TNG in General

Judging from the fact that you clicked the “Database Powered by TNG” link, you’re interested in how this genealogy web site was made. That link used to take you directly to the “The Next Generation of Genealogy Sitebuilding” software web site. I’ve placed this page here, though, because the TNG link could be seen as an endorsement of the TNG software, and you deserve a caution before being sent to the TNG software web site.

One way to put genealogical information online is to make a series of static web pages that present specific, predefined information to visitors. That’s how most web sites work. Another way is to create no web pages at all, but to put genealogical information in a database, and use computer scripts to create web pages on the fly as visitors look for information. That’s what TNG does, and it does it pretty well.

That said, TNG is not a polished, consumer level software package that you install on your home computer, and figure out quickly as it leads you through everything you need to do to achieve your goal. TNG is a set of PHP computer scripts that have to be loaded onto an Internet server, where you will also use those scripts to set up an SQL database. In other words, you need web hosting. TNG will go on your web host’s computer. Then you will access TNG using a web browser, upload your genealogical information, configure the scripts to work how you want them to, and at that point you will have a web site. Hopefully. The default TNG configuration is unusable to the vast majority of computer users, since it demands that you have a good grounding in HTML, CSS, and PHP, along with some understanding of SQL, to create a decent layout for the web pages you want the scripts to create. However, TNG comes with some premade templates, and you can select one you like to get a predesigned web site layout. Even then you will not get a web site customized to look as if it is your own family history web site. You will first have to get into at least a couple of the PHP files and change the HTML coding to customize it to your liking. This is something that really ought to be handled by the administrative menu’s setup area, but it isn’t. To make this a bit more clear: if you don’t have and aren’t willing to get at least a basic grasp of HTML coding, you won’t be able to make TNG work for you. If you look at examples of TNG-powered sites made by the various TNG templates, you will see that the templates have been personalized with text specific to the family that put up the site, and with a family photo rather than the generic template photo. You might assume that TNG has an identified place to type in your own custom text, push a button, and have that become part of your web site. You might assume there would be a simple way to change the generic pictures on the home page and on the other pages to something specific to your family. There isn’t. You have to open up the PHP files, find the relevant lines of code, and write new code that meets your needs.

The preceeding paragraph may have sounded negative, but I’m really not trying to turn you away from TNG. After all, I use it myself. I’ve just noticed that a lot of people did not understand what they were getting into when they bought the software, and I don’t want you to assume that my TNG link will take you to something that is user friendly. If you’re interesting in using TNG, I recommend that you first take a look at the TNG Forum, and particularly look at the answers people are giving to questions about installation and modification of TNG. If those answers totally mystify you, that should give you pause. It can take a long time to get this software fully customized and fully functional, and for most people it would be hard to do. The TNG web site does have a lot of positive comments on its testimonials page, but remember that those were hand selected by the developer. TNG is well rated on Hotscripts, but then Hotscripts is a site for computer geeks who already are used to PHP scripting. There are a lot of TNG sites on the Internet that consist of nothing more than a generic template that the users never figured out how to modify for their own use, and there are a lot of frustrated users posting to the TNG Forum. On the other hand, the software isn’t very expensive, and especially if you already like creating your own web pages then TNG is worth a try if you like this or one of the other kinds of TNG-powered web sites.

As far as customer support, TNG is a one man show rather than the product of a big company, and the developer is readily accessible by e-mail, although the quality of the answers you get is variable. There’s a mailing list where other users may give you answers to questions; when you buy the software you get more information on that mailing list. There is the forum mentioned above, which may also get your questions answered; the search function there is a good way to see if a question you have has already been answered (for example, you could use it to find some discussions on how templates can be personalized, such as this one on how I personalized template 5). Some users are developing a Wiki with some helpful hints. For more information on “The Next Generation of Genealogy Sitebuilding” software, click the link in the first sentence of this page.

This Site in Particular

The “Wake Family History” web site is a TNG 7 powered, template 5 based site. It has several tweaks to the layout to make it look a little better (compare my main page to the demo of the stock template 5 home page). There are a couple of modifications on the search page and one on the timeline, a captcha mod on the contact page, customized logs in the admin area, and the rip prevention mod throughout (refresh a page repeatedly and quickly, and see what happens). Most of these are B. McFadyen mods, although I’ve further tinkered with them. I used to have a nice Google Earth mod by D. Bodor, but it became difficult to keep updating, and TNG 7 now has some of its functionality. Many TNG based sites don’t make full use of all the TNG features, especially of things like timelines, reports, and albums, but I’ve made an effort to use all those features, if for no other reason than to see how they work. I also added the Lazarus Guestbook to the site.