Legacy Family Tree 8 Revealed at Recent BYU Conference

One of the classes I attended at the recent BYU Family History and Genealogy Conference was "What's New in Legacy Family Tree 8" by Geoff Rasmussen. I always love to learn about new versions of software.  I wish I had images but hopefully this write up on what Geoff demonstrated and discussed will do. 

Geoff told us Legacy Family Tree 8 will be available in the next month or so. We saw a demonstration on a pre-release version of Legacy 8 that was just given to Geoff an hour before the class. At BYU you could purchase Legacy 7 for $20 and then get the update for free. You would get the Legacy 8 book that day but the CD would ship later. If you buy Legacy 7 after the conference you still get the upgrade free.

There was a question asked if Legacy would be releasing a Mac version of the software. Geoff said that with things moving to the cloud, in the next couple of years it won’t matter if you’re on Apple or PC. That was a rather curious comment. Does that mean Legacy 9 would be an online program?

Geoff did mention his new book “Legacy Family Tree -  Unlocked!” based on his webinar series “Watch Geoff Live”. The book was written using Legacy 8.

He also said there would be a free update to Legacy 7 that week that would have the new Family Tree interface. The class was two weeks ago and just tonight I discovered there was a new update released on 13 Aug 2013 for Legacy 7.5.0.267. It does appear to be working with the Family Tree now.  Curiously I haven’t seen any mention on the Legacy Mailing Lists about this update.

New in Legacy 8

FamilySearch

It will be working with the FamilySearch Family Tree when it is released but adding sources will come later. In the past when you clicked on the FamilySearch button in Legacy it would take a while to load. Now it’s instant. The look is similar to the way it was with New FamilySearch. There is a heart icon to show you the living people. There are also some new filtering options. I also saw that they were using the new FamilySearch logo.

Reports & Charts

1. Origins Report – created in response to one of Geoff’s children asking where they come from. This report will tell you what percentage of “blood” you have from various countries of origin. The percentages are based on your ancestor’s place of birth recorded in your database. It’s a good way to see the count of your ancestors and what countries they are from.

2. Migration Report – It shows a person’s descendants and where they are on the country and state level. You can see how far and wide a person’s descendants spread out in the world.

3. Pedigree Charts with Citations. They devised a way to simplify the numbering system so sources can be reference on the pedigree chart. Next to the events for a person will be a super-scripted numeral that references a separate source page. The source page has numbered paragraphs the will list all the sources for that event. A person’s birth could be number 1, their marriage number 2, all the sources for that event will be in its own paragraph.

4. Source Labels – you can print out labels with your source citations so you can affix it to the actual source document.  

5. Picture Appendix – this was not covered in class but it is in the handout. It says there is a new Picture Appendix to your books.

Color Coding

Mary Hill the author of “Mary Hill Color Coding System” was in the audience. Legacy has had her color coding system in their program for a long time. You can now color code from two starting points (one for you and one for your spouse, for example) and track the eight great-grandparents’ lines. You can use any color or level of that color you want. If your line intersects with another colored line it will give you both colors on that one person.

Migration Mapping

The Mapping button has always shown you a map with a list of places where a person lived. The list is now sorted chronologically. There is a play button that animates the ancestor’s movement through time and how they migrated from place to place. You can click on a location to zoom in and view it. It also includes the events of family members and their locations on the map.

Instant Duplicate Checking

When you add a new person to your database it will check if the person is already in your tree. It will give you the possible duplicate and allow you to merge them.

My Toolbar

Legacy 8 uses a ribbon for the menu like the charting program does. If you double click on a title it will hide the buttons below to give the program more room. You can add your own custom buttons now. Geoff had a button for the AniMap program, when you clicked on it; it launched the program for you. He also had one setup to launch a website. So the customized button is allowing you to add a short cut to other programs on your computer and internet favorites.

Potential Problem Alerts and Gaps

A little red exclamation point (!) will appear next to a person that contains a potential problem. If you hover over it, it will tell you what the potential problem is. It will also show you any “Gaps of Unusual Size”, alerting you to too many years between the births of the children, or to many years between the marriage and the first child’s birth.  That could suggest possible missing children. You can mark items not a problem and adjust the alert setting criteria.  Problem Alert’s will also appear on a person’s edit screen next to the individual facts.

Shared Events

You can now add an event and then share it with other individuals. Instead of copying a census fact to all the family members you can now share just one event between them all. It will give you a list of family members to select to share the event with. You can also specify each person’s role in the event. The shared events are included in the reports.

Chronology View

Shared event are included in the chronology with an indicator and their assigned role. Under Options you can now include extended family members, such as grandparents, and grandchildren.

Wall Charts

1. Family Bow Tie chart displays the ancestors of the husband and wife on either side, as well as their children in the middle.

2. Descendant chart with left-to-right formatting.

Statistic Report

They have extended the number of statistic reporting in your database. From the list you can go to anyone in your database. You can create a search list out of any of the results. Here are some of examples given: family statistics, individual statistics, birth by era, longest living individual, average life span of individuals, and average life span by century, gender, average age for man or women when married, and most popular name.

Tagging

You can see all 9 tags on the screen. In Advanced Tagging you will see a count total for the number of people in each tag.

Pictures

In the tools there is a “Media Re-linker” to help you move pictures from one computer to another. Another feature is the “Gather My Media Files” button. It will tell you if your files are all over your computer and help you gather them into one top folder.

Sorting

When adding new children it will auto sort their order. It will also automatically sort your events. The person’s age at the time of the event now appears. You can over-ride the auto sort if needed. 

Sources

I don't recall Geoff mentioning this part of the handout on Sources.  This is what the description says. "In addition to the new Source Labels, Legacy's new Source Quality settings let you record the quality (original vs derivative, primary vs secondary, etc., direct vs indirect) of each source as you attempt to prove your conclusions. The Source Clipboard has also been expanded to load up to five different citations that can be assigned at the click of a button."

As I have time I will write up more about the other classes I attended at the BYU Family History and Genealogy Conference.

See ya tomorrow, for tomorrow is always another genealogy day.