[Ger-Poland-Volhynia] Software recomendations

[Peter]

Hi Richard,

Sure, you could go with Family Tree Maker. I would not feel
comfortable using it myself, but a lot of people do seem to use it.

To my knowledge, Ancestry -- with the possible exception of linking to
Family Tree Maker -- will only ever let you export your data in the
Gedcom format (someone please correct me if I'm wrong). The
disadvantage to Gedcom is that it is possible to lose data when
transferring between different versions of software, let alone with
different kinds of software. I just find that to be completely
unacceptable.

My own software of choice is Gramps:

https://gramps-project.org

One of the reasons that I like Gramps is that it's Open Source and
hence, completely free -- both free as in beer, and free as in your
important genealogical data is not locked down to some closed source,
proprietary format (like Family Tree Maker, etc.)

Also, thanks to it being Open Source, Gramps can be run on Windows,
Mac, and Linux -- all versions of Gramps are free, and all are
actively being developed by Open Sources coders the world over -- not
just a single coder or two at one company. And you can export and
import your Gramps database between the different computer operating
systems without ANY loss of data! The Gedcom standard certainly can't
boast that.

Yet, you can still perform a Gedcom export from Gramps and import that
to Ancestry if you like. That keeps Ancestry as a secondary, online
source of your data, but all of your primary data can still be
maintained and kept free (in every sense) in Gramps.

I was a devotee of The Master Genealogist for years, but that was
Windows only. When I began using Linux as my primary operating system,
I explored Gramps and finally converted my entire database to Gramps
earlier this year. Turns out that was very prescient, as The Master
Genealogist is no longer being developed and the security updates end
on December 31st of this year, a few days from now....

Being left in the lurch by closed, proprietary software (like That
Master Genealogist or countless others) is something that will never
happen with Gramps.

If you're curious to learn about importing your own genealogical data
into Gramps from other sources, visit this link:

https://gramps-project.org/wiki/index.php?title=Import_from_another_genealogy_program

It's all free of charge, and insures that your genealogical data will
be liberated for posterity.

And just like the SGGEE, Gramps has a handy mailing list community
which is very helpful to new and old users:

https://gramps-project.org/contact/

I hope that helps,

Peter


On Mon, Dec 29, 2014 at 12:37 PM, Richard Boltz
<ricardo.tornillo.g at gmail.com> wrote:
> Looking for suggestions for software.  I have been using Ancestry.com for
> research and entering data, photos, comments , etc.  I now realize that I
> am tied to Ancestry forever for access to my work.  Their Family Tree Maker
> looked like a great option because it said it syncs your software, say on
> my PC, with the online information. I assume that all the information is
> downloaded to my PC.  Looking at some reviews of the latest version were
> not so positive.   Thanks for any help.
> _______________________________________________
> Ger-Poland-Volhynia site list
> Ger-Poland-Volhynia at sggee.org
> https://www.sggee.org/mailman/listinfo/ger-poland-volhynia