Contents
When
you start Family Historian, the first thing you will see is the Records
Window. This shows all of the records for people in your file. It
also shows how they are all related (if at all) to a root person that
you choose. Sort the list by clicking on any column heading. Double-click
on any record to see all information you have stored about that person.
To see the relatives of any of the people in the list, select the person
you want and click on any of the 4 diagram buttons on the toolbar 
.
These buttons open the Diagram Window to display respectively Ancestor,
Descendant, Hourglass (Ancestors and Descendants)
and All Relatives diagrams.
More diagrams are accessible from the View menu, including the Everyone diagram, which shows all Individuals in your file.
We will look at Data Entry and Getting Started in section 3 below.
The image shows an example of an Ancestors and Descendants diagram.
Family Historian allows you to work in a much more visual way than is possible with other programs. Diagrams are interactive. They are used in numerous ways - for browsing, exploring and 'navigating', for data entry (by click-and-drag), for editing, and last but not least, for creating wonderful charts to print out or send to others.
Some of the different uses for Family Historian diagrams are described below.
2.1 Use Diagrams for Browsing and Exploring
All
branches in Family Historian diagrams have (optionally) a little circle
called an expansion button (see right). Click on this circle to show the
rest of the branch (if closed) or hide the rest of the branch (if open).
When you do this the diagram automatically adjusts to accommodate the
change. By expanding and hiding branches you can explore your family tree
visually.
2.2 Click-and-drag Within Diagrams to Add Relatives
Double-click
on any box to view and edit a person's record. Any changes are reflected
immediately as diagrams update automatically. Click-and-drag on boxes
to add relatives (spouses, parents or children).
Using diagrams you can add, delete (with appropriate safeguards) or modify records and family relationships.
Using automatic source citations (see below) you can ensure that correct source citations are added, even when you add relatives using diagram-based editing.
2.3 Design Superb Wall Charts Using Smart Trees
All
trees in Family Historian diagrams are Smart Trees. You
can move or resize boxes and branches and the trees adjust automatically,
making it easy to make changes that would otherwise be impossibly difficult.
You can control almost all aspects of any diagram - including the contents of each box (text and pictures), the box shape and style, line thickness and colour, and background colours or stripes, the number of generations to display, the diagram orientation (top-down, left-right, right-left, etc), the layout, and so on.
You can add as many additional trees to any diagram as you wish. You can also add as many extra pictures, text boxes, lines and rectangles as you like, and format them all as you like.
You can choose from a number of preset styles, or create your own look for any diagram. It is entirely up to you what information is displayed in boxes - any and all information that you have about a person can be displayed in their box. Boxes can be configured differently depending on box type (ancestor or descendant etc), on sex, on generation, or on other conditions which you specify. Lines can be configured to have a different appearance (e.g. to be crossed-through) if a couple are divorced or separated, etc.
You can save any diagram as a chart file. Diagrams can also be saved as images in 9 picture formats. You can also save and re-use your settings, and create new custom diagram types if you wish.
View video
demo of a Smart Tree automatically adjusting as boxes & branches are
resized and moved
2.4 Create All Relatives and Everyone Charts
In
Family Historian's unique All Relatives diagram you can
see not just ancestors and descendants, but all other relatives too -
aunts, uncles, cousins (however many times removed), nephews and nieces.
You can include all of your in-laws too if you wish. By default, all relatives
of the same generation are grouped together in bands (see right), and
all relatives of the same type are aligned in rows, with optional row
labels describing the relationships.
Now in version 3, Family Historian has added a new Everyone diagram which includes everyone in your family tree file and all of their relationships.
3.1 Getting Started
Click
New on the File menu to start a new Family Tree file. Then
click on the Insert menu and choose New Individual to add
your first record. Fill in the basic details of the person in the Property
Dialog (see example opposite).
To add a spouse, click in the area marked A, where it says '<click here to add spouse>'. A menu will appear and you will be given a choice of creating a new record for the spouse, or linking an existing record as the spouse.
To add parents for the person, click on the 'Parents>>' button.
3.2 Adding More Relatives
Each
spouse that you add gets their own 'tab' in the middle section of the
Property Dialog. In the example on the right, Cameron Peabody (our subject)
has now been given 2 spouses called 'Sarah' and 'Jean Clare'; and he and
Sarah have 2 children: Amanda and Ian. To add another child, with Sarah
as mother, click in the area marked B,
where it says '<click here to add child>'. There is no limit to
the number of children that can be added in this way (scroll to add 'slots'
for more children if necessary).
To find out what children Cameron Peabody has with Jean Clare, and/or to add children with her as the mother, click on her tab.
Notice that there are 3 tabs in the picture - the third one is blank. However many spouses you add, there will always be one extra blank one. Use the blank tab to add another spouse. There is no limit to the number of spouses that each person can have.
