Hello. I am new to AEON Timeline. I see that there are some Quick Start Guides but is there a printable PDF or user guide for Mac? I tend to do better with printed manuals than on a screen.
Can I combine more than 1 template - I’m writing a Novel but I’m a bit unsure of what template to use as I want timelines, character arch, etc - any suggestions.
Any suggestions for templates family trees?
Thank you in advance!
D
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Hi, Diana.
Welcome to the AT community. 
To my knowledge, there is no PDF version of the manual.
Regarding a template for your novel, I started with an earlier version of the Fiction template for my novel series. It was a good choice to get me started. I suggest starting there for your novel, too.
As for which template to use for family trees, there are plenty of folks here who have experience with that (I’m not one). I’d guess that the Historical template would be a good choice. That said, I do not believe you can combine templates for the same project; you’d have to have separate projects unless…
If your family tree comprises characters in your novel, you might consider starting with the Fiction template for everything. I say that because you are not locked into the choices made by a particular template. You can modify the AT configuration to suit your needs. Additionally, the brilliant aspect of AT is that it separates the chronological timeline (viewed in the Timeline, Spreadsheet, Relationship, and Subway views in the current version 3) from the order of events in your work of fiction (viewed in the Narrative and Outline views). So you could have an extensive family tree of characters, create events that place them in the correct date/time for their activities (in, say, the Timeline view), and order the scenes of your novel any way you want (in, say, the Narrative view).
But anyway, for your novel, start with the Novel template and you can go from there.
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Hi Steve:
Thank you very much for your reply! Your suggestions make a lot of sense. I will start with the template you suggested and go from there. I am a bit overwhelmed right now but I know that the more I use it the easier it will get. I’ve heard a lot of good things about this program.
As for the family tree - I need 2 one for my characters and one for a personal one.
Thank you again for your suggestions.
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Hi @Diana1, welcome to the community, and thanks @SCN for all those great suggestions.
As Steve mentioned, the templates are intended only as a starting point, and everything within them is customizable. In many cases, the functionality is very similar between templates, but some of the labeling can differ according to the target audience for each one (character vs person, event vs task, etc).
The Item Types Guide touches on how to tweak some of the things in your template to suit your intended use.
We’re also more than happy to create a mini guide just for you if you’re not sure how something works, or you find yourself wishing for something you’ve seen in another template.
Just send an email to us at support@aeontimeline.com with some example data and a bit of info about what you’d like to do with it.
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Also, with the family trees, if you use the Mindmap view for those, you can create one for your characters and a separate one for personal use.
However, depending on what you’re trying to do, it might be better to keep them in separate timeline files.