Why does 'Updating all fields…' take so much time and memory?

Selecting "Update all fields" will considerably extend the time taken to create a book, this will be exacerbated where a huge number of individuals are included in the book as memory consumption will be very high.

Where books are created with a fixed-layout document format like PDF, performance and memory usage all depend on complexity and size of the documents being generated. To update all fields, Family Book Creator must internally build a 'page layout' of the document to be able to automatically update all fields (Table of Contents, Cross-References, Index of Individuals etc.); this uses a lot of your PC’s resources.

Updating all fields during document creation is optional when creating a book in the DOCX, DOC, ODT and RTF file formats. It is still possible to update all fields after document creation is done by using the function incorporated into your word processing application. For the fastest generation of a book create it as Word Document (DOCX) file format with 'Update all fields'-option on the 'Preferences', 'General' tab page unchecked as shown below.

You may want to use Microsoft Word to update all fields later. To update all fields at any time, highlight the entire document (click 'Select All' on the Edit menu or use CTRL+A), and then press F9. How many pages do you get and how long does Microsoft Word need to update all your fields inside the Word document?