Family Tree Maker Deluxe Version 11
© 2003 Riverdeep, Inc.
The latest version of this genealogy program comes on 10 CDs, and is designed to walk you through each stage of creating a family genealogy project, from research to printing a family tree or making a web site. The first step is gathering information. You do this by typing in as much as you know about your own family, especially dates of birth and deaths, into a simple database template. If you put in the locations, you can see family members represented as a dot on a map (a nice feature). When you can't find someone, you can turn to the Internet or one of the four "Family Finder" CDs, that let you search millions of names. Other included CDs are the World Family Tree, Volume 100; Marriage Records from 1560 to 1900; Social Security Death Index (1937-1999) and Family Pedigrees for Mid-Atlantic Family Histories, from 1340 to 1940. New features for Version 11 (listed by the publisher) are enhanced help files, customized background colors, and the ability to view two files simultaneously. You can also backup family files to CD-R, and export family books to PDF format. Overall, this is a solid program but it is not without some glitches. The most annoying is the prevalence of pop-up windows, either to help you, or to sell you some additional product or service. We also noticed a prompt asking for "FamilyFinder Index A-C, version 8" even though we were using Version 11. Finally, the program froze when we asked it to make a web site. Strengths are the multiple ways to display and print information about your ancestors, making this a logical choice for hobbyist family researchers. There are three versions: Standard ($50), Deluxe ($70) and Collector ($100). All three include a 3 month trial subscription to World Family Tree. The Deluxe and Collector editions include subscriptions also to the US Census Collection and other databases from Europe.
$49.99, Windows
Teaches: geneaology, history, writing, creativity