NWA-PCUG Newsletter Article, August 2011
Legacy Family Tree Basics, Part 2
By Bill Ellis,
Regular Newsletter Contributor, Computer Users of Erie, PA
December 2010 issue, Horizons, The Official Journal of CUE
http://www.cuerie.com
cuerie1 (at) verizon.net (click to email author)

Legacy Family Tree Genealogy software
http://www.legacyfamilytree.com/

This is a continuing article about the Legacy program’s Home Page. I mentioned in the previous article, which was published in the December 2010 issue of Horizons, that our hectic lifestyle keeps us from investigating all the amazing features that are included in the software programs that we use every day. We stick to the same old tried and true procedures, because it’s quick, it’s easy and it gets the job done. I hope this article will encourage you to take a little time to look further and see what your software program(s) have to offer.

As mentioned in the previous article, to startup in the Home page window you need to click on the Options menu item at the top of the screen. In the drop down menu, click on Customize. In the customize window are several tabs. You should be at the General tab view. If not, click on the General tab to bring that view forward. The very first item, on the left, is called Startup View. In this section, you can select one of several views that will tell Legacy which view you would like to have Legacy start up in. The first view item is called Legacy Home. This is the one that I would like you to select if it hasn’t been already selected. Now go to the bottom of the screen and select save. From now on, whenever you start the Legacy program, you will see the Home view screen with several panels. These panels are as follows, Legacy News, To-Do items, Birthdays, Death Dates and Anniversaries, Statistics, Updates and Support. You will also notice a long white bar across the top of these panels with the word Address in front of it. This is the same address bar that is in your browser when you’re surfing the Internet and is used in the same way. We’ll talk about that address bar a little bit later.

When you open Legacy in this Home view screen you can connect to the Internet via cable, DSL or dial up. You will have to tell Legacy how it needs to get connected. To do that, click on the Options button near the upper right of the screen. In the drop down menu, click on Options. In this window are two tabs. One is called Internet Options and the other is called Reminder Options. Click on the Internet Options tab to bring it forward if it isn’t already forward. The Internet Options tab gives you two selections to choose from. Choose the one that is right for your type of Internet connection and click on save.

Now that you are connected to the Internet and you have started Legacy in the Home View screen you can use the Legacy News panel. This panel lets you read some of the latest news from Millennia. The articles in the panel are short excerpts of the full story. If you would like to read the full story, just click on the highlighted/underlined text and you will be transported to the Millennia web site. At the Millennia site you can read all or some of the articles and even add your comments at the end of each article. You are also given the choice to submit your own article(s). When you have finished with the Millennia site, simply click on the little house icon that is just above the address line and to the left. There is also a little house icon at the very top of the page. DO NOT click on that one. When you click on the little house icon you will be transported back to the Legacy home view from whence you came.

Below the Legacy News panel are two very interesting panels. One is the To-Do items panel and the other is the Birthdays, Death Dates and Anniversaries panel. Both of these are reminder panels. They remind you of items that need your attention. For example, when you create a To-Do item for an individual or an event you can fill in a reminder date of your choosing. As that date approaches, the To-Do item will be posted in the To-Do panel as a reminder. You can also create a reminder for birthdays, anniversaries and dates of death. In order to create this type of reminder, go to each person’s information screen, where births, deaths, occupation, etc., are stored. In the lower right side of the window are two selections. They are birthday reminder and death date reminder. If you check one or both of these options, the dates of the checked events will be posted in the corresponding reminder panel. The same holds true for anniversaries. Click on the couple’s marriage date to bring up their wedding information. At the very bottom of that window you need to put a check mark in the Anniversary reminder. Now that you have the reminders ready to go, you need to do one more thing. Go back to the Legacy Home view screen and click on the Option button in the upper right of the window as you did before. Click on Options in the drop down menu. This time click on the Reminder Options tab to bring that window forward if it isn’t already forward. There are three reminders listed. Put a check mark in the ones you will be using. Just above these three reminders you will need to tell Legacy how many days in advance you would like to be reminded of these events. Once you’ve done that, click save and you’re all set.

The remaining three panels on the right, Statistics, Updates and Support are pretty self-explanatory. The statistics tells you the number of individuals, families and sources in the family file that you are working with. The update panel tells you if you are up to date with the latest version of Legacy. If this panel tells you that you need to install the latest update, you can click on that panel to download and update the Legacy program. Whether you update your Legacy program, or not, is your choice. I like to wait at least a week after an update is out before I install it. This gives the programmers a little more time to get some of the bugs ironed out, if there are any. The support panel has several items in its list. There are two items here that I feel are of great importance. They are watch training videos and tips from the experts. When you choose watch training videos you will be able to view a video of the basics of legacy for free. This is a really good training video for all levels of genealogists. You can also preview all the other videos to see if they meet your needs. Some you can view for free, while others you can preview before you decide whether or not to buy it. Clicking on the Tips from the experts will take you to a very long list of “How To” instructions. Here is where you can get tips on a ton of Legacy’s functions such merging, split screen view, importing and exporting and so on. The Tips from the experts go hand in hand with the help screen that is within the Legacy program and in most cases will also give you step-by-step instructions.

So, my friends. Don’t be shy. Dig into what software you’ve been using all this time and see what it has to offer. To my genealogist friends, I wish you happy hunting.

System Requirements:
Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP, Windows ME*, Windows 98*, Windows NT, Windows 2000 (Legacy runs on newer Macs with Windows installed under Bootcamp, Parallel or Fusion. Legacy runs on Linux machines with a Windows emulator like VMWare or Sun's Virtual Box) Note: Runs on both 32bit and 64bit Windows platforms.

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