Genealogy at home: Keeping track

Published on 24 March 2020

Set up a system for recording and organising your research

By now you will have accumulated a stack of papers. This pile will grow into a confusing mess if you don’t start a filing system of sorts. Use whatever works for you. Most people end up using a combination of digital and paper based systems.

Paper based

There is nothing wrong with keeping paper files if this is what you are most comfortable with. If this is the way you want to start, it is handy to have a supply of Family Data Sheets and Pedigree Charts on hand. This makes it easier to record and keep track of details and means you are not handling your important original documents unnecessarily. These can be downloaded and printed from many Internet websites.

PC based software

You might decide that you want to record your research digitally. There are a few ways to do this. There are many stand alone genealogy computer programs around and most of them are very easy to use these days. Some software is free to download, and is a good way to see if this is the way you want to go. Check out some of those listed here or find your own by googling “genealogy software comparison”

Be aware that many genealogy software packages (free and otherwise) offer to display your information on the internet as an “option”. It can be difficult to turn this feature off, however, and not everyone wants to publish their tree in the early stages.

When you are looking for a program, it is advantageous to ensure that you will be able to import and export data between software packages. This enables you to upload or view information other people give you, or change software without losing data if things don’t work out. GEDCOM is the standard file format shared by genealogy programs.

Online software

The other type of software for genealogy is web based, and this includes the large Commercial vendors like Ancestry.com, Findmypast and Rootsweb. There are also free web based genealogy packages. Check out this website for information and comparisons, or find your own by googling “web based genealogy software comparison”

The advantages of going web based is that you can access your tree from anywhere, on any device and can share a login so that more than one person can input information.