RootsMagic 8: Work-in-Progress Preview

[@k0rc]

Version 8 will make it a lot more efficient making updates to records that are interrelated. The ability to have independent windows for different people is a huge improvement, even if you are not blessed with dual monitors (you should bless yourself if you don't already have them)!

[@alanaparrycorbett9763]

So excited for all the wonderful new changes coming with this update! Version 8 seems a lot more intuitive, efficient and user friendly. Can’t wait!

[@jennyharrison2986]

Thanks for all your work, Bruce and team. Can’t wait to try it out now. 🤓

[@patty5111]

I feel like there is a chance that I might be able to work more freely and have access to so much more. Being slow to catch on to things & changes, I can already see that this is going to be easier and more workable in the long run, than 7 is. SO excited. Thank you so much for all you have done, the hard work, the testing, the God given inspiration put to good use.

[@RHGCastel]

Sources and citations look so much better and efficient, thank you for improving that! Looking forward version 8!

[@aram5642]

So the two personas within me want to comment. As persona #1, fronted dev, I absolutely give my best applause to the direction of the rebuild. Modal dialogs are (mostly) evil - I am very glad you reduced them. The usability and workflow seem to have been improved immensely. Hopefully a lot of keyboard mappings will make this program not so mouse-hungry. I also like that, as one comment said, you didn't succumb to the customers' pressure to release quickly at the likely cost of quality. That having said, persona #2 (a former DTP designer) must say - and will most likely be the only one to say that - I greatly dislike the new graphic design, mostly that of the pedigree screen. The color palette just hurts my eyes. Too much variety, mixture of unrelated colors, straight lines vs rounded corners, small blurry icons, their outline looking like render glitches when not filled, even/odd row color varied (blue, grey), icons much heavier than their captions, black lines everywhere. As an oldschool guy, I really liked the unshowy, moderate UI of v7. I thought - what a great balance, robust interface - just great for work with data. What this new proposed UI brings is a huge visual discomfort. I hope this is only a temporary UI that was needed to alpha/beta test the product, and there is a design work still planned to be done. I find the design unbalanced and discouraging from use, calling to be take care of. Would be a shame if great programming effort and an unrivaled commercial product got eventually released wrapped in a cheap-looking interface.

[@jum5238]

I agree... tooo many colors. Make it selectable to to turn on/off. (Some people are color blind as well)

[@suecieslak]

Hahaha...Many moons ago (version 3) I switched from FTM because they really changed the program so much I found it difficult to manuver. I love RootsMagic because it is simple and straight forward. I'm a little nervous about version 8.

[@virginiahorvath7595]

He did say in prior videos that the colors are completely customizable so you can change them or turn them off.

[@sallyhopkinson988]

Can't wait for this to become active. I've been waiting to upgrade from version 6 since I heard it was on its way. Looks really great!

[@virginiahorvath7595]

Thank you for the overview...patiently (sometimes impatiently) waiting for this new version to be released.

[@KyleMcNally]

Thanks for this. Sources and Tasks seem WAY better.

[@EVSA]

Hi Bruce, Great presentation. I Have a suggestion. For those people like me who only ever use one file, I suggest to move/add the most recent file to a new panel in the top left position (above "RootsMagic Files"), this way one doesn't have to look down to the recent file list every time when opening the program. Maybe call it "Most Recent" or something better. Looking forward to version 8.

[@AE1PT]

I am looking forward to the eventual release of RM8. So many things cleaned up, and nice extended capabilities. The chosen theme colors are a bit jangling for me--but I understand that this will be customizable on the final release. My primary use of RM7 is as a master console. I use its Ancestry and FS interconnection to draw down research from those resources--and to edit, add, and make notes and expansions to family members. The results are then ported via GEDCOM and media upload to my WordPress/TNG genealogy website. Having started out with GrampsAO and tried several other "solutions" RM is the best! Thank you for all of the efforts, and hope that the new release arrives before I become an ancestor...

[@yoyosmum]

I can't wait for the Mac Catalina version.

