I use Reunion on my Mac to keep track of my family tree. It’s the only software I’ve used, so I don’t have a basis of comparison, but I really like it.
My default view is the Family View and when I open the program, it starts at the base of the tree, with the records for my husband and me. At a session at the Midwestern Roots conference last year, I learned about creating a shortcut so that I can easily click on a person from anywhere on my tree to access their record. Reunion calls the area at the top of the screen the quickbar and it calls the individual name you put there a quickbar button.
I created quickbar buttons for my three ancestors for whom I have Civil War pension files because I access them a lot. I also added one for my great grandfather’s half-brother, Wayne Horace Adams (1907-1976), because otherwise to get to him, I have to first click on the red arrow to access his mother (his father’s second wife), which is a tiny hassle. (This year I’ve been trying to figure out Horace’s late childhood/early adulthood, so I’ve been spending time with him.) Click on the picture at the top of this post to see a larger photo of my opening Family View screen with the quickbar buttons at the top. (To protect my husband’s privacy, I blurred out his info and our marriage date.)
It’s extremely easy to add a quickbar button. Within the Family View just click on the person in question and drag him/her to the quickbar at the top of the screen. Reunion will ask you to give the quickbar button a name. To remove it, just drag it to the trashcan icon on the Mac. You can also click the little pencil icon on the far left of the quickbar to edit the buttons on it. And if you click the question mark icon you see in that edit menu, you’ll get lots more information on the quickbar.
I have found this to be so helpful, especially since I’m focusing on one family line this year. My great great grandfather G.W. Adams is the nexus of my research this year, so I click on his name pretty much every session. It’s really nice not to have to click my way up my tree to him!
Thanks for the tip. I’ve been using Reunion for only three or four years now and love it. My previous program of choice (Legacy Family Tree) had a similar feature which I used all the time. I missed it in Reunion until now. Thanks a bunch!
I’m glad you found it helpful! And I’m really glad you like Reunion. I like it quite a lot.
Who puts out the Reunion Software?? How much does it cost and where do I purchase it?? Is it Ged com compatible??
Mary Lou, Reunion is from LeisterPro (http://www.leisterpro.com). The current version is 11 and it costs $99. There’s a separate app, Reunion Touch, that syncs the program between your computer and mobile devices. It costs $9.99 and uses Dropbox for synching. (I don’t have Reunion Touch because I always bring my laptop along when I’m researching.) You can import and export GEDCOMs from Reunion. However, unless I’m missing something, when you export a GEDCOM from Reunion, the multimedia files that are attached to the sources don’t go with it. I find that disappointing. You can purchase it at the above link. Hope that’s helpful!
Very Helpful. Janine!! Thank You so very much.
So glad you found it helpful, Mary Lou!
Thanks for this information. I’ve used Reunion for many years and there are many capabilities I haven’t used. Only recently have I found the time to try out its many facilities – I’m happy to find out any Reunion info you can share!
Glad this helped, Linda!
Do you know when a new version of Reunion is being released? I noticed 11 is a few years old, and I hate to invest in it then turn around to pay for the upgrade (even if it is half off, etc.).
Andy, I looked at ReunionTalk, the online forum for Reunion users (http://www.reuniontalk.com), and someone asked the same question. The response was that there is always a new version in the works, but they don’t discuss new versions before they’re released. So one will come some day, but I have no idea when. Thanks for reading!
Thanks for this tip. I had been using Reunion 9 (!) for 10 years but recently bought Reunion 12, and I didn’t know about the Quickbar. Very useful!
By the way, does everyone know about the Startup setting? You can set it to be the last couple who were on your family screen, meaning that you can come right back to the last family you worked on. For me, it helps with continuity from one session to the next, and it saves me the navigation steps to get to the couple I want. It can be set to do this with the the Startup feature under Reunion’s Preferences.
Thank you, Marian! I upgraded to Reunion 12 on January 1 and I wasn’t aware of the Startup setting. I’ll “Last family” a try!