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yet another Microsoft blogger

# Wednesday, January 17, 2007

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Neat Family Tree Software

My Dad has been really family tree software since he got his first Mac. The transition to Windows was hard because his trusted Reunion Program didn't exist on Windows. Since then he has been using some crappy $20 program that looks like a DOS app.

Anyway, Geni looks amazing. I just tried it and it's cool. I like that all the family members can collaborate together to help the tree grow. I hope they add export and print functionality.

[Source: lifehacker]

Software
Posted Thursday, January 18, 2007    Permalink    Comments [4]  View blog reactions

 

Wednesday, January 17, 2007 10:56:04 PM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)
Really interesting. I like how they solved the problem of expanding family trees. I haven't seen any offline genealogy software that does it as well. However, they need to add a few features to be feasible as a real product:

1) Export into the standard database format (GEDCOM: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GEDCOM) & maybe import as well for people who have already invested time in other software
2) Viewing for non-family members based on invitation and open to all by choice (with PII concealed)
3) Export into some printable format (PDF or something else)

And then there's the usual concerns of storing this much PII online with a startup in a (possibly) non-retreivable format. I'd prefer a well done client application in this regard that I can buy and keep my data to myself and share directly via a file.
Vamshi
Thursday, January 18, 2007 1:26:29 AM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)
Heh, you beat me to it. I've spent an hour today entering stuff into Geni; the interface is butter.
Scott Hanselman
Thursday, January 18, 2007 12:17:01 PM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)
Looks like they store your password in cleartext (they sent me a mail with my changed password), so I don't know how secure they are.
steve k
Friday, January 19, 2007 11:50:33 AM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)
Thanks for the link Omar. I've already added the immediate families of both my wife and myself and have begun to branch out to the more connected relatives. I wonder how big this thing could get once people begin to fill out their respective nodes...

Steve: You'd be surprised how many of these types of companies STILL send out passwords in clear text over email. Some companies have no sense of security when it comes to the basics.
Peter
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