New Features & Fixes

We're happy to announce that we've just completed our first major release since we launched just over a month ago. If you return to Geni now, you'll see the following new features and fixes:

Family Tree

• Easier removal of mistakenly-added family members, via the "x" icon
• More arrows for adding parents of relatives
• International keyboard layout support
• A new Edit Info dialog box, with frequently edited data on first tab
• A new field for display name on the Edit Info dialog
• A new Partners tab on the Edit Info dialog, with fields for marriage dates, locations
• A circa checkbox for birthdays and other dates on the Edit Info Dialog
• A county field for marriages and other events
• A new photo upload interface
• Easier entry of same-sex marriages/partnerships
• Better support for partners, not just spouses
• Better support for long names
• Increased size for the text used to display relatives' names, as well the title of the family tree
• Smarter display of "extra" people (placeholder nodes for parents and spouses)

Profile

• A new profile editing system, with more room for all controls
• Convenient in-place replies to comments on your profile
• All the same new fields as described above for the Edit Info dialog box in the Family Tree
• Support for multiple high schools/universities/etc.

Performance

• Optimized complex requests, for faster display of the family tree and family list

As always, if you have any questions or suggestions, we're happy to read all of your comments and requests.

Comments

[Bernard Tarver]

I would love it if there was a way to print chart information easily, perhaps if we could select individual branches or sections and print them.

We've got an upcoming family reunion planned for the late summer and while I hope I can bring a laptop and projector to show this information that may not be realistic, plus family members who are less Internet savvy or computer competent may still want hard copies.

[Rémi]

As Whayne said, a blood origine calculator could be great, but i don't think it's the most important now. Why not adding a family calendar with all the events related to our tree (first of all, the birthdays ?). A blog platform could also be enjoyable for my grandma to share all she wants!

[David Sutherland]

SUGGESTION:
(1) When you suggestion placing suggestions on the blog, make it clearer where you'd like them to go.

(2) This is a slighlty complicated request but can be used and understood very easily. I'd like a "picture mode" feature where, if available, all my thumbnails will switch to showing me a certain age range for each individual. I.E. I'd like to see all the pictures I have of peple when they are their closest, to say, 10 years old. Or maybe I want to see everyone at 40 y/o (assuming they have a picture in that range.)

Basically you would have to add a way to tag a photo with a year, or use EXIF data on a jpg and also allow people to modify the date in the store exif data.

And then just add a drop down-menu choice "Show Pictures from: ..." and then list decades but also list relative ages Teens, Twenties, Older, etc.

This way I can compare faces from the family based on the same approx age.

[Chris Bennett]

By far the most well designed geneaology solution I've found. Even my elderly mother can use it without much help :-)

I would like to emphasize some comments of others. The users are putting in a large investment of time and effort with data, but at present there is no way of exporting the data to ensure it isn't lost. We can't even print a hard copy of the information.

These are two features which are essential, and I'm sure that users would pay for being able to produce nice PDF books with the trees and data on people.

Is this on your horizon? If not, I'll have to return to the other program I've been using :-(

[Johan Christian Høgåsen-Hallesby]

I'd love to see Geni open up for translations. My (norwegian) grandmother loves this kind of stuff, but her english isn't all that good. Let me know if I can help out.

[Henrique Seganfredo]

Hello, just 3 questions/suggestions:

a) Is there a way to provide the whole tree as graphic file for a printout? Sincerely, I can´t take my computer, even tough its a 19 inch LCD screen to my family reunion where a bunch of old uncles can´t see well.

b) A comment field (allowing 4-5 lines of text) for each person on the tree would be nice. Usually someone in your family had a nickname, or lived a interesting story in his life, and you want to have this data written on his profile.

c) How do I connect two cousins that got married? They already are inserted on my tree, but I just got an email from a relative saying that they were actually married. What do i do now?

[Gabriel Porras]

Hello...

I'd like you use the TITLE Tag in all your pages.

I have surfing all my family trees and profile pages. All of them has the Title: "Geni - Everyone's Related"

It's better if it tell me where i'm.

For example: If I'm here:
http://www.geni.com/profile/index/399334

The title its better: " Alejandra Maria Quintero Rendon Profile - Geni - Everyone's Related"

Thanks!

[Enrico Vecchi]

Thanks for a great program.
When multiple links between families (see Robert Rissler above)?
Furthermore it happens to me that info of many people are no more editable: the edit box is missing in the profile.
Is it possible to correct?
Enrico Vecchi

[Fernando]

Just came across the site now. Congratulations on a wonderful idea and implementation.

Suggestions (some may be repeated):
- some way to output this data - print, GEDCOM, XML, something. Not sure how much effort one is willing to dedicate to completing their tree and bringing others is if the information availability is solely dependant on the web site being around. Not meaning to sound pessimistic, but will you guys be around in 3 years? 5? 10? 30? longer?
- the linkages between families is also important.
- from a navigation perspective, how about an option to hide the "arrows"? Say I click on someone and THEN I have the option to add relatives. This would make navigation much cleaner...

