Despite our best efforts, Clooz 4 is no longer targeting the Mac OS.  It remains a possibility in the longer term.

Clooz 4, like the current version  3, will run on Mac’s currently when a virtual Windows configuration is established, such as with VMWare Fusion.  This requires a licensed copy of Windows.

In early 2015, Ancestral Systems, LLC established a new policy of having Clooz purchases support free updates for a period of one year following the purchase date (see update support policy for complete description).   Update support needs to be renewed annually to be able to continue to take advantage of new features and changes to Clooz.

Assuming you wish to run the latest versions of Clooz, renew your update support (if expired) on our Shop page.   Enter the new serial number provided to you into Clooz.

If you do not wish to renew, you can continue to run the most recent version of Clooz that was released while your support was still active.   Older versions of Clooz can be obtained on the cloozsetups web page (scroll to bottom part).   Uninstall the newer version of Clooz (if you had installed one), and then reinstall the older version.

In versions of Clooz at least 3.3.8, there is a License Status item in the Help menu.   It tells you when your update support will expire, and provides a convenient link to the Shop site to purchase a renewal when necessary.

Sign up to be on our mailing list.   The profile settings control which types of mailings you want to receive.

We promise not to share your email address with other parties.

Please notify us of the change at support@clooz.com

If you have signed up for our mailing list, update you account information at Constant Contact.  Find one of our email messages and click on the Update Profile/Email Address link at the bottom of the message.   There you can edit your email address and make any desired modification of your profile.

The two programs which Clooz has direct read and write capability to interface with are Legacy Family Tree and Family Historian.  Family Historian maintains data in memory until you save the file, so Clooz does put up a reminder to save the Family Historian file before proceeding with imports or exports. So there is one small manual step there, but Clooz steps you through it.

RootsMagic is somewhat similar, but does not allow Clooz to write data directly to the database. Rather, a special GEDCOM file is produced by Clooz and has to be manually imported into RootsMagic. It is special in that it includes record identifiers so that RootsMagic knows whether the person the data is for is a new person (to be added), or already existing in its database (thus avoiding duplication of people records). It’s just a little bit trickier to use, but can be as effective.

Clooz is not permitted to have direct access (read or write) to FamilyTreeMaker, so all data transfers must be done via GEDCOMs.   The process of importing a GEDCOM into FTM does provide some support for identifying people already in the database (to avoid duplication), but this requires the user to be very attentive and examining all the details.   Clooz will adjust for some of the non-standard aspects of FMTs use of GEDCOM files.

Using a generic GEDCOM, data can be imported from or exported to nearly all other genealogy programs.   However, duplication of people may result depending on the program.

Additional interface improvements are planned for the future.

The option to turn on additional columns of information on the main grid-style listing of people in Clooz (such as RIN numbers, user assigned IDs, etc) is contained in the context (right click) menu when the main list of people is being displayed.   Click on the desired column type to toggle it on or off.

If the option to display these columns is not appearing in the menu, then you have not designated a “Primary” file on the list of External File Links.   Since Clooz can be linked to any number of external files, you must designate which one is to be active at any one moment.   This is done by right clicking the file in the External File Links list, and selecting “Set as Primary”.

Clooz requires the Georgia Regular font to be installed on your system.   It is one of the standard fonts Windows provides.   If it has been deleted, the Georgia.ttf font file needs to be restored in the Windows fonts folder.

This error means your Windows Installer service (the MSIserver in Windows that processes application installers) is either missing, corrupted, or otherwise not running.

Commonly, it is often the result of some previous program installation or uninstall not completing properly.   Some users have had success using programs such as Revo to install Clooz (although this should not be taken as our endorsement of any program).  There are also various solutions described on the Internet when you search for “Windows Installer Service could not be access”.

Contact us at support@clooz.com for further assistance.

When you import people and/or sources into Clooz using the Data Transfer Manager, you are simply importing the individual people (which Clooz then remembers who they are in the other program), or in the source case, the individual source.   No events are imported, since Clooz is entirely document-based.   It is the events (or characteristics) in your family tree program that link a person to a source.   Thus, there is no real way to reproduce that link in Clooz.

However, when you export a document from Clooz back to the family tree program, Clooz will exact information from the document and produce a list of events.   These will be automatically linked to the source of the document in order to have the event in the family tree program proper cite the source.

Think of it this way…    You can create a birth event based on information in a birth certificate, however, you cannot create a birth certificate based on a birth event.   Clooz is dealing with the documents, which becomes evidence of events occurring.   It is not a substitute for your family tree program.

In Clooz, information that contributes to the formation of a complete source citation for a piece of information is contained in both the document and source levels.

A Source in Clooz is a description of the document itself.   It could be a census, book, church record book, marriage certificate, tax record, etc.   The Repository is where this item is physically held.   In the case of online databases, the database, perhaps listed as a Collection, would be the source.   The web site/company publishing this database would be the Repository.

A Document in Clooz is where the contents of the source document are entered.   It consists of two parts.   The general part where some additional information is contained relating to the source (such as the location it applies to).   Secondly, there is then a detailed set of information related to each individual person linked to that document.   For a census, everyone in the family might be linked, with the document detail containing the information listed on their line of the census.   Typically, it is in this detailed set of information where the page number reference is listed, since different persons might be mentioned on different pages of the same document.

This way of organizing information and source identification (some programs call these type of sources Master Sources) results in the most reuse of source records.   Clooz is flexible enough for you to adapt these definitions to your own desired approach.