Perspective Event Sets

(For Timeline charts, Ages sidebar, and On This Date report)

What is a perspective event?

In Reunion, a perspective event is an event of historical significance which you can add to a timeline chart, thereby enhancing the legend of the chart. You can add perspective events one-at-a-time, or you can add an entire set of perspective events.

The timeline example below contains perspective events from the Aviation History perspective event set.

Timeline Chart with Perspective Events

Perspective event sets can also be used in the Ages list by selected them from Perspective Events popup menu.

The example below shows the Composers perspective event set applied to the Ages list for Joseph Patrick Kennedy.

Ages Window with Perspective Events

Download perspective event sets

Reunion users have contributed their own Perspective Event Sets to share with others. You can find a complete list of sets below...

Download event sets (.zip - 67 KB)  (Updated 11/29/10)

After you have downloaded the event sets file, unzip it and drag each of the Perspective Event Set files -- not the folder itself -- into the Perspective Events folder. You can find this folder in your Home/Library/Application Support/Reunion/ on your hard drive.

NOTE: In OS X Lion, the Library folder is hidden, but can be accessed by opening a Finder window, selecting Go -> Go to Folder..., typing in ~/Library and clicking Go.

Once you have moved the sets into this folder, you can start using them in your Timeline charts and your Ages window.

Opening a Set of Perspective Events in a Timeline Chart

To open a set of perspective events, create a Timeline Chart (Create -> Timeline Chart) and choose Timeline -> Perspectives -> Open Set. Opening a set of perspective events adds the contents of the set to any existing perspective events in the chart.

Opening a Set of Perspective Events in the Ages Window

Open the Ages list for someone in your family file (List -> Ages) and click on the Perspective Events popup menu at the bottom left of this window. From this menu, you can check or uncheck any combination of perspective event sets from your Perspective Events Sets folder. The selected perspective events will be sorted into the Ages list along with the personal events listed for the person.

When you open a perspective event set into a timeline chart or the Ages list, Reunion will only import the perspective events that fall within the bounds of the timeline or Ages list (starting date to ending date).

Technical information about perspective event sets

A perspective event set is an rtf or plain text file with simple formatting but many options.

You can use your text editor (for example: TextEdit) to build your own sets by simply saving the relevant event list in a new text file with an extension of '.pEvents' .

Perspective event sets should be saved in the Perspective Events folder, located inside your Home/Library/Application Support/Reunion/ folder.

NOTE: In OS X Lion, the Library folder is hidden, but can be accessed by opening a Finder window, selecting Go -> Go to Folder..., typing in ~/Library and clicking Go.

Please see your Reunion 9 manual for detailed instructions on how to format .pEvent files.

Share your perspective event sets

If you'd like to share your perspective events sets with other Reunion users, please send them to help@leisterpro.com. We'll post them on this web page.