It is recommended to use Gramps 4.0.0 with python 3.2 so as to be ready for the future (python 2.7 works though).

The dependencies for Gramps 4.0.0 are completely different than 3.4 due to the switch to GObject introspection, and the removal of autotools. So only install 4.0.0 if you are certain you can obtain the dependencies, see README and INSTALL files.

Major enhancements in Gramps 4.0.0:

• GEP 8: code reorganization
• GEP 26: Replace make
• GEP 29: Gtk 3
• GEP 31: Python 3 support

More info in the manual.
Everybody is invited to update the manual to make it current!

Changes since alpha5:

• solidify detection for locale and date environment
• prevent DB corruptions related to environment (python and bsddb versions)
• some fixes on bytes, python3, encoding issues
• some fixes on CLI, draw and textual reports
• bug fixes on interface, editors, widgets, tree models, handles manager
• bug fixes on tools, exporter, name, quick views
• fixes on proxies (references, filters)
• fix on narrativeweb report
• fix on book report
• fix on grampletbar and citations gramplet
• callback support for TAG class
• improvement on version (versioning)
• Gedcom: improvements on ADDR tag and Repositories support
• better logging
• better support for pro-gen file format
• some updated translations

You can download Gramps 4.0.0-beta for testing only from sourceforge unstable section.

The main changes are:

• Sorting of names, places etc. uses the International Components for Unicode (ICU) libraries which resolves many bugs particularly on MS Windows, and ensures that sorting is the same for all platforms.
• Addon checking and download works again.
• A large number of fixes to Narrative Web. In particular, media objects attached to events and sources are now output.
• Many other bug fixes.
• Various updated translations: da, de, es, fr, it, nb, nl, pt_BR, pt_PT, sv, uk.
• See the changelog for more details.

The latest releases can always be found on our Sourceforge page.

This release fixes some bugs and adds new features.

Changes since alpha4:

• Move to grampslocale, const
• Move from pyexiv2 to GExiv2, metadata
• Better log statements
• Improvements on encoding handling, unicode
• Consistency on dialogs and options (reports)
• Some fixes on Web reports
• Better PyICU integration, sort functions
• OS specific: Mac, Windows
• Geography views
• Ability to use latest gtkspell version
• Debug on tools, libs, DB stuff
• Fixes on filename, filter, proxy and export assistant
• New install script as launcher for UNIX-like OS
• Improvements for thumbnails, gdkpixbuf under Windows OS
• Some translation updates

You can download Gramps 4.0.0-alpha5 for testing only from sourceforge unstable section.

This release fixes some bugs and adds new features.

Changes since alpha3:

• Impovements on installer
• Better version handling with svn version support
• Fix some OS and dependencies issues
• Optional close button on gramplet bar tabs
• Gramplets view becomes Dashboard
• Add private column to views
• Fix encoding issues
• IO enhancements for XML import
• Web app improvements
• Consistency on Bookmarks, better Navigation and review on View models
• New filter matching twins on a family
• New ToDo gramplet
• Better python 3 support
• Ability to get better results by using PyICU
• Bug fixes (book report, file formats, tools, etc …)
• Some translation updates

You can download Gramps 4.0.0-alpha4 for testing only from sourceforge unstable section.

This release should fix a major bug in upgrade code that causes broken family trees if you upgrade a family tree from 3.3.x.

Changes since alpha2:

• ability to add a tag when importing. Adds preference, and tag on import for CSV, XML, and GEDCOM file formats.
• improvements on setup.py
• New URL for gramps-addons
• better LANG variable management
• better support for python 2 and python 3
• bug fixes

You can download Gramps 4.0.0-alpha3 for testing only from sourceforge unstable section.

See previous advices and warnings for any “UNSTABLE” release.

You can download Gramps 4.0.0-alpha2 for testing only from sourceforge unstable section.

