Associating Saved Reports and Preferences with Data File.
John Layman
john.layman at laymanandlayman.com
Fri Mar 16 17:29:01 EDT 2012
Yes, your view makes a great deal of sense for saved reports, report
stylesheets, and the like (don't need Company A's logo stylesheet when
working in Company B's file). But my intuition (as a person who's been
involved in the development of software as product for nearly 50 years) is
that the need for multiple user preferences is very small indeed. That is
not to say there are zero instances where (say) a husband and wife access
the same file or files under different OS user accounts. But how many of
those few users truly need to customize the app to personal preference? I
would confidently wager that the incidence of this is almost nil. What
we're talking about in this case is a feature in search of a need.
Developer fascination with it notwithstanding, I wouldn't waste effort on it
without some measurement proving there to be significant customer demand for
it.
Meanwhile, it's clear from monitoring this group that (for example) the
Windows check-printing defect is a serious issue affecting many users.
Workarounds are not a serious response to that problem. There is a pressing
need in this case, but the issue languishes. I'm just sayin'..
From: David T. [mailto:sunfish62 at yahoo.com]
Sent: Friday, March 16, 2012 4:22 PM
To: warlord at MIT.EDU; philologos at mindspring.com;
john.layman at laymanandlayman.com
Cc: gnucash-user at gnucash.org
Subject: Re: RE: Associating Saved Reports and Preferences with Data File.
Well, actually, I see it a little differently. To me, it's a question of
having saved reports "go with" the data to which they refer. As it stands
right now, the reports are stored completely separately from the data, and
if by chance you have multiple data files (which is much more common in the
user base than the multi-user model to which you refer), then it is
problematic to have all reports (regardless of data file) stored in one
file. It's also easy to forget this file when backing up or transporting
your file.
David
_____
From: John Layman <john.layman at laymanandlayman.com>;
To: 'Derek Atkins' <warlord at MIT.EDU>; 'Bob Taylor'
<philologos at mindspring.com>;
Cc: <gnucash-user at gnucash.org>;
Subject: RE: Associating Saved Reports and Preferences with Data File.
Sent: Fri, Mar 16, 2012 6:45:43 PM
This is an issue where some customer profiling would be truly helpful.
Given the nature of GnuCash, I have to wonder what percentage of
installations actually has more than one user with distinct preferences. In
this respect, GnuCash is much more similar to Quicken than to Quickbooks
(only the latter of which provides for multiple users.) My guess would be
that - so long as GnuCash is a single-user app (and I doubt very seriously
it will ever be otherwise short of redevelopment from the ground up) there
isn't a significant warrant for per-user preferences. The notion that the
existing GnuCash code base and data model can evolve to a multi-user
offering strikes me as -- well, er -- wildly unrealistic. If per-user
preferences are a desirement of only .005% of the installed base, hey! --
the feature ain't worth the effort.
-----Original Message-----
From: gnucash-user-bounces+john.layman=laymanandlayman.com at gnucash.org
<javascript:return>
[mailto:gnucash-user-bounces+john.layman=laymanandlayman.com at gnucash.org
<javascript:return> ] On
Behalf Of Derek Atkins
Sent: Friday, March 16, 2012 12:23 PM
To: Bob Taylor
Cc: gnucash-user at gnucash.org <javascript:return>
Subject: Re: Associating Saved Reports and Preferences with Data File.
Bob Taylor <philologos at mindspring.com <javascript:return> > writes:
> I have already made it clear, but will repeat my opinion All
> preferences and custom reports should be associated with the data
> file.
I heard you the first time, and I disagree that all preferences belong with
the data file. I still maintain that Some preferences are for the user, and
some are per-user-per-datafile. But yes, there are many preferences that
should be part of the data file but are not.
-derek
> My workaround seems to work pretty well. It has several drawbacks though.
> 1. Each company file (or personal) must be set up. This is tricky. The
path must be correct (backslashes must be changed to slashes) or the program
defaults to "C:\Documents and Settings\user-id\Application Data".
> 2. To move a file would also be messy.
> 3. Occasionally the preferences are not picked up. I think this is a
timing problem. It happens only occasionally and closing the file and
reopening fixes it.
> 4. The file must always be opened with a batch file, i.e. you can't use
recent documents or history. This is not much problem, except:
> 5. you must be careful when opening a backup file. (This, by the way, is
the very bestest feature of GC.)
> 6. Opening multiple instances of GC is also tricky. The second instance
shares preferences with the first. However, they have separate custom
reports.
>
> Regards, Bob Taylor
>
>
> Derek Atkins wrote:
>> Mike Evans <mikee at saxicola.idps.co.uk <javascript:return> > writes:
>>
>>> Would having a different GCONF_PATH for each account be contrary to
>>> any gconf standards? This would provide a way to associate an
>>> account with preferences settings perhaps.
>>>
>>> .gconf/apps/gnucash_accname
>>>
>>> Wouldn't solve the .gnucash\saved-reports-2.4 issue though.
>>
>> I personally have not thought about how one would implement something
>> like this. I think Phil did start looking at it, but he's been busy
>> recently.
>>
>> Note that we have Edit -> Preferences and File -> Properties
>> currently, so we do have "per user" and "per datafile" prefs
>> currently. We just don't have per-user-per-datafile prefs, nor do we
>> have per-data-file data for some other saved data (e.g. saved
>> reports, qif-import-map)
>>
>> One thing that would be useful would be going through all the
>> preferences and determining which category it belongs in. I do
>> believe that there still are some things that should be per-user,
>> such as # register lines, colors, etc. I believe this inventory can
>> be done by a non-developer. Any takers?
>>
>>> Just a thought.
>>>
>>> Mike E
>>
>> -derek
>>
>
>
>
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--
Derek Atkins, SB '93 MIT EE, SM '95 MIT Media Laboratory
Member, MIT Student Information Processing Board (SIPB)
URL: http://web.mit.edu/warlord/ PP-ASEL-IA N1NWH
warlord at MIT.EDU <javascript:return> PGP key
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