APG-L Archives

From: <>
Subject: Re: Still here, and looking for comments . . .
Date: Tue, 22 Dec 1998 16:05:56 EST

In a message dated 98-12-21 22:52:49 EST, you write:

<< From: (Helen S. Ullmann)
Reply-to:
To:

. . . on publishing books from genealogy programs. What do you like
about doing it and what problems need to be dealt with? >>

I'm sorry I do not have alot of time, but I teach this class at a local
college and here are some things to watch for:

Problems to deal with:

1. Is the program really pulling in every line you asked for?
2. How are your documentary sources being treated (as endnotes, footnotes,
inserted text in smaller font, no notes, etc.).
3. How do you want them treated? If you are not consistent in how you enter
your documents, they won't be consistent when you produce your book.
4. How are the indexed items being indexed? Is it by name only, does it
include the birth and death year by the name, is it crossed indexed using ID
numbers and a publishing format so I can publish in a modified register
version but still find my record Identification Numbers if I used them? How
many options do you have with this program?
5. Can I see my work on the screen before I waste lots of paper printing it
all out?
6. When I insert a picture or a few pages of text the client just sent me
will all the pages be renumbered, will the table of contents be regenerated,
and will the index be regenerated? And will it do all of this without
touching my original book edits. Why? Because I may have spent weeks in
spell check and grammar corrections and not want to do all of that again?
7. What is the limit in size for this particular program in terms of
megabytes or pages?
8. Can I take the manuscript to a local printers, like Kinkos, and have them
print in from a diskette if I do not have a fancy printer?
9. What font choices do you have?

There are many more things to ask yourself. I've used PAF Companion 2, FTM
5.0, Legacy, and nine or ten other programs which take your data files and
produce a book, but by far I have liked GenBook the best if you use
WordPerfect or Word as your word processor and you use a program that GenBook
is compatible with. I've published books from 29 pages to 1300 pages,
inserting transcribed oral histories, adding scanned and half-toned pictures,
inserting clip art, and more. It allows a user to regenerate the index and
table of contents up to the last moment when clients add changes (which they
always do until the very end). The program costs $59.95 and is available from
Clement Custom Programming, .

Good luck to you.

Karen Clifford, AG, President
Genealogy Research Associates, Inc.

PS: We had snow in Monterey, California's surrounding hills on Sunday as
well. Strange weather this year.

This thread:

• Still here, and looking for comments . . . by "Helen S. Ullmann" <>
  • Re: Still here, and looking for comments . . . by "Merrill Mosher" <>

  • Re: Still here, and looking for comments . . . by <>