New Sponsor, New Address, New Graphics!

February 1998

Hello all -

I'm very pleased to announce several exciting new happenings on my web site. Cyndi's List now has an official sponsor! Sierra, the developers of a great new genealogy software program for Windows titled "Generations Deluxe," has offered to sponsor my web site and help me make improvements and enhancements that I would never be able to do on my own personal Internet account.

I have often received questions from visitors to the site asking, "Why don't you have . . .?" or "Why don't you add this . . .?" My answer was always that I was maintaining the web site by myself, on my own personal Internet account at Oz.net, and didn't have access to any of the snazzy technical stuff available on a commercial web site. In addition, the work of maintaining the web site has kept me so busy that I haven't really had time to set up and implement new things on the site. Now, I finally have someone who can make all this possible and who can help me make the site bigger, better and faster for all of us to use. It's about time, isn't it?

My head is just filled with dozens of nifty ideas for things that will improve the site and make it an even easier online research tool to use. I'm not going to tell you the ideas I have all at one time. Instead, I'm going to save them and surprise you with them as they become available. It will be like Christmas all year long. ;-)

Just before my new partnership with Sierra, I had decided to register my own domain name and move the site to RootsWeb. So, thanks to help from Brian Leverich, the site has a new, easy-to-remember address:

http://www.CyndisList.com

I have set up forwarding pages at each of the old web page addresses to help you get to the new pages easily. Please be sure to update your bookmarks and any links you have to the site. All of the individual web page file names have stayed the same, so you can just replace http://www.oz.net/~cyndihow with http://www.CyndisList.com
There are two exceptions to this:
- Queries & Message Boards, queries2.htm is now queries.htm
- News Groups & Mailing Lists, newsmail.htm is now mailnews.htm

Last, but not least, I have some pretty new graphics for Cyndi's List. The old graphics will remain on my personal web site. The new graphics were designed by Mark Brill at Sierra. I love them! I told Mark what my ideas were and "poof," there they were. Not only are they beautiful to look at, they are also optimized for quick loading in your web browser; the pages are therefore much quicker for you to get to, which means you can get to the good stuff linked from my site that much faster.

I'm happy to be associated with Sierra for several reasons. The first reason is, as I mentioned above, that they are going to help me make the site the best it can possibly be. In addition, they are located here in Washington state and I'm glad to support a local company. This also means that I've been able to visit with them, see their headquarters and get to know the people on the Generations team. They are a very enthusiastic group and I can tell that they really love what they are doing. They are also proud of Generations and from what I've seen so far of the beta versions of the program, I think they should be. Sierra's Generations program is based on the previous Reunion for Windows genealogy program. Reunion has always had a reputation as a fine genealogy software program. Combining that with Sierra's own ability to turn out high-quality programs is sure to make Generations a popular new tool.

With Sierra's help, I'm committed to continue work on the web site so that it will grow and have the same level of quality that I've maintained over the last two years. I have several personal goals regarding this web site which the people at Sierra respect and support. First, I believe that the site needs to be kept as current as possible and that updates to web addresses are just as important as any additions of links to the list. Also, I want the site to be equally accessible to everyone, no matter what type of computer they have or what speed their modem might be. And last, I have insisted that the site always remain a free resource for all of you to use.

Cyndi's List is just about to have its second birthday. I can't think of a nicer birthday gift - new friends, a catchy new address and a new look. I hope you each enjoy all of this as much as I do!

Cyndi Howells
Cyndi@CyndisList.com
http://www.CyndisList.com

**I'd like to express my sincere thanks to several people who have helped to make all the recent, wonderful changes on the site:
• To Brian Leverich & Karen Isaacson at RootsWeb for hosting the site and for helping me to obtain my new domain name.
• To Mark Brill for designing the beautiful new graphics used throughout the site.
• To Jennifer Godwin for her help in a current project to identify outdated links.
• To Shirley Bruso for her terrific help over the last two years, especially recently in tracking down some specific sites to be added to the list.
• To everyone at Sierra Home, especially Sarah Ford for coordinating everything, and Elon Gasper for teaching Evan how to stick his tongue out. I really owe you for that one Elon!
• To several members of the RDPP for moral support and a few laughs whenever I need them.
• To my wonderful husband, Mark, for supporting me in a million different ways throughout the life of this web site. Thanks also for the help in testing, proofreading and spot-checking all the new pages. What would I do without you? I don't ever want to know.