3.3 Adding Events and Attributes
You
can store an unlimited number of facts (events and attributes) about each
individual. These are listed in the Events tab (marked C
in the picture). Click on the 'Add Event/Attribute' button (marked D)
to bring up the Event/Attribute List. You can add as many events
or attributes as you want for each person. People frequently have multiple
occupations and multiple residences (addresses). You can record them all,
with dates, place and address details, and notes for each one.
You can create new fact types if the standard ones are not enough, and you can hide standard fact types you never use.
3.4 Viewing and Editing Record Details
Other genealogy programs force you to 'go' back to a special window, to enter and edit record details. Family Historian's Property Dialog is designed to be used in conjunction with, and to 'float in front of', other Family Historian windows. It doesn't matter if you are looking at the Records Window, the Diagram Window or any other window - if you can see a reference to an individual you can access their full record details, see everything you know about them (including all the sources for your information), and change any of it, without having to 'go' anywhere else. We have already seen that you can use the Property Dialog when using diagrams to browse and explore, or when working on your data using Diagram-Based Editing.
There is no limit to the number of pictures, sounds, videos and other
multimedia that you can add for each person. Each picture can be linked
to all the people in the picture. Each person can be linked directly to
their face in each picture in which they appear. You do this by dragging
stretchy boxes around each face to mark the linked area. When displaying
a picture of a person in a diagram or report (or website or family tree
CD) you can re-use these faces without having to 'crop' your pictures.
When viewing pictures of a person in the Property Dialog, you can switch
between close-ups of their face, and the whole picture.
Learn more about how Family Historian handles pictures and other multimedia
To
create a website to display your Family tree, simply click on Create
a Website on the Internet menu and a wizard will take you through
a few simple steps, and then generate your website for you. Creating a
great-looking family tree CD is just as easy.
Although you can usually just accept the defaults, there are extensive configuration options giving you all the control you need. Click on the link below to visit a simple sample site, created using Family Historian.
Family
Historian's comes with 28 standard reports, and you can create your own
custom reports. All reports are highly configurable. You have fine-grained
control over not only the content of each report, but also the style and
layout. And you can make your changes 'on the fly' while viewing the report
in the Report Window. This style of working makes it much easier to see
what you are doing and get the results you want.
All reports can be saved as word-processor documents (in Rich Text Format - RTF), as web pages (HTML format) or as text files. They can also be copied and pasted into other applications.
Learn more about Family Historian report options
Here is a selection of sample reports:
- Descendants by Generation (Narrative report)
- Family Group Sheet (2nd page of report shown in 'Learn about ... report options' above)
- Individual Summary Report
- Ancestor Outline
- Descendant Outline
- Record Detail - Individual
We
saw earlier how you could use diagrams to browse and explore your family
tree data by clicking and expanding branches. You can do something very
similar in the Records Window, to explore your data there too.
Learn more about using the Record Windows to explore your records
Entering
source citations (where you got your information from) is easy in Family
Historian, using Automatic
Source Citations. You have fine-grained control of how source citations
print in reports (see the example of Source
Options for the Family Group Sheet report). And you have easy access
to source information within the Property Dialog.
Learn more about Sources and Source Citations in Family Historian
A
query is a stored set of instructions for retrieving data, and for displaying
it in a spreadsheet-like grid. For example, you might create a query to
retrieve all the male ancestors of your spouse who died of a heart attack
or whose cause of death is not known. Another query might retrieve everyone
in your family tree file who was born or baptised in Durham. Family Historian
comes with 28 queries when installed, but you can easily create your own.
The
Merge/Compare facility allows you to compare any 2 GEDCOM files (whether
or not they were created by Family Historian) side-by-side. Family Historian
will analyse each file and determine which records it thinks match. When
matching Individuals it will take into account near relatives (parents,
grandparents, spouses, etc).
You can use this feature just for comparison purposes, or you can let Family Historian merge one file into another (and optionally generate source citations to cite the first file as the source of the merged data). You can also override any aspect of the proposed merge, as much or as little as you like. Family Historian will show you exactly how it proposes to merge each record and each field, before you start any of it.
Family Historian comes with numerous tools to help you manage your family tree data. Here are some of them:
- A tool to help you manage all links to external files - e.g. picture files (multimedia files can be embedded in your Family Historian data file, but most users prefer to keep them elsewhere and just store links to them instead).
- A tool to help you manage and work with record identifiers (RINs).
- A facility to re-order out-of-sequence data in a file (e.g. for children, spouses, and events).
- A Backup-and-Restore facility that lets you backup data in a standard Winzip format
- A tool to help you split a family tree file into two or more parts.
- A facility to help you create and work with 'Named Lists' of records (named lists are used for research purposes as ToDo lists, as bookmark lists, as lists of key people, and so on)