Thanks!!!

[Shauna Anderson]

I love the site. It's quite addicting!

A suggestion from my mother-in-law for something to add in the profile section: how about a section on MEDICAL HISTORY? Whenever I go to the doctor, they always ask, "Is there a history of xyz in your family?" It may be helpful to see a history of diseases/cause of deaths in a family tree, especially for things like cancer and other genetically-passed-on diseases.

For instance, 6 of my great-grandfather's siblings died young of brain aneurysms, as well as my uncle, which I only just found out since I started working on my family tree and talking to relatives. There is a big history of strokes and heart disease on my husband's side of the family as well. This would be helpful info to know when asked by doctors. Causes of death are included on death certificates.

Not sure what other people think, but it's just an idea...

Thanks for the great site!

[Leonid]

Please try to solve a problem when two brothers married with two sisters.How to eastablish links between their parents?

[Robert Holmes]

I'm new to Geni but so far it's been a fabulous resource.

Two small quibbles hoever,
(1) There does not appear to be any way to have birth & death dates show on the Tree. When printing the Tree it would be nice to have dates shown.
(2) Presumably no-one who died prior to 1970 +/- would have an email address and it is now necessary to manually remove that field for all generations which can be very time consuming. Could it not be an addition rather than a deletion?

Lastly, I agree with an earlier poster who suggested a default Country approach which could be changed if necessary, but its automatic use would help considerably.

Thanks,
Bob Holmes

[Daniel Longmore]

I would like to offer my suggestion. I have heard that one way you plan to support the site is to offer such things as printing services. So here is my suggestion. I would like to print on a single page something looking like a tree of all the descendents of a couple. For instances say I would like to see a picture and the names of all the children, grandchildren and great grandchildren of my uncle/aunt and thier spouse all together on one page. I could then compile these pages into a family book one page for each of 12 aunts and uncles (yes my dad came from a big family). When we get together it is hard to learn who is who. This would be very helpful. Hope the idea is clear. Thanks.

[Sean From IT]

On Profile pages, it would be helpful if the area code would be displayed in the left side contact summary. Also in the contact section, a ZIP code would be appreciated for US addresses! :-)

[Sean From IT]

The system doesn't appear to handle adoptions very well. There should be an up arrow on people with last names different than existing parents (so you can add blood parents), as well as a sister/brother option that allows for not having existing parents.

[Theresa]

When it asks where a person was born, there should be a place to enter the hospital, instead of just the city, state, and county.

Also, in the birth order, there should be a choice for "adopted", or a box to check if someone is adopted.

[Roderick Sutherland]

Hi

It's a wonderful site, however I think that the tree display is a little ugly. One of the great things about this site is the ability to create and view an entire family tree. But when printing this out, surely we need to be able to remove irrelevant text such as 'edit info' and 'view tree'? Also, can we have an option to remove the blue and pink boxes - the colours look a little insipid.

Thanks

Roderick

[dcberner]

I second the request for tree merging.

[Tanya]

I'd like to see GEDCOM file import-ability added.I have software with an extensive family tree already and this would make adding them easier.

[Etienne Jacquemyn]

My aunts grandfather and her husbands grandfather are brothers. While building up my family tree both my aunts name en her husbands appear independently in the tree as son and daugther of. Is it possible in one way or another te connect them together as man and wife? Or is it possible to indicate that two names on the tree refer to the same person?
Kind rtegards.

[Andre Parmeggiani]

As mentioned before, exporting is a must to have. I wouldn't like to loose days/months/years of work just because i cannot have a backup. In addition, if it's my data, i'd like to have a copy with me :-)

Thank you ... Keep doing a great job !

[M1l35]

SUGGESTIONS
----------------------------------------------
1. I would like to second the suggestion for being able to print out the family tree. Some of my elderly relatives do not have computers and would like to be able to see the tree as well.

2. Functionality to be able to add adopted and birth parents to an individual.

[Joelle]

I third the request for family tree merging.

[Michael Harrison]

I echo the sentiment for a "Birth Name" sticky checkbox for the family tree. Let users indicate whether they want to see birthnames or maiden names in their tree display. "Display Name" is good, but what about those of us who have already gone through and provided maiden names? It'd be nice to flip a switch and have the tree display that data instead of the surname.

Great, great update, though! I love it.

[Love It]

I think this is VERY IMPORTANT and is asked by many people. How to link two families. My cousin married my sister-in-law's first cousin's daughter. So no way I can add my maternal uncle to my mother and also link it to my sister-in-law's cousin's family !

Also great would be some way if you provide an option to write macros over it so that in India there are some rules of marriages like I can not marry any of my cousin or even from my sister's inlaws family ! So we can write marriage compatibility on top of Geni!