Mathew Deighton, With Ancestry.com, sent out an announcement this morning letting us know that no new version of Family Tree Maker is coming out this year. Instead, they will do free upgrades for those using Family Tree Maker 2012. This is good news in my book. Simply releasing new versions for the sake of releasing one annually doesn’t make a lot of sense. Good move, Ancestry.
The following is from Ancestry’s announcement:
Ancestry.com normally has announced the newest version of Family tree Maker around this time of the year. This year, they have decided to make several key updates to the existing software, and give those updates away for free. Ancestry.com will be working hard this year to improve the current product and customers will see these bonus features throughout the year.
Users will need to upgrade to Family Tree Maker 2012 before they can download the bonus features.
Since Family Tree Maker 2012 was released last fall, a number of updates have been sent out that include improvements and new features. Here’s a list of just some of these changes:
- Numerous enhancements to TreeSync so syncing your tree to Ancestry.com is faster and more reliable
- A new Family View Report that displays a person’s ancestors, spouse, and children together (similar to the Family View in the People workspace)
- A new Undocumented Facts Report that lists people’s facts that have no source documentation
- The ability to merge info from multiple versions of the same fact
- New source templates for the 1940 U.S. census and improved support for city directories
- Dozens of report enhancements including performance improvements and new options in the relationship chart, family group sheet, Individual Report, Notes Report, Data Errors Report, Outline Descendant Report, Media Item Report, photo albums, Media Usage Report, Documented Facts Report, and calendar
And there are more enhancements to come in the next bonus update—so stayed tuned.
The more the program is changed the less desirable it becomes. The 1995 version is still the best version. I wish that it was available in 64 bits. I do NOT like the latest updates. Is there a good alternative to Family Tree Maker? ?
I have 2011. Can it be updated?
All I want is a Family Tree Maker that can handle large databases. I do not want to split my database
Arlene
The latest version is poor, slow to deal with large databases, poor in building books and most certainly not intuitive. The fact that the 2006 version was perhaps the best version so far (most intuitive) means that whilst I bought the 2012 version I have tried it but not used it.
The 2012 book producing facility is extreemly poor and not a patch on the 2016 version (even with that ones shortcomings). Its time that there was an easy way to produce a book from the data and charts in FTM, the 2012 version is poor on chart/box types