Family tree websites

[youngtug]

The DVD is fine,, it works like the online version of my tree. I got 2 for the price of one [offer] About £20 including postage if I remember correctly. The membership cost me about £15 for a year. I have made one query online to the admin and was answered immediately, the problem was my fault so I cannot say how good they are at fixing a fault of their own. I have also had a few contacts from other tree holders but am not inundated with requests to look at my tree. The security can be tailored to suit yourself.

[MonicaL]

Thanks for the feedback on the DVD, youngtug  Good to know your experience overall is positive.

Monica

[pinefamily]

Funny, after browsing on the tribalpages site for information about their DVD's, I received an e-mail offering me 50% off, effectively two for one.
Coincidence or not?

[MonicaL]

I just got that too  Something in the air obviously!  Need to load everything on properly (images and notes) before moving on to the DVD.

Having fun with the site though and finding it quite straightforward to load on the images and anotate etc.

Monica

[pinefamily]

Yes, me too. I am a better researcher then recorder, and have a lot of info to add to tribalpages before I can get a DVD.

[PaulStaffs]

To return to the original question for a sec:

For £30 you can buy a domain name and a year's unlimited hosting and put your tree on your own website.

Advantages:
You have your own domain name eg fredsfamilyhistorypages.co.uk
You have complete control of your data - if tribal pages goes bump can you get all your data back in a suitable format? Is commercial use being made of your data? What if the service is unavailable?
You can use your domain for other stuff (like email, file storage etc etc)
You can use whatever software you like to manage your on-line tree (be it read-only or edit-online)
It is more search engine friendly than tribal pages

Disadvantages:
You need a basic understanding of installing web-based software and security (but the essentials aren't difficult).

Take a look at something like Webtrees (http://www.webtrees.net/index.php/en/) for more detail.

Paul

[LeedSam]

I'm new to all this and a bit confused.
To make my own website do I need to understand all the software etc? I've googled a bit and seen this kind of thing http://website.1and1.co.uk that does it all for you.
What does the tribal page do? Do you need to have a website already?
I want to be able to have somewhere to keep all the information that other family members could look at when they want to.

Sorry if I'm asking silly questions, I'm not very technologically minded at all

[PaulStaffs]

OK this might help a bit....

You need somewhere online (a 'website') to store your info for others to look at. If you want this website to have a custom name, for example 'the-smith-family-history.com' you need two things:

1 A domain name (the 'location' www.the-smith-family-history.com for example).
2 Some web space to 'host' or simply 'hold the content of' your domain name.

You mentioned the company 1&1 - they can sell you a domain name and provide space to use with that name. You can also register a domain name with one company and have it hosted on another.

For example I 'bought' the domain name www.digdeeper.org.uk off one company (I think it cost a couple of pounds for two years) but host it with another company (that costs about £30 per year in this particular case).

So, assuming you have a domain name and some webspace - you now need some family history software to display (and maybe edit) your data.

In simple terms, you install this program to your webspace, upload your data to the same webspace and away you go.

Using a 'service' like Tribal Pages or Ancestry.com removes the need for buying a domain name or renting web space - they do all that for you, you just upload your data and off you go. The disadvantage of using a service is that you're stuck with their way of doing things and so don't have full control of your data and what happens to it.

Hope that's some use, shout if you need further explanation!

Paul