Personal Ancestral File (PAF), as of 2013, is a discontinued free

genealogy software Genealogy software is computer software used to record, organize, and publish genealogical Genealogy () is the study of families, family history, and the tracing of their lineages. Genealogists use oral interviews, historical records, g ...

provided by

FamilySearch FamilySearch is a nonprofit organization and website offering genealogical records, education, and software. It is operated by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church), and is closely connected with the church's Family Hist ...

, a website operated by

the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, informally known as the LDS Church or Mormon Church, is a nontrinitarian Christian church that considers itself to be the restoration of the original church founded by Jesus Christ. The ch ...

. It allowed users to enter names, dates, citations and source information into a database, and sort and search the genealogical data, print forms and charts, and share files with others in

GEDCOM GEDCOM ( ), complete name FamilySearch GEDCOM, is a ''de facto'' open file format specification to store genealogical data, and import or export it between compatible genealogy software. GEDCOM is an acronym standing for ''Genealogical Data Comm ...

format. PAF also linked images and other media files to individual records.

History

The history of PAF ran in parallel with the evolution of

, the de facto specification for GEnealogy Data COMmunication or exchange. Version 2.3.1, released in 1994, was the last version written specifically for the Macintosh operating system, though PAF 5.2.18, written for Windows, can be installed on Apple Mac OS X using

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Mac. In 2004 there were speculations about PAF being made open-source. Version 5.2.18.0 began with an adaptation of Incline Software's Ancestral Quest program, written by Gaylon Findlay. Findlay has been involved in updates of PAF.Personal Ancestral File for Macs - Selected FAQ
"The current version of Personal Ancestral File for the Macintosh is 2.3.1. The current IBM versions of Personal Ancestral File are 4.0.4.18 and 5.2.18 (as of Aug 2002). Ancestral Quest has been developed separately, although it retains much of the basic visual layout and file structure of PAF. , PAF was discontinued.

Releases (1984–2002)

The following is a selected release history: *PAF 1.0 (

DOS DOS is shorthand for the MS-DOS and IBM PC DOS family of operating systems. DOS may also refer to: Computing * Data over signalling (DoS), multiplexing data onto a signalling channel * Denial-of-service attack (DoS), an attack on a communicat ...

) released in April 1984. Written in BASIC and did not have support for GEDCOM. *PAF 2.0 (DOS, Apple II, CP/M) released in April 1986. Supported an early specification of GEDCOM 2.0. Due to PAF's slowness in BASIC, it was rewritten in C. *PAF 2.1 (DOS, Apple PRO-DOS,

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) released in 1987. Supported an early specification of GEDCOM 4.0. *PAF 2.2 (DOS, Apple PRO-DOS, Macintosh) released in 1989. Supported an early specification of GEDCOM 4.0. *PAF 2.3 (DOS, Macintosh) released in 1994. The Macintosh version was called ''PAF:Family Records'' and ''MacPAF''. Supported an early specification of GEDCOM 4.0. *PAF 2.31 (DOS, Macintosh) released 30 Sep 1994. This was the final release of the Macintosh version and only worked on Classic OS - OS 8.5 through OS 9.2.2. Supported an early specification of GEDCOM 4.0. *PAF 3.0 (DOS) released May 1997. Supports the current GEDCOM 5.5 specification. *PAF 3.0M (DOS) released June 1999. A maintenance release of PAF 3.0; Shows as Release 3.01M. *PAF 4.0 released 28 June 1999. (Win9x/NT) Freeware. Supports the current GEDCOM 5.5 specification. PAF 4.0 was based on Ancestral Quest. *PAF 5.0 released in November 2000 (Win9x/NT) Freeware. Supports the current GEDCOM 5.5 specification. First version to support

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allowing multiple languages."Software upgrade makes names easier to submit to temple"
''

Church News The ''Church News'' (or ''LDS Church News'') is a weekly tabloid-sized supplement to the ''Deseret News'' and the ''MormonTimes'', a Salt Lake City, Utah newspaper owned by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church). It is t ...

'', March 24, 2001: "PAF 5.0 was recently updated to accept most of the world's alphabets and now has screens in and prints reports in Japanese, Chinese, Korean, Swedish and German." Included was a standalone read only Palm OS application to view, but not edit, PAF data. * PAF 5.1 released in 2001 (Win9x/NT) Freeware. Supports the current GEDCOM 5.5 specification. Support multiple languages. * PAF 5.2 released 23 July 2002 (Win9x/NT) Freeware. Supports the current GEDCOM 5.5 specification. Supports multiple languages."Updated PAF 5.2 available"
''

'', August 10, 2002.

Multilingual support

*PAF 4.x supported English, Spanish, Portuguese, German and French; PAF 4.0.4 was the last version for French, Spanish, and Portuguese *PAF 5.x supported English, Chinese, German, Japanese, Korean, and Swedish

References

External links

PAF support page
at FamilySearch.org
PAF Tutorial
at

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(2007)
Alternatives to PAF
from

Modern Software Experience: A Brief History of Personal Ancestral FileModern Software Experience: Why PAF is still popular
{{Genealogy software 1983 software Products and services discontinued in 2013 Discontinued software Genealogy and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints Windows-only freeware Windows-only genealogy software

History

Releases (1984–2002)

Multilingual support

See also

References

External links