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Gardening Software for Holiday Gifts

© Connie Krochmal

Gifts need not be expensive to be meaningful. Gardening software and related titles are always welcome as holiday gifts. I tested a number of them for Windows, and recommend the ones discussed below.

Of all the titles I've tried, the "Ideas Genie-Software for Plant Lovers" (http://www.ideasgenie.co.uk) is the most versatile and complete. By far my favorite, it deserves the highest praise. Ideas Genie is a jewel of a program. It is suitable for all levels-from average home gardeners to public gardens and garden-related businesses. Space doesn't allow me to even mention in passing all the various user-friendly components of this praiseworthy program. Because it is so comprehensive, it is really the equivalent of five or more programs all-in-one.

With the Specimen component, users can enter the details on how and where they obtained their seeds and plants. The Swap CD feature allows public and trial gardens, and similar organizations to create records for all their plant collections and make these available to the public.

Buyers are invited to share their garden photos and information on the highly popular User Forum featured on the extensive website. And, the level of support you get from these folks is beyond belief. They're extremely dedicated to their product, and make frequent downloadable updates available free on the website. The developer gave considerable thought to the Help resources, and this is reflected in the helpful tutorials on the software and on the website. The database contains lists, descriptions, and information on plants for various situations. This is one of the very few bi-lingual gardening programs available. Each version is in a paired language set, such as English/Spanish, English/Italian, etc.

Thanks to the tremendous business talents of Doug Skelton--the American agent for the program--the U.S. launch of the product took place in February 2003 at the Northwest Flower and Garden Show in Seattle where attendees welcomed it with rave reviews.

With "Ideas Genie," I can organize my gardening files, compile slide shows of my garden, design new garden areas, develop my own plant database geared specifically to my planting conditions, keep an up-to-date list of the plants in my garden, create printed material for garden tours, keep a list of garden chores, do searches, file gardening information from printed and Internet sources for later use, and make a list of nurseries or seed companies and what I obtained from each. It even tells me when my gardening books are due at the library.

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