exiting from gnome

[Greg Troxel]

  Nope.  Just like there is no way for gnucash to stop you from
  unplugging your computer or turning it off.  Exiting gnome is
  outside the purvue of gnucash.  By the time gnucash gets told
  that gnome is going away, you have no more UI.

I went to look up this issue in the Gnome HIG, and did not find
explicit mention of this issue.  However, it is clear that losing work
on logout violates the principle of least astonihsment for novice
users.  I found a note that seems to imply this:
https://listman.redhat.com/pipermail/xdg-list/2001-November/000197.html
And, see
http://developer.gnome.org/projects/gup/hig/draft_hig/usabilityprinciples.html
under "Forgive the User".

I think that there should be some autosave mechanism similar to that
of emacs. (Also, a clear modified-state flag, similar in concept
to the * that shows up in modified emacs buffers, and a read-only
indicator.  I haven't noticed either of these - whether my database is
modified has been non-obvious to me.)

Gnome exit (sending SaveYourself to programs) should trigger an
auto-save if there is unsaved data, with gnucash offering to read
autosave data for a file if it exists on startup.

I would be opposed to doing a real save without explicit user
request.  The user might have wanted to abandon changes.

Interrupting logout with a confirm dialog seems OK if this is
consistent with the Gnome HIG.

I realize I am not enclosing a patch, so I don't mean to complain
about the current state of things.  I'm just reacting to the 'is it
broken' question: my reaction is "yes, but someone needs to write
code....".

        Greg Troxel <gdt at ir.bbn.com>