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Despite the United States and France’s recent foreign-policy differences, you have to admit the French have a certain, well, panache. Look what they’ve done for wine, goose liver, perfume — and now, genealogy software. Heredis Mac X.2, the latest English-language version of the best-selling French program, is a full-featured, snazzy-looking family tree program.
Getting started is a snap. It cleanly — if v-e-r-y s-1-o-w-l-y — imports GEDCOM files, or start from scratch using the cute icons for spouse (two doll figures united by a heart), children, mother and father. Data-entry aids suggest surnames and places you’ve already entered, saving typing and misspellings. Adding events and sources is equally straightforward, and the Mac-friendly interface makes selecting a source from existing lists quick and intuitive. The ability to rate each source’s Surety Level from marginal to convincing is a nice touch.
Heredis’ view switches between Immediate Family, a handy snapshot of who’s who; Personal Data, where you enter events; and Union Data, where you manage marriages. Clicking a pedigree-chart icon brings up a separate window (not the slickest solution) showing a family tree headed by your current person; clicking another individual in the tree returns to the main window, with that person’s information open.
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All the standard reports and charts are found under the Family Trees and Documents menus. But it’s the graphics bells and whistles that’ll leave PC users drooling: Oak, Medieval and Leaves options let you produce a colorfully designed family tree that looks like a tree or coat of arms. If you’ve added photos to your file (cleverly integrated with Mac’s iPhoto) you can display them with a descendancy picture tree. Photos are crucial to making the most of Heredis’ coolest feature, the Global 3-D Tree, which visualizes all your ancestors as cubes linked in a zoomable 3-D space. Ancestors without photos display as plain-color cubes, however, so the 3-D tree loses some pizzazz around the 18th century.
You can publish Heredis files online or export them to your Palm hand-held device. Lists you generate can be saved as tabbed text for opening in Excel.
Underneath its flashy exterior, Heredis is a capable, easy-to-use and -learn program that should meet all your genealogy needs. You can download the free demo to test it out. Heredis requires MacOS X version 10.1.3 or later, 64MB RAM and 27MB hard disk space. (Note: Heredis <www.heredis.com> also produces a separate Windows version for $65.)
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Vital Statistics
Heredis Mac X.2
Price: $69 download, $49 upgrade
Biggest draws: Nifty graphics, 3-D family tree
Drawbacks: Slow GEDCOM importing
From the August 2006 issue of Family Tree Magazine.
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