Rating: 
Summary: It's a Handfull to Learn But Well Worth It!!
Review: After I decided to publish my genealogy information to my own website I found Family Tree Maker was great for use on its own site but terrible for general web creation. I had to cut and paste from FTM and it was a real hassle.After reading up on The Master Genealogist I plopped my money down and gulped as I read the manual. The manual is very detailed and a great guide after a few false starts. The Master Genealogist (TMG) is a super program. All the source information and repository data you'd ever need is on TMG. The web publishing system is totally HTML driven and easily customized once you get the system down. I can publish pages in a fifth of the time it used to take! Trust me...once you learn this program you won't go back! I strongly recommend the Gold version over the Silver version. The few extra dollars are well worth the additional features you receive.
Rating:
Summary: It's a Handfull to Learn But Well Worth It!!
Review: After I decided to publish my genealogy information to my own website I found Family Tree Maker was great for use on its own site but terrible for general web creation. I had to cut and paste from FTM and it was a real hassle. After reading up on The Master Genealogist I plopped my money down and gulped as I read the manual. The manual is very detailed and a great guide after a few false starts. The Master Genealogist (TMG) is a super program. All the source information and repository data you'd ever need is on TMG. The web publishing system is totally HTML driven and easily customized once you get the system down. I can publish pages in a fifth of the time it used to take! Trust me...once you learn this program you won't go back! I strongly recommend the Gold version over the Silver version. The few extra dollars are well worth the additional features you receive.
Rating: 
Summary: This Is 16-Bit Software!
Review: I examined this program, but chose NOT to buy it. Unbelievably, this is 16-bit--not 32-bit--software (i.e., from the Windows 3.x era). Hey, guys, Windows 95 was released over six years ago, and you were promising a 32-bit upgrade over two years ago! What gives? Don't waste your money.
Rating:
Summary: This Is 16-Bit Software!
Review: I examined this program, but chose NOT to buy it. Unbelievably, this is 16-bit--not 32-bit--software (i.e., from the Windows 3.x era). Hey, guys, Windows 95 was released over six years ago, and you were promising a 32-bit upgrade over two years ago! What gives? Don't waste your money.
Rating: 
Summary: So Much Potential...
Review: I thought the latest release would have addressed the critical design faults in previous versions, but they remain; the design of the software is so complicated that it burdens even a configuration which can handle almost anything I throw at it. I can certainly see the potential for TMG to be vastly superior to any other product in the genre, but at the end of the day, I will always favour a succinct and unencumbered design. Configuration: version 5.11; Windows XP; P4 2.6GHz; 1GB RAM.
Rating:
Summary: The best genealogy program on the market
Review: The Master Genealogist (TMG) is far and away the best genealogy program on the market. Having used four competitors' programs previously including the top selling program, I feel qualified to recommend it to every serious genealogist. TMG's handling of research sources and infinite capability for properly citing information are tops. Data entry is easily understood. The learning curve is a little longer than other programs because the user has more control over input and output. Once a user becomes familiar with TMG and its features, input becomes second nature. The "person view" screen provides easy access to all data entered about a given person, while "family view" and "tree view" show his immediate family and ancestry. Reports are easily produced with filters that can be changed or set as the user desires. Reports can be written to screen, file or any popular word processing software with the accompanying footnotes or endnotes. Whether your database consists of 100 persons or 100,000 persons TMG can streamline your genealogy work with charts, research logs, exhibits and reports to help you accomplish more and access information about a person more easily. I've used TMG for three years and my research results have improved tremendously due to my ability to accumulate data and find and manipulate it after it's input.
Rating: 
Summary: There was a new download only version 5.0 released in May
Review: The version for sale here appears to be 4.0 which has been around for years and is somewhat outdated. I bought the new 5.0 version of this program recently and really like it although the learning curve is fairly steep and for the truly serious genealogy enthusiast. The new version is not complete yet but has most features working and is available only by downloading the program and there is no manual yet. The program CD will be available sometime in the future with a manual and that is included in the price for the download. It is actually cheaper than this 4.0 version so I would wait and purchase the full 5.0 version with manual sometime in the future unless you get a free upgrade to 5.0 when you purchase the older version. 5.0 works with Windows XP.
Rating:
Summary: There was a new download only version 5.0 released in May
Review: The version for sale here appears to be 4.0 which has been around for years and is somewhat outdated. I bought the new 5.0 version of this program recently and really like it although the learning curve is fairly steep and for the truly serious genealogy enthusiast. The new version is not complete yet but has most features working and is available only by downloading the program and there is no manual yet. The program CD will be available sometime in the future with a manual and that is included in the price for the download. It is actually cheaper than this 4.0 version so I would wait and purchase the full 5.0 version with manual sometime in the future unless you get a free upgrade to 5.0 when you purchase the older version. 5.0 works with Windows XP.
Rating: 
Summary: The Master Genealogist Gold Edition (version 4.0c)
Review: This is the first time in quite a while that I have purchased a product that actually makes me angry. I'd like to know exactly how long ago this thing was written. The user interface looks like Windows 3.0 (maybe 3.1). It doesn't understand long file or directory names (8.3 only), the scroll bars don't immediately update the view and the thumb bars are 3.1 style (not sized according to amount of data). From here things get worse. It won't take advantage of a larger screen if you have it (the sub-windows actually don't allow you to size them and make them larger). The next "feature" I see is the nebulous "blank screen" mode. If you click on an area below the main display area, it erases the entire client area and leaves you with nothing but a window with a menu bar, then you must select "view" to get a display back. There also appears to be no text completion as Family Tree Maker has so you must completely re-enter common birth city names, etc. The one redeeming factor seems to be the reports. This is the one area where this product exceeds FTM. The bottom line is that this package has tons of features and reports, but the UI is such a disaster as to make it more effort than it's worth to access them. The only exception to this is the reports which are quite extensive and actually even use the more modern UI elements of Windows 95 (and later). It makes me think this part of the product was written by a completely different design team. If I hadn't foolishly thrown away the box I would definitely return this product for a refund.
Rating:
Summary: The Master Genealogist Gold Edition (version 4.0c)
Review: This is the first time in quite a while that I have purchased a product that actually makes me angry. I'd like to know exactly how long ago this thing was written. The user interface looks like Windows 3.0 (maybe 3.1). It doesn't understand long file or directory names (8.3 only), the scroll bars don't immediately update the view and the thumb bars are 3.1 style (not sized according to amount of data). From here things get worse. It won't take advantage of a larger screen if you have it (the sub-windows actually don't allow you to size them and make them larger). The next "feature" I see is the nebulous "blank screen" mode. If you click on an area below the main display area, it erases the entire client area and leaves you with nothing but a window with a menu bar, then you must select "view" to get a display back. There also appears to be no text completion as Family Tree Maker has so you must completely re-enter common birth city names, etc. The one redeeming factor seems to be the reports. This is the one area where this product exceeds FTM. The bottom line is that this package has tons of features and reports, but the UI is such a disaster as to make it more effort than it's worth to access them. The only exception to this is the reports which are quite extensive and actually even use the more modern UI elements of Windows 95 (and later). It makes me think this part of the product was written by a completely different design team. If I hadn't foolishly thrown away the box I would definitely return this product for a refund.
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