TUESDAY'S TIP - CHANGING THE BACKGROUND COLOR IN LEGACY 8

Maybe it’s just me, but I like to change the look of my Legacy file now and then.  I have my favorite color scheme, as I’m sure all of you do.  But, once in a while I like to change it.
 
Today I was trying to do just one simple change – the background color on the Family View.  Shouldn’t be difficult, right?  I’ve done it many times before.  HA!  I couldn’t get the correct selection to come up in the “Change Colors” part of the program.  After many many attempts, I finally asked a Facebook friend who also happens to work for Legacy, what am I doing wrong?
 
I knew it was operator error and I was obviously doing something wrong.  Sure enough it was, but not entirely.  Changing the background on the Family View is not one of the choices available in the “Change Colors” tab.  Here’s how to change your background in Legacy 8.

Step 1 – Select the Options tab and then select Change Colors.  When you do this you will see the pink box pop up.

(CLICK ON ANY IMAGE TO ENLARGE IT)
 


Step 2 – Ignore the pink box and place your cursor in the right or left margin and click.  This will bring up a set of choices for your background, as shown here:



Step 3 – Select the type of background you are interested in using.  You have 3 choices – Color, pattern or gradient, as shown here:

    

Select the background of your choice and click on it.  Presto!  New background
.
TIP:  The color and gradient choices will come up automatically.  However, the Background choices are located in a different file.  Here is a direct quote from, Michele, the Legacy tech who assisted me “They are in C:\Program Files\Legacy8\BackGrnd.  If you have a 64 bit computer it will be C:\Program Files (x86)\Legacy8\BackGrnd.  The color schemes are in the documents folder but the backgrounds are not.”  Knowing where the background files are is very important and it was why I was having problems.

Whether you want a color a pattern or a gradient, it’s your choice to make.

This     or this     
or maybe even this                                            It’s all up to you.

Have fun with it.
 
For more Legacy tips from Michele Simmons Lewis, who assisted me, please visit her blog Ancestoring and use her “search this blog” box.  Type in Legacy and you will see her great tips on many subjects.

If you are still using Legacy 7.5, I wrote a post about changing background colors in that version too.  Please click here to visit that post.

Here are some of the other posts I’ve written about Legacy.
Legacy 8 – A Quick Guide to Label & Tab Colors
Tuesday’s Tip – Using the Internet Search Option in Legacy 8
Adding a Record to Legacy from Ancestry – Step by Step Instructions

There are more tips about Legacy on my blog.  Just type “Legacy” in the “search this blog” box and you will find them all.

Happy hunting,

Michigan Girl

Copyright ©  2010-2015   Diane Gould Hall

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.  NO USE WITHOUT PERMISSION

LEGACY 8–A QUICK GUIDE TO LABEL & TAB COLORS

I’ve been playing around with the color schemes in Legacy 8.  I have found SO many ways that you can customize your colors.  Even BETTER than version 7.5!

However, I apparently missed one little thing regarding the label colors when you view the Individual’s Information screen.  The labels for entries that have sources was colored red and I wanted them to be blue.  I went to one of my favorite Facebook pages TECHNOLOGY FOR GENEALOGY (here is the link to the page: https://www.facebook.com/groups/techgen/) and posed my question about how to get those labels to change.

   

Of course I knew that someone in the group could answer my question, and they did.  Thank you to Michael Giallella.  And now, as you see in this screen shot, my labels are blue.

HERE IS THE ANSWER TO MY QUESTION:
Click on the “Options” tab, then click on “Change Colors.” 
When the little box pops up, then click on “Click here to change other user-interface colors.”  

      
Now you’ll see a screen called “Set Interface Colors.”  Click on the “OTHER COLORS” tab.

From there you can click on each of the choices at the bottom of the screen and change those colors to any number of choices.  I clicked on “Sources” – “Text color for Label Showing Attached Sources” and selected my blue.  Then I clicked on “Select this Color” and BINGO!  My labels were now blue.

Sometimes it takes us a while, when we get an upgrade or new version of a favorite program, to get used to the new interface.  

TIP:  When you are using a new version or upgrade of any software, be sure that you really play around with it and become very familiar.  Otherwise you will become frustrated and spend too much time looking for things you used to know how to do.  If there are tutorials, read them, if there is a book or CD’s, consider purchasing them.  And never ever be afraid to ask.  For us as genealogists we have access to so many others who share our passion and are happy to help.  If you haven’t taken advantage of the wealth of information and help available on the Technology for Genealogy page on Facebook, then I highly recommend you check it out and join the group.  You’d be surprised what you will learn.  

SOMETHING ELSE I LEARNED JUST A DAY OR TWO AGO – How to change the colors on the tabs

Go to OPTIONS and click on the “Tab Color” icon third from the left.  You can also use the “Tab Style” icon to change how your tabs will look.   You’ll get a drop down list when you click on the icon.  

I chose “Access 2007” and “Multicolor Tabs” and this is how mine now look.  You can tell that I like colors.

Have fun with your program and don’t be afraid to “play” with your options. 

Happy hunting,
Michigan Girl

Copyright © 2013 Diane Gould Hall