Generic Transaction import discussion

[Benoit Grégoire]

On Tuesday 15 October 2002 06:23, Christian Stimming wrote:
> * Currently imported transactions are created as transactions with one
> split (haven't checked this week, though). IMHO this is a BAD THING
> (tm). I would *very, very much* prefer the way this was handled in the
> QIF importer, where by default any transaction was created with one
> split in the imported account and the other split into some default
> account. This way, at least we end up with correct double-entry
> transactions. Additionally, the QIF importer presented the list of
> transactions to the user, showing also the "other" account. Then the
> user could either leave that "other" account to be the default one, or
> could choose a different "other" account. Yet additionally, the QIF
> importer remembered the choice of the other account (very much similar
> to the auto-completion features in the register), and tried to fill in
> the remembered other accounts for all transactions possible. This is
> very much the same thing I would eventually like to have in the generic
> importer.

There are placeholders in the GUI for showing the "other" side of the 
transaction (the othe splits).  What is planned is that once this is 
implemented the user would be presented with the opportunity to create 
another split (filing in as much default data as possible, eventually 
memorising defaults like the QIF account) or dump it in a default "Misc" 
account.  However, I won't have time to do this before 1.8, but if somebody 
else wants to start working on it...

> * The GUI shows the list of imported transactions in the listView
> top-left. Each time a transaction is selected in the listview, the state
> of the transaction can be chosen by the buttons lower-left. IMHO that's
> not a good thing but is rather confusing. If the GUI wants to present a
> choice of different states for each transaction, then this should be
> presented right next to each transaction -- not "first click on
> transaction, then choose among one out of several buttons somewhere else
> in this window". I would very much prefer e.g. something like a
> drop-down list right next to each transaction.

This is what I wanted to do, but simply didn't know how to do it.  I've only 
been touching glade and GTK for a few months now.  I certainly didn't see how 
to do it from glade.  Considering that maintaining the code needed just to 
maintain the bottom choices in sync is a pain, I'd be happy to flush it, but 
I need some pointers.

> Or maybe even some of
> these choices aren't needed at all. IIRC in the QIF importer there was
> only one of these choices available, "Transaction is a duplicate of
> existing Transaction", which was a simple flag in each line of the
> listview... if I recall correctly. Anyway, all other choices didn't have
> to be chosen by the user but were rather derived implicitly one way or
> another. Anyway, I think this GUI probably can still be improved. But
> the matching itself is already really good. Keep up the good work.

I personally think all of these choices ARE needed (Well, replace is not 
really essential, but it scratches an itch for me...)

-If the match is good enough, RECONCILE is automatically selected.
-If there is no reasonable match, ADD automatically selected.
-If the match is in between, IGNORE is automatically selected.

The treshold for these will be user selectable (eventually: the code is there, 
but not the preference page).  The point of selecting IGNORE if the matcher 
is unsure is off course to tell the user that he must make a decision.  Also, 
when clicking apply, all transactions marked RECONCILE or ADD are commited 
and disapear from the list, leaving a much smaller list of transactions to 
deal with.

Off course, IGNORE allows you to skip transactions you don't want imported if 
you press OK.

Hopefully this clarifies some of what I am trying to do.