Most users will find the conversion process to Ancestral Quest 12 to be straight-forward and will not need special instructions. But since a few users struggle, we are providing this step-by-step guide.

If you use Collaboration, read through all of these instructions, including the sections further down, before completing the procedure.

1. Place your order for the Ancestral Quest Upgrade to version 12, either online at www.ancquest.com/orders.htm or by phone to 800-825-8864. You may purchase either the download of the program for $19.95 or you may choose to have the program CD sent to you for $25.95 (including shipping and handling). The CD-ROM also includes the Quick Start Video Tutorial (which is available online for free)
2. Download the Ancestral Quest program or obtain the AQ 12 CD.
3. Make sure that your previous version of AQ is not running, and install the new AQ 12 program.
4. Once installed, run the new Ancestral Quest 12 program.
5. Ancestral Quest may automatically try to open the database that you were last working on within your old AQ program; if not, go to Open your main database.
   Note: If you use a collaborative file as your primary database, do not open or convert the database file, but cancel out of the conversion (if necessary), skip to step 7, and then proceed with the steps for Upgrading Collaboration files, below.
6. The database will need to be converted to the new version 12 format. Follow through the conversion procedure. When you are asked for a name for the new version 12 database, you will most likely want to give the database a different name from what it had before (or store it in a different location). A good idea may be to add V12 to the end of the database name, so that you will know this is a database for AQ version 12. For example, a database that was called AOJohnson.aq within AQ 11 would now be named AOJohnsonV12.aq for the database in AQ 12.
7. You may be prompted to enter the AQ 12 Registration Key; if not, go to the Menu bar, choose Help, then select Register Ancestral Quest. Enter the registration key you received: If you had purchased online, the registration key appeared on the webpage at the conclusion of your transaction (and it was e-mailed to you; if you did not receive the e-mail, check your spam/junk mail folders for a message from support@ancquest.com). If you received a CD, the registration key is inside the case, beneath the disc holder.
   When entering the Registration key, the case of the letters does not matter, however the hyphens must be included. Click the Save and Continue button. If you receive the Congratulations message, you have successfully registered the program. If not, you will want to check the registration key that you entered to be sure it was typed in correctly.
8. You have now successfully installed Ancestral Quest 12. If you have other databases that you work with, they will each need to be converted. This will take place automatically when you open a non version 12 database. Follow the instructions in step 6, above, for each database that you convert.

Upgrading your Collaboration Files to Ancestral Quest 12

Note: If you are using a collaborative file and upgrade to Ancestral Quest 12, please note that everyone accessing your collaborative file must also upgrade to AQ 12. You cannot have some users on an older version and other users on the new version due to the new database structure. You may wish to consult with your fellow collaborators before making the decision to upgrade the collaboration file to AQ 12.

The following steps are to be performed by the Owner of a Collaborative file. Be sure that all the other collaborators have updated your current AQ collaborative file with their changes and have checked in the file.

9. Exit out of Ancestral Quest 12, if necessary.
10. Run your previous version of Ancestral Quest and from the Menu bar, choose Collaborate, then Open Published file. Make note of the name of the collaborative file that you wish to open and convert; write the name of the database down.
11. Check Out the file to ensure that you have the latest changes.
12. From the Menu bar, select Collaborate, then point to Admin/Owner, and select Rights.
13. Make note of the User ID, Rights and email address for each person you have granted access to this database; write this information down, if necessary. Click OK to close the Users with Rights window.
14. From the Collaborate menu, choose Convert to Local…, and save the database to your hard drive in a location and with a name you will easily remember (The default location is My Documents with the same database name as the collaborative database; you can go with these). You may wish to write these down, as well.
15. Close out of Ancestral Quest.
16. Run Ancestral Quest 12.
17. If it doesn't automatically, open the database you had just saved in step 14.
18. Convert the database to version 12. You may wish to use the naming convention described in step 6.
19. From the Menu bar, go to Collaborate and choose Publish Current File; You may need to log in to the Collaboration Server.
20. Follow the steps of the Publish Wizard. Be sure that on step 2 you do not use the same name for the file as was used for this collaborative file in your previous version of AQ. This is why the V12 at the end of the filename is very helpful. Continue then finish the wizard. The file will be republished to the collaboration server.
21. From the Menu bar, select Collaborate, then point to Admin/Owner, and select Rights.
22. Add the users with their appropriate rights, as you had written down in step 13. Click OK when you are done.
23. From the Menu bar, choose Collaborate, then Open Published file. Make note that the new collaborative file appears in this list along with the old collaborative file from your previous version of AQ.
24. Locate the collaborative file of your previous version of AQ (you wrote this file name down in step 10). Position the mouse on this old filename and click the secondary (right) mouse button once. From the shortcut menu that appears, click on Delete.
25. A window will appear to confirm that you wish to delete this file. This step cannot be undone. Click Yes; you do wish to delete this old file.
26. Cancel or Close the Open dialog box. You have successfully updated your collaborative file. Now the users that you have granted rights to the new file will no longer see the old file on their screen, but will see the new xxxxxV12 file. Notify your collaborators that the Collaboration file has been updated. The other collaborators must be using AQ 12 to utilize this new version 12 collaborative file.

The following steps are to be performed by the Users of a Collaborative file.

27. Run your previous version of Ancestral Quest.
28. Make sure that you have updated the collaborative server or checked in the file before the Owner proceeds with the upgrade to AQ 12.
29. You may wish to make a local copy of the original collaborative file as a backup. This is not necessary, but may give some users peace of mind to do so. From the Collaborate menu, choose Convert to Local…, and save the database to your hard drive in a location and with a name of your choice (The default location is My Documents with the same database name as the collaborative database; you can go with these).
30. Close Ancestral Quest.
    If you use the collaborative file as your primary database, you want to wait to perform the next steps until you have been notified by the Collaborative file Owner that the database has been upgraded.
31. Contact the collaborative file owner to obtain the new name for the proper collaborative file.
32. Open Ancestral Quest 12.
33. If you use the Collaborative file as your primary database, choose Collaborate from the Welcome screen; otherwise go to the Menu bar and choose Collaborate, then Open Published file; You may need to log in to the Collaboration Server.
34. Select the name of the proper collaborative file (refer to step 31), and click on Open.
35. Follow the prompts to create a local copy of the file; you may wish to be sure that the V12 is included in the file name, if desired.
36. You may now work with the collaboration file like you did in the previous version of AQ.