A little while back I read about a unique software program. This program let you put together memories of your life and them publish them in a format for others to look at. The idea sounded like something that something that could be used to chronicle a person's life history. After taking a look at the program, I found that it did a lot more than just jot down things about your past. The name of the program is My Life and it comes from a company called Lifelogic.

First of all, I was skeptical that anyone would really want to bring moments of their past out in the open for others to look at. But after asking a few people about it, I discovered that a lot of folks want to tell the world about themselves. So with that in mind, I proceeded to test out My Life.

When you start the program it prompts you to either open an existing project or start a new one. If starting a new project, you are asked to name it and choose the appropriate folder for it to be stored in. Then you are asked for a password. This feature is optional, but might be helpful if you don't want anyone to see the project before it's finished. There is also a clue section that lets you give hints to yourself about what the password is. Then you are prompted to set your date of birth. Again this is optional. After choosing to either list your birth date or not, move on to the next part of the program.

The Map is the gateway to other parts of the program. The map lists the different subjects that the program has for you to provide information about your life. There are subjects like My Life Diary, Timeline, My Photo Album, Free Association and My Life.

Each item in the map is a card. You can move from one subject card to another or add cards to one of the subjects. You can add cards to any subject.

When you open up a subject to work with, an introduction comes up on the screen. This is done to give you something to base your subject information on. If you want to write your own introduction, it will appear in the finished product at the start of the subject matter.

When a subject card appears on the screen, there are four different work areas. There is the Topics, Think About.., See Also and the Story Window. The Topics area lists items that the program feels would likely be covered by this subject. Items from the Topics can be transferred over to the Think About.. work area. These items can help form the framework for you will put on the subject card. From there move on to the See Also.. work area. This area lists other places in the program that you can jump to or that relates to the card you are currently working on. And finally there is the Story Window where you put all of your remembrances down in print, pictures, voice or video.

You can add a video clip to your Story Window. You can use a video capture method to drop a clip into the
Story Window from a direct source or just add an existing video clip. You can also record an audio clip to add to the Story Window. Add graphics, text files or even hyperlinks to the Story Window.

When you have added everything about your life that is to be chronicled, output the file to either a web page, stand alone desktop presentation, or as a CD-ROM file. You can publish just a single card or the entire project.

My Life is a wonderful, unique way to document your personal history. It is easy to use, has a ton of suggestions to help chronicle the past and allows you to publish this history for others to view.

My Life requires a Pentium 166 PC and either Windows 95, 98 or NT. You will need 32 MB of RAM and 20 MB of free hard drive space. A CD-ROM drive and a SVGA monitor will also be needed. For publishing on the Web, you will need Internet Explorer 4.0 or later.

You can find My Life at most software retailers. Look for a box that has a film reel case coming out of it. Kind of nifty packaging isn't it?

For more information about My Life drop by their web site. It can be found at www.life.com

Copyright © 2000 Bruce E. Von Stiers