[@Elyse90505]

I'm so excited for this!

[@karenrisher5224]

Bruce, Looks like some great improvements. I think it would be helpful if, during training videos, you would make your cursor larger and BLACK to make it easier to follow. Thanks for the update!

[@nconway567]

Looks like a great update! I would like to see the ability to open the person's primary photo in an external editor (such as photoshop), or at least locate it - "open in folder". I'd also like to have the ability to add add a spouse, child, etc from the bookmark list. I didn't see any mention in the video of editing fact types. This is a big feature for me and I found the sentence language a bit lacking. It would be nice to add the fact Notes to the sentence description. I'd also like to see sorting options on the Person list - by surname, given or given, surname, as well as by date of birth/ death or by lifespan. Hope this update is coming soon!

[@k.charleslloyd4345]

Thanks for this presentation. I enjoyed it. I looked forward to the releasing of RootsMagic 8. I would to know if the feature that allows you to transfer gedcom from ancestry to familysearch (myheritage & other sites) will be updated also. I hoping that it be easier to use quickly. Manually building trees to each site is time consuming. Thanks.

[@fcgn1908]

Thank you for the demo. You didn't mention the Color Coding feature. I'm hoping it works similarly to the groups in that you can set it from the person edit screen.

[@GregKleist]

Looks great, Bruce! I'm looking forward to it, especially the Mac version! I do have one question. On the pedigree view, what are the four bubbles on each person? Thanks!

[@tysonmeyer6855]

looks good, im worried that i didnt see my heritage, looks shinier but im wondering what we lost in the upgrade..

[@sherryarcher4832]

Can't wait for 8 to come out. I would like to know if we will be able to select a portion of a tree to create a new tree. This is a big deal for me, as trees can become very large.

[@S.a.r.a.h.S.]

You do this in RM 7! Under file choose export - at the top it will have everyone selected but you can go in and select a person from the list. From there you can export just their line!

[@annewilson1747]

The video introduction looks very interesting. I haven't been using RM7 recently, as I'd hoped to use the ability to keep it in sync with my Ancestry tree. It just didn't seem obvious to me how to do that, and it didn't get a mention in the video. Is it easy? possible but not so easy? or better forgotten?

[@SeanLamb-I-Am]

The filtering shown at 13:19... Can I use programmatic regular expressions in this field? For example, if I wanted to filter to names that include either "ran" or "rin" could I enter [ran|rin] or something similar?

[@jum5238]

YAY on separate windows for different databases! And simplified searches!!! and switchable edits! And shared citations!!! And tasks better apply to multiple people/places, etc. Place search... can we print the results? On media management/search.. can it be by name?

[@bobmatulka6793]

I still would like to know what if any enhancements there will be to publishing a tree on the Rootsmagic website. Even such a simple thing as being able to make changes to the home page for the tree on the web without destroying everything and having to start over. Not sure why that is so mysterious.

[@philweight3480]

Why still no traditional top-to-bottom ancestor/descendant family view? The family view in v7 and this new version is basically a reversed pedigree view.

[@toniasalways]

I'm looking forward to 8. I have 7 now as I phase out of ancestry software. I am most interested in being able to sync tree software with the ancestry site

[@kimwickman4843]

Will the USB be USB-C for Mac users?

[@jum5238]

Is there a rewrite to the Rootmagic android platform? The current one is so badly rated I didn't even want to install it.

[@gregsmith2104]

Is this for Windows 10 only? This has the appearance of a UWP (Universal Windows Platform) app that will only work on Windows 10. Is there a Desktop version for Windows 7 users?

[@francescha66]

Is 8 going to be able to pull in a MyHeritage file like it does now with Legacy?

[@VetazLilJ]

Is there a way to search for a person who has a child that is colored blue for example?

[@resmith83714]

Anything about using Ancestry.com DNA data?

[@mikel4510]

Ads in an ad.😡

[@JorgePurgly]

wow

[@bigashland]

this is incredibly useless, it has been a year and no actual update