12WRC

Week 2 of the 12 Week Research Challenge centers on planting your tree. For the beginner challenge, it’s about selecting one place to store and organize your data. For the intermediate challenge, it’s about creating a second tree to take advantage of record hints, connect with other researchers, and have a backup in case something happens to one of your trees. For the advanced challenge, it’s about syncing.

For me, I use Legacy Family Tree as my main tree. I am able to use the Families app so that I can have a copy on my tablet. In addition to Legacy, I have a tree at Ancestry. This tree was last updated about a year ago when I uploaded a GEDCOM file produced from my Legacy tree. I try to post a new one each year (and remove the old one so I don’t have a gazillion trees out there). I have it set to private and invite family members to view it. I also have a bare-bones tree of direct ancestors, with minimal details, that is attached to my AncestryDNA profile.

I love the idea of syncing, however, Legacy doesn’t sync with Ancestry and I don’t want to deal with a tree on FamilySearch (sorry). Years ago, when Family Tree Maker was able to sync with Ancestry, I tried it out. It was a little wonky, and I really didn’t like FTM, at all. I’m satisfied with my solution—it works for me. If Legacy ever has the ability to sync with Ancestry, super. But it’s doubtful—if anything it will sync with MyHeritage, which now owns Legacy. If that happens, I’ll probably add my tree to MH and allow them to sync.

What about you? What’s your tree solution? Drop me a line!