Family Tree Maker 2010 Platinum Edition (PC CD)
Product Details
- Amazon Sales Rank: #46 in Software
- Brand: Avanquest Software
- Released on: 2009-10-08
- Platforms: Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7
- Format: CD-ROM
Customer Reviews
Family Tree Maker, 2010
I have been using FTM 2010 for several weeks, and am very satisfied with it. Having previously used FTM 2009, there are several features that I have found to be considerably improved. The most significant of these are the 'enhanced nodes' in the 'People' workspace, the improved mapping controls in the 'Places' workspace, and the better integration with Ancestry website. The 'enhanced nodes' feature adds thumbnails and lifespan dates to the 'boxes' in the pedigree. If you have several generations of ancestors with the same name, this greatly reduces the likelihood of confusion when working on your tree. One of the most irritating aspects of the previous version of FTM was its propensity to mis-locate places on the map, even when you entered the correct county and country. This issue has been addressed in the 2010 version by the provision of a push-pin facility, which enables the user to override the software's automatic choice. The integration with Ancestry allows both uploading trees to, and downloading them from the website. However, the trees are still not synchronised, so that working on either one will not update the other. This is one aspect that will hopefully be addressed in the future. The only other major gripe I have with the software is that there is no facility to identify individuals on group photographs. If you have a wedding-group photo with a dozen or more people on it, you can very easily link all the individuals to the one photograph, but in order to know who is who, you have to write tedious descriptions - "the third person from the left on the second row from the front, etc" - in order for them to be of any real value. Having previously been a user of the (free) Family Tree Builder software, which has this facility, it is disappointing that FTM have not made something similar available. Notwithstanding this, the software is both very easy and satisfying to use, and has advanced features that will suit the most demanding of family historians.
I originally purchased FTM Deluxe which claimed to have 3 months subscrption to ancestry, but only had 2 weeks. This edition had 6 months and when on special offer was worth considering as subscription to ancestry is £100-150 annually.
The software is powerful. There is starting guide (with a demo to work though- this is based in Diana Spencer and I found it upsetting to have her as an example) there is also a hints and tips booklet, v helpful when the basics are mastered. There is also an online video overviews and help functions.
The basic operation is quite simple, but soon becomes quite complex to use the full facilities. There are several 'views' of the data. It's not clear to me whether it is better to have one large tree with every one on it or split into smaller files with significant branches of the family.
