Undo

[Peter Selinger]

As I understand it, in a large GnuCash installation, multiple users
could access the same backend database. The lock-edit-commit mechanism
prevents conflicts. 

So what should be the default behavior of U2 and U3 (undo or redo) if,
for example, the transaction has meanwhile been edited by another
user? 

-- Peter

Karl Chen wrote:
> 
> 
> Hi Gnucash developers,
> 
> First, excellent work - Gnucash is awesome.  I especially
> appreciate the book data format which has allowed me to make batch
> changes externally.
> 
> I have a wishlist request: Undo functionality.  I think Undo
> (various levels described below) would add a LOT to usability.
> 
> I've searched the mailing lists and Bugzilla and only found
> something about CashUtil, which seems abandoned.  I'd like to
> request and add a Bugzilla wishlist item for Undo functionality in
> Gnucash.
> 
> It's especially easy to lose text because of the auto-complete
> feature.  It's easy to accidentally change the account of a split
> and then have to hunt around to find it.  If you accidentally
> change an amount or date field, even if you realized what you just
> did, you might not remember the value to revert to.  I often have
> to look in backups just to get back a value I accidentally
> changed.  (I version-control the account file so at least I can do
> this reliably.)
> 
> I see the following kinds of Undo with increasing utility and
> implementation difficulty:
> 
> U1. Undo in account register entry fields (text, date, account,
>     amount, etc.) while editing a transaction.
> 
> U2. Undo for transaction insert, delete, modify, after the
>     transaction has been committed.
> 
> U3. Undo for larger or more complex operations, such as deleting
>     an account.
> 
> Lack of U1 is a big hit to usability - it's almost a standard in
> GUI applications, since default widgets support this.
> Implementation of U1 is the easiest since it's "widget-local".
> The next level, U2, is harder, but would also improve Gnucash a
> lot.  The "please confirm" dialogs would be obsoleted by U2.  U1
> and U2 have orthogonal implementation, and having U2 is almost as
> good as having both U1 and U2 since you can save and undo the
> entire transaction.
> 
> Even just single-level undo would help a lot, though sequential
> undo (and redo) would be even better and is worth the extra
> marginal effort.
> 
> For an example of a project with great Undo support, see Gimp.
> You can undo pretty much any operation; nothing requires
> confirmation.
> 
> Thanks for reading so far and I would love to get feedback.
> 
> -- 
> Karl 2007-02-22 14:15
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