“The new release is designed to make Family Historian as easy to pick up and learn, and as easy and fun to use, as we could make it”, says Simon Orde, managing director of Calico Pie. “We’ve got a completely new component window called the Focus Window which is the new hub of the program. It’s a big step forward in user interface terms. At the same time we’ve completely re-written the Property Box – the main data entry window – to make it much easier and nicer to use too.
There are also a lot of new features relating to pictures and multimedia which is another big focus of the new version. And there are loads of other great new features. Family Historian has always been a very innovative program, and there’s a lot of innovation in version 4”.
New features in version 4 include:
• A new hub component window called the “Focus Window”, with views for spouses & children, parents & siblings, ancestors and descendants. It is designed to make adding relatives and moving around a family tree, completely intuitive and easy.
• The main ‘Property Box’ (for data entry) has been reworked so that it too is now easier than ever to use. Users can configure its appearance, customize it, move it, resize it, or ‘dock’ it to the side of the application window.
• Project management capability has been added. The program automatically looks after all your project files for you (including picture files and other multimedia, saved charts and more) in a dedicated folder on your hard disk.
• Multi-level undo/redo lets you make changes in confidence, knowing that if you make a mistake you can easily undo it (this is the most voted-for feature on users’ wish lists).
• Full support for same sex relationships has been added.
• Support for multimedia, and especially pictures, has been significantly enhanced. Thumbnail views have been added to make browsing pictures easy. You can now link pictures to events and attributes. Adding pictures and multimedia is easier than ever, as is browsing all the pictures in your project - thanks to extensive filtering options, including keyword filtering, in the Multimedia Window. Support for pictures has been improved in reports, and there is an all-new multimedia report.
• Charts, reports and queries can all now be saved in PDF format. With charts, you also have the option of saving the entire chart as a one-page PDF file.
• Extensive power-user features have been added, giving power-users much greater scope to extend and customize the program than ever before. Ordinary users can also benefit through the ability to download program extensions written by power users, from Family Historian user websites (e.g. www.fhug.org.uk).
• Enhancements to charts and diagrams.
• Improved support for website generation and for family tree CD creation. … and much more.
Christmas Offer While stocks last, customers who buy Family Historian 3 now (full version) from participating stockists, will be sent a free CD upgrade to version 4 when it becomes available. The CD upgrade is expected to have a recommended retail price of £23.95.
Anyone who buys the download version of Family Historian 3 now (full version) will get a free downloadable upgrade to version 4 when available (see www.family-historian.co.uk/products). Awards for Version 3 Your Family Tree magazine gave Family Historian 3.1 its Family History Software of the Year award for 2008 (Dec 2008). Which? Computing gave Family Historian 3.1 their Best Buy award and their highest overall score in a group test of eight top genealogy programs (July 2008).
Windows XP: The Official Magazine gave Family Historian 3.1 their Editor’s Choice award and highest score in a group test of four top genealogy programs (Dec 2007). Computeractive magazine gave Family Historian 3 their Buy It! award – the second time it has won this award (July 2006) Personal Computer World magazine gave Family Historian 3 their Personal Computer World Recommended award (May 2006). Other reviewers said of version 3: “The best genealogy package just got better” (Family Tree magazine), “The best just got better” (Norfolk Roots), “Brilliant and dead easy to use” (Univadis), “The diagrams are superb” (National Genealogical Society News magazine), “One of the best, if not the very best, in its class” (Australian Family Tree Connnections), “Superb picture handling and the best set of charts around” (Your Family Tree), “Without the slightest hesitation, I am happy to label this the best piece of genealogical software I have ever used” (The Banyan Tree).
Today and yesterday, President-elect Barack Obama announced key members of an economic team tasked with creating jobs, stabilizing the economy, and getting our country back on track. Barack is bringing together some of the best minds in the country to make swift progress on the economic challenges we face.
Timothy F. Geithner, president and CEO of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, will serve as Secretary of the Treasury. Lawrence H. Summers, former Secretary of the Treasury under President Clinton, will serve as Director of the National Economic Council. Christina D. Romer will serve as Director of the Council of Economic Advisers, Melody C. Barnes will serve as Director of the Domestic Policy Council, and Heather A. Higginbottom will serve as Deputy Director of the Domestic Policy Council. Peter Orszag, currently Director of the Congressional Budget Office, will serve as Office of Management and Budget Director, and Rob Nabors will serve as Deputy Director.
Watch the video of Barack’s announcement yesterday and learn more about the economic team: Barack’s economic team has already begun work on a recovery plan, and he’ll provide progress updates in the coming weeks. He’ll also provide their initial recommendations to the incoming Congress. You’ll be instrumental in generating support to pass legislation that puts America on the road to recovery. While we can’t underestimate the challenge we face, we also can’t underestimate the opportunity we have to bring the change our country needs.
The Smithsonian National Museum of American History will open its doors this morning for the first time in more than two years. Back will be Old Glory, Thomas Edison’s light bulb and Dorothy’s ruby red slippers. Also back, particularly this weekend, will be the crowds. Don’t say we didn’t warn you. Having said that, there’s no doubt that the centerpiece of the renovated museum — the American flag that inspired Francis Scott Key to write his famous poem — has never looked more magnificent.
