The installation wizard will automatically create a shortcut to Bird Journal on your desktop:

To launch Bird Journal double click on the shortcut icon.  The first time you run Bird Journal you will be presented with the first run setup wizard:

 

Here you can customise the behaviour of the journal to accommodate for your recording habits.  For example, if you’re not interested in counts then un-tick the counts checkbox and the counts field will be hidden when you come to adding sightings.

Some taxonomy checklists contain species names in different languages, English is the common language throughout the journal, however switching to French or Catalan will display specie names in the chosen language where possible.

You may wish to switch the taxonomy to reflect your location so that the display of species names are more relevant.  Most people prefer their species list to be displayed in taxonomic order, however if you like you can switch this to alphabetic.

When you are done configuring your journal, click Ok, the journal is now setup and ready to use.

If you wish to make changes to these options in the future, you can do so in Options menu within the software.

In the next few weeks we are publishing a series of ‘Getting Started Guides’ to help new and existing users to better understand how Bird Journal works. 

The getting started guides are to cover the basic functionality of the software then moving on to explaining how to get the most out of your sighting data. 

Be sure to check back later to get the most out of Bird Journal.

It has been another successful year at the Spring Bird Fair, Middleton Hall Tamworth.  Thank you for those who came to visit us at our stand, it’s always nice to catch up with friends of Bluebird. 

From the fair we’ve taken away your suggestions and ideas about further improvements to our journal software.  We also gained plenty of positive feedback about our mobile version which is roughly 60% complete. 

We are currently looking for testers for the mobile version, to become a tester all you need to do is complete our mobile questionnaire.  If you haven’t already done so you can complete the mobile questionnaire from here: http://www.bluebirdtechnology.com/birdJournalMobile.aspx

Hope you had a nice weekend; it’s been a sunny yet windy one here in the West Midlands.

(9.30 am to 5.30 pm on Saturday 21st May, 10 am to 4 pm on Sunday 22nd May - Price: Adults £5, children free)

We are exhibiting at The BirdWatchers Spring Fair 2011 this weekend.  If you are in the area come say hi, we'lll give you a sneak preview of Bird Journal Mobile and would love to hear what you think of the prototype.

We'll have a demo station setup for Bird Journal, if you have any questions about the software feel free to get our attention.

To find us, we are located in the same area as last year: 

Make sure you bring your binos, there is plenty to see especially at the new reservoir: Middleton Lakes.

Look forward to seeing you there,

Christine & Justin

Since our last point release of Bird Journal v2.2 there were two serious crashes found by our users:

1. Crash when importing wildlife/birds/synonym lists.  
2. Crash occasionally when reviewing entries with sightings consisting of multiple taxonomies.

We have now managed to fix both problems.  Our testers have thoroughly tested this release to ensure the build quality is as stable as possible.

Bird Journal version 2 users are entitled to a free upgrade and an email will be sent to you with the upgrade details.  If you have not received this email feel free to get in touch.

Thank you for your patience and apologises for any inconvenience caused with the previous release.  Once you have installed Bird Journal v2.3, continue to use the software as normal.