Below is a list of programs and tools I often use when making pedigrees and tracking horse information
Microsoft Office
If you are a student, you can get Microsoft Office 365 (all of the current programs included with Microsoft Office) for free! All you have to do is go to the link below and sign in with your school email. Unfortunately, this is not available for anyone else unless your employer has some sort of subscription to Microsoft Office 365. For people that aren't students and don't want to pay for office, the web browser versions are free and useful for basic use (including drafting pedigrees and breeding certificates). All you have to do is make a Microsoft account and then you can use OneDrive on the web.
I'm self-taught in excel and if you're able to do that as well, it's a great skill to have. I can't really explain how I learned how to use excel effectively for small database management other than by saying I have to use excel formulas and functions for my college chemistry classes and taking the skills I learned there and applying them to my hobbies helped me grow those skills quickly while still having fun with it. If you have something specific that you would like to automate in excel, feel free to talk me through it and I might be able to help. Otherwise, I've linked a guide below. Once you start using formulas in excel and know the basics of how excel's "code" works (it's actually a lot simpler than most codes, it's made to be used by everyone), you can easily play around with different things and see how far you can make the technology stretch.
Kintraks
I recently have gotten back into Kintraks and now that I have adjusted literally every setting possible, I've finally gotten it to work for me! Kintraks is a paid software based in Australia that is meant for primarily dog breeding but has built in options for all different species - including horses. There are some aspects of Kintraks that are a bit overkill for model horse collectors, so I sub them for other uses. For example, I don't really use the "Journal" tab in Kintraks as a journal, I use it to log "standard" live and photo show records. What I mean by standard is saying "1st place Quarter Horse" instead of assigning it to my points system (which I still use for IPABRA records). I feel like none of that makes sense but oh well. What I'm trying to say is Kintraks is pretty awesome and a really helpful tool for those of us who seem to be drowning in pedigrees (also for those of us that keep repedigreeing horses on accident because you lose old emails).
Kintraks is a paid software but you can get a trial version for up to 200 entries. If you are typing in horse pedigrees, these 200 entries go by fast. It's $25 AUD, which is about $15 USD and worth every penny. You won't have to re-register or pay anything on top of that initial fee - unless you lose access to the original email account used to get the key, like I did. The software updates automatically when connected to the internet and works normally when you aren't connected to the internet.
Photoshop
If you don't actively photo show and do graphic design, there is no reason to get an expensive software like Photoshop. However, if you are looking for something to edit photos and create custom graphics for, you can't top Photoshop in my experience. I currently use Photoshop Elements which is a cheaper and kind of "dumbed down" version of Photoshop CC. I don't use Photoshop for drawing or for making custom graphics from scratch, so I don't really have a need for Photoshop CC. My Photoshop version also came with Adobe Premiere Elements, which is a video editing software (dumbed down version of Premiere Pro).
Through doing research for this page, I also found out that Photoshop CC and Premiere Pro are both subscription based. So there's another reason to get Photoshop Elements, it's a one time fee. You can buy Photoshop Elements from Adobe today for $69.99 or a package with Photoshop Elements and Premiere Elements for $99.99. You can likely find them cheaper elsewhere, just about anywhere sells Adobe software. I recommend checking out Amazon or Walmart before buying directly from Adobe.
Avery.com
Before I went to college, I didn't have the full Microsoft Suite, which meant I was missing out on some game-changing software like Publisher. I was somehow surviving off of Google Docs and 2003 versions of Excel and Word. Don't ask me where these random 2003 versions of the software came from because your guess is as good as mine. What I'm getting at is that Avery.com is basically Publisher, but free, and probably more user-friendly.
Whenever you open Publisher, you'll see templates for different things, and then you have to use a code found on your labels (if that's what you're designing for) to find a template that'll fit on your labels. Avery simplifies this. If you have Avery brand labels or paper products, it's really easy to find the right template for your product. What I use Avery.com for, however, is to make breed documentations. You can find some beautiful templates on Avery.com for just about anything you can think of and the best part is, you can print it at home on any paper your printer will allow. I use a wedding invite template to make my breed documentations which prints double sided with 2 cards per page.
HTML & BBCode
HTML and BBCode are both really valuable things to learn. BBCode is basically a simplified version of HTML which, in simple terms, is the code of the internet. I understand that the word "code" can be really intimidating for people, especially those that aren't very tech savvy, but once you just dive in and use it, you can pick it up pretty quickly. I know HTML much better than I know BBCode simply because I've used it more, but BBCode is, at it's core, much simpler.
Now, why might you want to learn a web code? If something seems off with your website and you know a little bit of HTML, you can probably figure out what's wrong. You can right-click and "view source" to view the HTML code of the page you're looking at. Knowing HTML will essentially "highlight" what's wrong. You can also adjust HTML codes to make something look "perfect" on your website. One way I use HTML almost daily is to change the spacing in my embedded pedigrees on this website.
Combine PDF
When generating certain documents (but especially horse reports), I end up with a lot of small PDFs that I need to combine into one larger PDF. As you probably know by now, I'm cheap and don't want to pay for software when I don't have to. Instead of buying Adobe Acrobat (even though it is a wonderful software), I just use the online tool below. This website has very little ads, doesn't lag one bit, and combines my PDFs quickly and easily.
This is a model horse website, all real horses are clearly marked with -r, (r), or by being listed in all caps.
To request a breeding, click below to view current breeding rules and guidelines.