Really useful tips, comments and suggestions - thank you Michael. June 17, 2017 3:28 AM, "Michael Feldman" wrote: Hi all,
I've just completed a set of descendant charts for a reunion of my mother's extended family. The event -- the first such in 50 years -- took place last Saturday in Philadelphia with splendid turnout, and everyone had a wonderful time. Many in attendance were wowed by the 20-page booklet showing the 5 generations starting with my grandparents who arrived in the US in 1907. My mom was the youngest of their eight children. Using v8, I was able to control the chart content on each page by adjusting its starting point and number of generations displayed. This allowed me to produce a very attractive set of sub-family charts (one or a few pages for each of the eight). A number of my relatives made clear that this would be a tremendous resource for them and their kids. I handled the divorce issue by inserting a little text box with "div" just above the double line that connects spouses. (See the "Insert" tab -- 3rd item in the chart menu.) Luckily there weren't too many of these. I also confirmed with divorced family members whether or not they wanted the "div" to be published in the chart. Some did, some didn't. I made a policy decision to prioritize family harmony over genealogical precision -- this was definitely the right choice for the circumstances. I found the ability to hand-edit a chart -- move boxes to better fit them on a page, add text boxes, etc. -- to be a useful feature. I do wish the chart were better integrated with the database; as it is, even a slight change to a box's content (correct a typo or whatever) requires the chart to be regenerated from scratch, so any hand-editing is lost and must be re-done. I'd like to see a Legacy chart work more like one in a spreadsheet -- the chart is dynamically linked to its content so a change in the database is automagically reflected in the chart. I'd also like to be able to specify that a date be displayed as year-only. In this era of privacy concerns, one's birth date has become an important identifier (especially in health care). I'd like to be able to flip a switch to suppress month and day, so as to show the approximate age of a relative without exposing their full birth date. Perhaps I'm missing something, but with v8, I found no way to do this except to physically delete month and day from their record in the database. I'll put these in as suggestions. All in all, I was satisfied with Legacy as a vehicle for this. For now, my project is complete; we'll see what the future brings. Michael Feldman Portland, Oregon
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