On Monday, Synium released an update to their Mac genealogy software, MacFamilyTree. This release, version 5.4, contains fixes, enhancements, and new features. Here’s the rundown from the software update window:
New Web Page Export
- New: display a Context Chart on every person page, showing close relatives for the selected person
- New: Kinship Report available on each person page
- All sources in a tree file are exported including citations
- Completely new web page design and enhanced workflow
- Additional and improved themes available
- Web pages con be exported in different localizations
- Tree Statistics available for each web page
Improved Charts
- Optionally display Notes for each chart
- Fonts can be customized for each chart
- Charts editing improved
- Enhanced rendering performance on-screen
- Improved printing
Virtual Globe/Coordinates Lookup
- Vastly improved coordinates lookup
- Larger and more detailed locations database
- Country and state information displayed for search results: more easily identify specific places
- Coordinates are propagated to other events in the same city/country
Reports
- Events can be optionally excluded in the places and event report
- Improved printing and PDF export
- Each report can be saved as a [sic] HTML file
Other
- Improved alignment of individuals in the Family Assistant
- Quick Navigation view now available in the family edit mode tool
- Improved option windows for Charts, Reports and edit modes
- New startup window with direct access to the recently opened files
- Improved date parser with handles date ranges correctly
- Virtual Tree alignment and performance improved
- The Virtual Tree now displays marriage and divorce dates
There’s a whole lot to see there, so I’ll produce a video walkthrough soon. Go get it and leave a comment letting us know what you think of the changes.
This latest update of MacFamily Tree has made a big difference in the ease of handling the various fancy displays that they have.
I am using ReUnion for the serious things, but find that MacFamily is excellent for showing relatives with no computers just what the family tree looks like graphically.
Of course it means keeping more programs updated with the same information.
This is a really good update to a piece of software that I always commended because of how it handled photos and other media connected to your research. The changes to its Web page creation might make it among the best on this front, too. The pages are attractive and functional, providing kinship reports on each person as well as a view of an individual's children and parents to ease movement through the database. (There's still a minor bug involving individuals with multiple spouses.)
Its built-in coordinate lookup (where events can be placed on a globe) appears to be functional, finally. It's a feature that sounded great on paper, but was hindered by bugs and an awkward interface. Now it seems to be living up to its promise.
Where MFT falls short is in the nuts and bolts of genealogical research. It needs more reports and greater oomph in finding duplicate entries and merging GEDCOMs.