Genealogy Chat

I would really appreciate any recommendations for the following. I'm thinking of doing a one-name study for an unusual name in my family tree and need some sort of very simple software that will let me input individuals into lots of 'mini' family trees, which I can then link up as I find more information. I've done some Googling (Custodian 2 or 3 has been mentioned in connection with one-name studies) ... but does anyone have any practical (tried and tested!) suggestions. (Going offline now, but will check back in the morning.) Many thanks. ~~~Penny~~~

Tribal Pages! I know this isnt what you are asking for, but it is brilliant and you can have any amount of floating people on it, until you can connect them together. I love it. I also did a simple database on my PC which worked very well indeed - until I lost the lot, because I didnt bother to back it up at all. I used a database rather than a spreadsheet as it was simpler to manoeuvre about, although of course I could view it as a spread sheet if I really wanted to (too cumbersome in practice, as I had so many fields.) OC

I have ended up doing a kind of ONS and use the Legacy tree program and find it copes very well with the 'floaters'. But with any tree program you can create as many different trees as you like - by county/country for example. I think Legacy can cope with a huge amount of names in a single tree but their web site would tell you how many.

Penny, Why don't you contact some members of GOONS (Guild of one-name studies) as they will have practical experience of the problem? Peter

I use RootsMagic and find it very flexible. I have found there is not a lot of benefit in have a Jones tree, a Smith tree, a Brown tree in separate trees. I have four (currently) unrelated trees on on file. I use the Search facility to switch between trees. When as expected two trees had a common name in the 1870s the trees linked without problem. Unlike OC I prefer to have my master tree on my own pc and use tribalpages (or similar) as a backup. Clive

I reccomend Custodian 3 every time, it is ideal for a one name study, it is quite different to a Family Tree programme. Custodian is set up to record Civil Registration Indexes, BMD certificates, baptisms, burials, Wills, Military Records, School Records, newspaper reports, IGI, VRI, Poor Law, Licences and Deeds, to name just some of them. You can also link them up into family groupe and include pictures, video and sound. Jennifer

Many thanks to you all for your recommendations/suggestions - I did, as I said, get back to my thread the following morning, but then I had to dash out before getting the chance to add a reply! You have given me a lot to think about. I had a look around Tribal Pages and had already come across Custodian, and now realise that I have samples of some of your other recommendations on some freebie CD-roms so can investigate those further also. What I'm really trying to do is more of a 'geographical' family tree - I know that the name originated in Oxfordshire in the late 1500s with some members moving to London in the early 1700s (plus 'odds and sods' in one or two other counties). The 1901 census only has 95 instances of the name (again, all in Oxfordshire and London, plus a couple of exceptions) and there are progressively less as one goes back to each census. I want to make up family groups from the latest census and plot them backwards on a family tree, joining up the groups as I go (post- 1901 will have to wait until a later time!). Wish me luck! Again, thank you for all your help. Penny

I use a PAF file for my ONS. You can individuals and connect them as you wish. Great for working out mini-trees plus room for notes etc. Jill (Mocock hunter!)

Penny, Good luck with your study. They can be immensely useful to the genealogical community in separating different lines of the same family. Peter