----- Original Message -----
Sent: Monday, April 15, 2002 11:12
AM
Subject: [LegacyUG] Descendent book and
Narrative
I just completed sending a bug report about
Version 4 (Deluxe). Build April 10
The Descendent Book and Descendent Narrative
reports (book) print pictures as follows:
For a book report on either Husband or
Wife about who the report is created, the Wife's picture is printed next
to the Husband's name (no husband picture) and the Husband's picture is
printed next to the Wife's name (no wife's picture).
I also sent a bug report on the following - The
Descendent Chart when printed with pictures and using Leaders, will print the
Leaders right through the pictures and do it every time.
In addition, the vertical spacing is not always
consistent, occasionally have one or two vertical spaces between lines as
opposed to equal distance spacing throughout the report.
I am a new user, about 4-6 weeks old, and I have
previously sent a bug report about the leaders printing through pictures on
the descendent chart. The problem was not corrected on either of the last two
builds. In addition I find it quite difficult to understand how a problem as
obvious as reversing the pictures of husband and wife on the Descendent Book
and Narrative book can so easily slip between the cracks prior to
publishing a new build date.
My impressions to date about legacy are mixed. I
am a long time FTM user. I very much like many of the features about Legacy,
but I am less than impressed with the programming staff's failure to catch
problems as obvious as printing leaders through pictures and reversing
pictures of husband and wife on two book items.
Perhaps what I find to be disturbing is their
apparent failure to read the bug report that I earlier sent in (two builds
back) about leaders printing through pictures on descendent
charts).
Right! I know, no
one is perfect and the legacy staff appears to do very well on quickly
correcting problems (some of the less obvious ones) with their new
downloadable builds - something that FTM never practiced except for a new cost
release.
Perhaps with time my impressions will improve.
However, I have this too say. As much as I disliked FTM for various
and sundry reasons - enough to drive me to try Legacy - FTM does in one
respect stand head and shoulders above Legacy.
How? With the FTM book feature that is part
of FTM and the various trees they print for inclusion in their book and also
for the ability to include Text items (stories) with various word processing
features such as centering, right, left and center justification and the
ability to include pictures and resize and position them anyplace on the story
document.
The text item documents in FTM are uniquely
created story documents and can contain whatever, including historical copied
documents, pictures etc. When creating an FTM book Text Item document you
are in actual fact writing a book plus having the ability to include any of
the various reports and trees available in FTM and uniquely formatted for a
book - including the placement of the table of contents and the index at the
front and back of the book respectively where they should be located. One of
the niceties of the index is that all of the various reports can be included
in a single book and the page number where each individual is located is
provided. As an example my name may appear on Descendent, ancestor, hour
glass, direct descendent etc, etc. and I will have a page number for each
location that I appear - not at the end of each report but in the index
appearing at the end of the completed book - perhaps you don't place much
value on that? I do. Some of the books I have printed are nearly 600 pages
printed on both sides (1200 pages) long.
Enough of the FTM accolades - there is just as
much to dislike about FTM as there was too like. Enough that I thought the
investment of a few dollars in Legacy may be worthwhile.
The biggest problem that I encountered with FTM
is their unacceptable (to myself) attitude toward customers and their failure
to rapidly provide upgrades correcting discovered problems between
releases.
If Legacy ever adopts the FTM book feature
capabilities, Legacy will be genealogy software without any equivalent
parallel currently marketed.
My suggestion is that the Legacy programming
staff seriously review the book feature of FTM and incorporate identical
features into a book feature for Legacy that goes beyond what Legacy currently
provides. I also add that Legacy should also review the way in which
FTM charts trees for their books and use the same format that FTM uses.
You all who are dedicated users and defenders of
Legacy understand that I am not putting down some of the excellent features
that I have discovered with legacy. I would just like to see legacy include a
few of the good things that FTM already has, namely an excellent book creation
feature and excellent tree charts of all types when printed for the book
format.
Until next
time.
