dates, I added photographs and newspaper cuttings in every space I could find,

It’s a descendants tree …7 generations including the head man. And the last generation, as living, all squeezed into one box per family.

The end result is a tree I haven’t had printed yet, but will be about 10 metres long. But I know I can just save the pdf/jpeg (different printshops have different preferences) to a USB stick and take it in where they will print it on one long piece of paper for me.

I don’t think it would fit on an A3 sheet in any world. (Or even A1)  Even if I took off all the images I might get it down to 9 metres but no more, if one wants to still be able to read the jolly thing.   (And this was not a highly fertile family)


If you mean a 7 generation ancestry chart with parents of each only.  Ie direct ancestors of one person, I’ve done a 10 generation one that has been printed and is about half an A1 sheet folded lengthways.  But again, I took it to a print shop, they were able to fit it across the roll, rather than lengthways. I’ll see if I can attach a screen shot of that.. Too large.

Of course not all generations are complete, which is just as well or it would never fit!

I have a rootsmagic question. Were you only able to add the treeshare facility on the PC?  Will it do it on the Mac?

[Gadget]

I've always use Family Historian on A3+ but it really depends how large, wxh, your tree is. Mine is far, far, far too big to print the whole tree if you include all kin and affines.