[comp.sys.ibm.pc] Genealogy

hessel@hpcupt1.HP.COM (Steve Hessel) (06/01/90)

With regards to geneology programs, I have used Personal 
Ancestral File (PAF) from the Church of Jesus Christ of 
Latter-Day Saints.  It is good, but not perfect, well 
supported, and has excellent documentation.  There is also 
considerable commitment to on-going expansion of its 
capabilities.  I have also seen two shareware packages 
being sold by shareware vendors (those who sell copies 
of software, and leave you with the responsibility to 
pay for the right to use it separately, once you know 
it serves your need.) 

I believe that PAF may be obtained from the church distri-
bution center of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day 
Saints in Salt Lake City, area code 801.  If someone wants 
me to look up the other programs, please let me know.  

Steve Hessel
hpda!hessel@berkeley.edu
 

schrader@loligo (David F. Schrader) (06/01/90)

In article <-286529955@hpcupt1.HP.COM> wrote:
>[Deleted...] (PAF) from the Church of Jesus Christ of 
>Latter-Day Saints.  [Deleted...]
>[Deleted...]commitment to on-going expansion of its 
>capabilities.  

Current version is 2.2. Supports color, mouse, most video
modes (I have EGA). Configuration program for many items.

>[Deleted...] sold by shareware vendors [Deleted...]

Brother's Keeper is available via FTP from SIMTEL20 from
the PD1:<MSDOS,DATABASE) directory as BK45??D1.ZIP,
BK45??D2.ZIP, and BK45??D3.ZIP. (3 disks, D1=200+K,
D2=300+K, and D3=200+K). Haven't had a chance to look
at them yet... .

> [Deleted...]
>I believe that PAF may be obtained from the church distri-
>bution center of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day 
>Saints in Salt Lake City, area code 801.  If someone wants 
>me to look up the other programs, please let me know.  
>
>Steve Hessel
>hpda!hessel@berkeley.edu
> 
Yes, it is. Here is the info:

  Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (The Mormons)
  Salt Lake Distribution Center    Ancestral FIle Operations Unit
  1999 West 1700 South             50 East North Temple
  Salt Lake City, Utah 84104       Salt Lake City, Utah 84150
 
  1-801-240-2584 Ancestral File Unit /&/ Software Support
  1-800-453-3860 Distribution Center Sales

  Note: The distribution center will accept Master/Visa Cards. When I
        bought V1.? It cost $35.00 (disks and manual(s)). I missed the
        V1.? to V2.0 upgrade but the upgrade to V2.2 cost me $13.00
        ($5.00 for upgrade, $8.00 for the new manuals).
 
It does lean toward "LDS" beliefs/philosophies (and isn't perfect) but
is one of the best genealogy programs I have seen (I am LDS so you know
my personal bias). 

David Schrader
Disclaimer: This is personal not work related.

robison@dfsun1.electro.swri.edu (Bob Robison) (06/03/90)

In article <861@fsu.scri.fsu.edu> schrader@loligo (David F. Schrader) writes:
[Description of other geneaology programs deleted]
>
>Brother's Keeper is available via FTP from SIMTEL20 from
>the PD1:<MSDOS,DATABASE) directory as BK45??D1.ZIP,
>BK45??D2.ZIP, and BK45??D3.ZIP. (3 disks, D1=200+K,
>D2=300+K, and D3=200+K). Haven't had a chance to look
>at them yet... .
>

I have been looking at brother's keeper for the last couple of weeks.
I like it!  It lets you input quite a bit of info on each person.  There are
the obvious Birth, Death & Marriage Dates.  You then have Baptised, and Buried,
and one user-definable field for date/place.  Actually, you can change the
Baptised, & Buried fields to other names.  There is a provision for message
lines to be added for each person.  I believe it is about 5 lines worth of
text that can be entered here.  If that isn't enough there is a way to put
an automatic pointer to a separate text file.

   It has the ability to print out Group Sheets (Tabular listings of info
on a particular family) as well as Tree Diagrams.  You can print a tree
of ancestors of a certain person, or descendants of a certain person.  When
descendants are printed it handles the siblings nicely and spreads things out
so that multi-strip outputs can be taped together to make a huge family tree.
You can also print more tabular types of reports, some of which can be
user customized.  All in all I think it is a very flexible & powerful
tool for keeping track of bunches of related people.   It even calculates
relationships for you! (i.e.  So-and-so is a Third Cousin Four Times Removed).

Just my comments,
bob


-- 
Bob Robison	- Southwest Research Institute, Electromagnetics Div.
robison@dfsun1.electro.swri.edu
{sun!texsun, gatech!petro, uunet!cs.utexas.edu}!swrinde!dfsun1!robison