The newest version of Windows, Windows 10, has been released. It’s available as a free download if you’re running Windows 7 or 8. (There was no Windows 9.) Our club PCs qualify for the upgrade. Further details are given in this FAQ from Microsoft.

The Windows 10 user interface is somewhat different. I have no advice on whether to upgrade, except for one thing: it’s best to be using the latest version of FTM or Legacy before going to Windows 10. (Any changes 10 required may only be in the latest version of the genealogy program.)

I did check for compatibility of our genealogy programs with version 10:

• FTM (Family Tree Maker): The only information I found is in the online discussion groups. A June discussion contains many reports of FTM working well under Windows 10, while a discussion started today reports a problem. A user says Ancestry said they are working on a fix.
• Legacy Family Tree: Geoff Rasmussen reported on June 1 that Legacy works great with Windows. Google didn’t find any other info for me.
• LastPass: This is the password manager we use in the club rooms. Windows 10 has a new default browser called “Edge” and LastPass is not available for that yet. But it is available for other Windows 10 browsers including Internet Explorer.
• Fences: The desktop organizer we use in the club rooms works with Windows 10.
• Ancestry, Fold3, Newpapers, & GenealogyBank should not be affected because they’re websites rather than PC software. But they have some browser add-ons that might fail.

I’ll upgrade just one of our club PCs soon, both to see if there are problems and so members can try out the new Windows if they like. The rest I’ll leave alone for now. Please comment/reply if you have thoughts or questions.