The address book

The address book is the lodge's member list, kept once and used everywhere. It belongs to the program, not to any single newsletter, so it is there next month too.

Where your members come from

Most committees already keep the list in a spreadsheet. Import it rather than retyping it: People → Bring in a list of members….

The import asks one question per piece of lodge information — Name: which column has it? — rather than showing a grid of headings and hoping. It guesses first, and nothing is written until the last screen shows you what it is about to do.

The import window asking which column of the spreadsheet holds each piece of information — name, birthday, telephone — with the guesses already filled in. — One question per lodge field, with the guess already made. You correct it if it is wrong.

Adding and correcting people

People → The lodge address book… opens the list. Type three letters of a name in the box at the top and there they are; the form on the right corrects one detail without disturbing anything else.

The people window, listing members of the lodge with their office and birthday, a large search box above them and a form on the right for correcting a detail. — Every field says what it wants in the words you would use — Birthday, as a month and a day, like 7/4 — because a box labelled only DOB is a box people guess at.

What it saves you

The birthday list fills itself in. It knows which month the issue is for and takes the brethren whose birthdays fall in it.
The officers wizard offers names. Instead of asking you to spell a name it already knows, it shows you who it could be.
Telephone numbers stay in one place. Correct a number once and every list that prints it is offered the correction.

The officers sync window, listing every change the address book would make to the officers table before any of it happens. — Filling a table from the address book always shows you every change first. Nothing is written on the page until you say so.

Where it is kept, and who can see it

On your computer, in the program's own folder, and nowhere else. TrestleBoard has no account, no server and no synchronisation — nothing about your members leaves the machine you typed them into unless you send a newsletter or hand on a pack yourself.

A copy of the list is kept each time it changes, so a mistaken import or a deletion can be undone: People → Go back to an earlier address book….

Handing over to the next secretary

Pack everything up for whoever comes next… puts the address book, your saved templates, your standing paragraphs and your settings into a single file. The person taking over opens it with Bring in a pack…, which shows them exactly what it would replace before it replaces anything.

The bring-in-a-pack window, listing what is inside a predecessor's pack and what taking it would replace. — What is in the pack, and what it would overwrite. Both stated before anything happens.