It’s inspiring as it sits behind a 35-foot glass wall in a theaterlike space, dimly lit to recall "dawn’s early light." Key’s words are simply displayed above the 30-by-34-foot flag. This space, in contrast to the old one, is meant to be calming and quiet. It’s also relatively small, especially the area available to stand in front of the flag. The museum has no plans to issue tickets to manage the crowds passing through the Star-Spangled Gallery. (Helpful hint: According to a museum representative, Thanksgiving Day is less crowded, as are the days leading up to Christmas.)
There’s much to like about the new old museum. The entrance is spacious, open and bright, with a skylight and balconies surrounding the atrium. You may have a hard time remembering what the old museum looked like. An abstract flag made of a silver reflective material greets visitors on the far wall as they walk in. Behind that is the Star-Spangled Banner. Many of the museum’s favorites are back: Kermit the Frog, Julia Child’s kitchen. Some are not: the Foucault Pendulum, demonstrating the rotation of the Earth. The space where it was is marked by a gray circle.
If you visit the museum this weekend, there will be plenty of special events:
- Historical images will be projected onto the museum facade tonight and Saturday from 5 to 10.
- Help a Fort McHenry honor guard fold an American flag correctly Saturday at noon and 3 p.m. on the terrace, weather permitting.
- Invent something at SparkLab, a hands-on center for kids of all ages, Saturday and Sunday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on the first floor of the west wing.
- At carts throughout the museum, wear a corset, use a cotton gin or try other activities Americans would have done in the past Saturday and Sunday from 10:30 a.m. to 4 p.m.
- Learn what it was like to be part of the civil rights movement at a 20-minute talk led by an actor portraying 1960s activist Samuel Leonard on Saturday and Sunday at 11:30 a.m., 1:30 p.m. and 4:30 p.m. at the Greensboro lunch counter on the second floor of the east wing.
- Take a 15-minute tour of your favorite exhibit led by a docent Saturday and Sunday from 10:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. - Check out live music: jazz on the first floor today at noon, 2:30 p.m., 4 p.m. and 5 p.m.; Saturday at noon, 2:30 p.m. and 4 p.m.; and Sunday at noon and 3 p.m. On Saturday only, there will be performances of 18th-century music at 10:30 a.m., 1 p.m. and 3 p.m. on Main Stage 1; bluegrass at 11:30 a.m., 1:30 p.m. and 3:30 p.m. on Acoustic Stage 3; and Dixieland music at 12:30 p.m., 2 p.m. at 4:30 p.m. on Acoustic Stage 3.
- Meet Mary Pickersgill, the star-spangled banner seamstress, and learn about the flag from a reenactor Saturday and Sunday from 12:30 to 12:50 p.m. and 3:30 to 3:50 p.m. in the second-floor Flag Hall.
- Listen to President George Washington (you know what we mean) and ask him questions Saturday at 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. in the second-floor Flag Hall.
There has been a recent flurry of news articles saying China may begin to diversify into Gold. But the articles conclude that China will move slowly, over years, so as to not disturb the markets. Funny. It’s funny because it’s like they don’t know basic math. China wants 4000 tonnes of gold, to help "diversify" their $1.9 trillion in U.S. bonds. It’s quite a joke. Please bear with me as I explain.
A tonne of gold is 32,151 ounces. Please search "troy ounces per tonne" at google to confirm, because this one bit of information, and a simple calculator, can help you unlock and decipher the meaning of what you read in the news regarding the gold market, as gold at the national level is usually always quoted in terms of tonnes. The total ounces China is seeking, is thus: 4000 tonnes x 32,151 ounces/tonne = 128,604,000, or 128.6 million ounces. That’s an interesting number because it is about half of the U.S. official gold reserves of 261 million ounces. It’s also an interesting number because the total annual gold market consumption is said to be about 4000 tonnes, while annual mine production is only about 2500 tonnes. But let’s now multiply by the current gold price, to see how much of China’s reserves could be diversified if they obtained that, without disturbing the price. At $736/oz., times 128.6 million ounces = $94649.6 million, or $94.6 billion. That’s funny, because $94.6 billion is not very much of $1.9 trillion, which is $1900 billion. What’s the percentage? Simple: $94.6 / $1900 x 100 = 5%.
See, if China diversified 5% of their reserves, they would dominate the world gold market, buying an equal amount bought by the rest of the world in a year, and that could crash the dollar by 50%, while gold prices could double! And actually, such a diversification of $94 billion would be no diversification at all, since China has added $600 billion to their dollar holdings within the last 6-7 months, up from $1.3 trillion. To truly diversify, they would need to sell more dollars than they are accumulating, so they really need to buy about $600 billion worth of gold, or more, in a year. How much would a true diversification be at current prices? $600 billion / $94 billion = 6.38 times as much gold as the world buys in a year. Please think on that, and buy silver, instead.
Because as we have seen, as gold moves, silver moves higher faster, and runs out sooner, because it is more scarce. Here is a quote that has been posted for over a year at my main page at silverstockreport.com: "Even though the U.S. dollar is no longer backed by gold, any holder of dollars could wise up at any time and start buying silver or gold. China, for example, could spend their $1.3 (now $1.9) trillion U.S. dollars in bonds and buy gold anywhere in the world, such as Switzerland, Dubai, Tokyo. China could even send agents to buy gold at any of the 4,000 or more coin shops in the U.S. The dollar could drop 50% or more overnight, and there’s not a single thing the U.S. government, you or I could do about it."
Why only now I realize that I was not alone in this world, nor the last creature on earth? It contained two meanings such as double-edged knife. Let's hope this becomes the ultimate of so exhausting journey.
