What is the best genealogy software out there for creating a book on family history?

Answer 1

Follow the first link below to see reviews of 10 genealogy software packages. The top ranked package in this review was Legacy Family Tree which is available in both a FREE and a pay version (see the second link below). In this review, Family Tree Maker came in second, and Roots Magic came in fifth.

If you're interested more in writing a family history narrative than recording your genealogical data, try Family History Products (the third link below).

Answer 2

I like Roots Magic. I used PAF, FTM and Family Origins for Windows. FOW was RM's predecessor. I liked FOW, and now RM, the best of the three. It costs $29 US.

No matter which one you choose, you'll spend 3 weeks (or a lifetime) accumulating data, then push a button and have the program grind out "Descendants of" or "Ancestors of". RM lets you "print" to an RTF file, which you can then open with Word or something else and modify.

Here are some rave reviews from the web site,

http://www.rootsmagic.com

"RootsMagic is arguably the best genealogy program we’ve seen." - Smart Computing Magazine

"My favorite for the best all-around program" - Kimberly Powell, About.com Genealogy Guide

"Editor's Choice" - Heritage Quest Magazine

"The most comprehensive, yet easy to use genealogy software available anywhere." - Bill Dollarhide, Genealogy Bulletin

"RootsMagic earns our highest recommendation." - Family Tree Magazine

"There's no better genealogy package for the money." - PC Format Magazine

"It's still the top of the genealogy tree." - Computer Active Magazine

"All in all, RootsMagic is a winner." - Dick Eastman

"This is the ideal program for recording your family history." - Your Family Tree Magazine

"Highly recommended." - Family History Monthly Magazine

Answer 3

My mother and I use the Family Tree Maker.
It helps catalog all the dates and what not, as well as giving you Family Fact Sheets to print out and take along when you go and visit that doderly old aunt that you have *hypothetically speaking* who spews forth vast amounts of fun family history and what not.

It also gives you access to something called the World tree that once you find one of your relatives it hooks it up with whoever else is working on that tree as well.

You can also get a website to host your family tree on as well through them.

Family tree maker is one of the better genealogy softwares out there as it gives you alot of info as well as hooking you up with people that have the info that you may be missing.

Its not a hundred precent fail safe mind you but no software is. You may run into some bumps that you are able to fix like dod dob children and the like. It will also help you find important documents, like say for instance *this was helpful for us as we came over here from germany* immigration sheets, census sheets and the like.

I highly recommend it!

Answer 4

I use FamilyTreeMaker, it can be expensive if you add all of the bells and whistles, but it works pretty well without them. You just have to do more legwork going to cemeteries and libraries and such.

Answer 5

I use family tree maker. its simple to use..