For information, on 2012, there was around 2227 commits on code (3.4, trunk, 4.0), making an average of more than:

• 6 changes per day
• 43 per week
• 185 per month.

Happy new Year!

This is a technology preview to allow plugin writers and packagers-installer
writers to update their plugins and scripts. This release is not production
ready, so use for testing!”

It is recommended to use Gramps 4.0.0 with python 3.2 so as to be ready
for the future (python 2.7 works though).

The dependencies for Gramps 4.0.0 are completely different than 3.4 due
to the switch to GObject introspection, and the removal of autotools. So
only install 4.0.0 if you are certain you can obtain the dependencies,
see README and INSTALL.

For linux, in Ubuntu 12.10 you can install 4.0.0, but you will need to
compile and install osmgpsmap manually to have the maps working (see
OsmGpsMap for Geography)

Major enhancements in Gramps 4.0.0:

* GEP 8 : Code reorganization

* GEP 26 : Replace make

* GEP 29 : Gtk 3

* GEP 31 : Python 3 support

More info in the manual.

Everybody is invited to update the manual to make it current!

You can download Gramps 4.0.0-alpha1 from sourceforge unstable section.

• Some fixes on NarrativeWeb report
• Some fixes on book report
• Improvement on database path interface and user’s preferences
• Consistency on Name display and regex support
• Some platform-specific fixes for Windows system environment
• Better support for media links on Gedcom file format
• Fix possible incorrect family relations on Gedcom file format
• Various fixes on citation records
• Fix and improve places handling on Geography views
• Fix on command line arguments
• Consistency on PDF file format
• New language: Greek
• Various updated translations
• See the changelog for more details.

The latest releases can always be found on our Sourceforge page.

What is it?

Obviously it is a fan chart showing the descendants. Let’s look at an example:

These are the descendants of Victoria Mary Louise. Quite a crowded view, but you are looking at 9 generations in a single overview. Some differences with the normal fan chart pop out immediately. It starts with the central person in the center. Inside of this the parents are indicated with a color (here brown). This allows fast switching to the parents.

Outside of the central person is her partner, here Edward. If there are several families, each would take a segment. Next come the children of the couple, their partners, their children, …

Different sized boxes?

Different people have differently sized boxes. The algorithm that determines this is based on the number descendants a person/family has. This can be changed to equal sized boxes, but that normally is not very informative. See the following examples of the descendants of the Greek God Uranus.

As is visible here, the equal sized boxes to the right make the fan chart much less useful. Some other characteristics are evident on these examples. When the family has only one known parent, a transparent box is drawn for the partner (which is white in the example). Next you notice black boxes. These are boxes showing duplicates. For example, Zeus is present here as son of Cronus, and has several partners. One is Leto, which is also present as his uncles daughter. This second occurence of Zeus is in black (the duplicate color is an option you can change).

What else?

Otherwise this fanchart does just the same as the normal fanchart: drag and drop to change center person, rotate, move, filter, expand/collapse nodes by clicking, …. Some extra options have been added to allow using this view as a way to quickly enter information:

• The context menu on a person has an add menu to add a new partner. This will open the family editor with the person preset as one of the parents
• The context menu on a partner (family) has an add menu to add a child to the family. In the case there are several partner, a reorder button is also present like in the relationship view to change the order of the families.
• If the view has focus (so you clicked somewhere in the view) then pressing e over a person will open the edit person dialog. pressing f will open the family editor. Combined with the normal fanchart this allows to use the fan charts to enter a complete family tree in a timely manner.

Is this it?

I sure hope this is it, I have other things to do. Some things can be changed, but better wait how the views behave once users start to stress them. The above chart of Victoria starts to stress my dual core laptop, so doing some profiling to see where the bottlenecks are to make it work a bit faster would be interesting. But then, why are we buying better computers, no? Time for me to find some time to work on the plumbing layer of Gramps.

As a close, a time period coloring of a part of my own tree, limited to 5 generations from the oldest Malengier in 1718.