GRAMPS Genealogy Software Reviews

(based on 3 reviews)

128 of 207 people found this review helpful

I was attracted by favourable comments in ComputerActive magazine. However, after spending over two hours trying every menu option I cannot discover the secret link to importing my existing Gedcom files. The (Wiki) help file/manual is very poorly laid out, and doesn't "help". If the software is good quality, them it needs a passing genius to publish Gramps for Dummies! I am giving up on this one.

In summary, I would not recommend GRAMPS Genealogy Software to a friend.

276 of 526 people found this review helpful

One thing I forgot to mention in my earlier review is that there is another serious drawback for those who have very large databases (i.e., have a large number of individuals that stretch back many generations) is that there is a maximum limit of 50 generations back in which the software will calculate familial relationships. This may not be an issue for those who are just starting out as you might not see a time when your work will take you back 75 or more generations, as mine has. You start out with a dearth of information, but if you stick with it and are lucky enough to link up to royalty, which is fairly well documented (and they are all pretty much related because they wanted their children to marry for strategic and/or political purposes), then you wind up with a plethora of information that cascades into having a database that could easily include over 200,000 names and goes back into the BCE period. Genealogy can become addictive, so if you do managed to make these well-documented connections, then you could find yourself not knowing exactly how you are related to these earliest of relatives unless you work your... (Read the full review)

In summary, I would not recommend GRAMPS Genealogy Software to a friend.

319 of 568 people found this review helpful

This is undoubtedly the most overly complicated, unintuitive, and user-unfriendly software ever! This is coming from someone who comes from a high-tech background, including programming, and has decades of genealogy experience behind me (would that be a pun?).

The one problem with open source software is that because it's not actually a company, there is nobody at the helm steering the ship, so the result in this case is the ship being lost at sea. They even tell you that it's not advisable to simply start using the software, that you need to read the manual beforehand (not really a manual as it's only available on-line). So, after a three hour tour, I was lost at sea.

A second problem with open source software is that the technical writing is generally horrible. The problem is it's written by programmers for programmers instead of as a tutorial for the end user.

What they have apparently done is pirate the GEDCOM standard and transmogrified it into something unrecognizable by other well-established genealogy programs. They even have the audacity to plainly state right in their own literature that the process of importing your old GEDCOM, especially if it's a large file, WILL cause... (Read the full review)

In summary, I would not recommend GRAMPS Genealogy Software to a friend.