IRC discussion on i18n, xml/utf8, and 1.8->2.0 data migration issues

[Andrew Sackville-West]

On Fri, 03 Feb 2006 18:29:52 +0000
"Andrew Duggan" <cmkrnl at speakeasy.net> wrote:

>  From: Derek Atkins [mailto:warlord at MIT.EDU]
> > 
> >    Would you rather be able to always read a data file created in a new
> >    version of gnucash using an older version of gnucash, where saving that
> >    data file will lose data when you re-open it in the new version, or would
> >    you rather the older version of gnucash fail to load the data when it
> >    sees data it doesn't understand in order to prevent accidental data loss?
> > 
> > -derek
> 

>Personally, I would recommend that you just warn the user on opening the file that if they save it, they *will* lose data related to features from all newer versions. Conversely you could warn them at the save time, and have the default answer to the dialog be "Cancel", and maybe an option to "save as" instead? Maybe warn at both open and save time? That I guess doesn't solve the 1.8 -> 2.0 problem, but the concept makes the users responsible for their own choices. At the end of the day it is impossible to "out-smart" via programming a user bent on being stupid or foolish or who is just naive. Even with that you can't *make* users read warning dialogs.


My  unsolicited pennies as well. total below.

First, how many users are actually going to move back to 1.8? I think the anticipation of 2.0 will cause a mass migration and you'll have next to no 1.8 users within short order.

I haven't followed the whole thread in-depth, but it seems to me the simplest thing to do is to have 2.0 notify the user, on opening a 1.8 file that "You are opening a file that was made by an older version of gnucash. This version of gnucash contains features that are unsupported in the older version. Any changes made to this file will not be supported in the older version and may result in loss of data if you attempt to use an older version of gnucash. A backup of your original 1.8 version of this file has been created at *.gnc1.8"

This way you've warned the user, you've left them with a file that can still be read with 1.8 (granted it has no NEW info in it), and you've done it all in 2.0 without touching 1.8.  This is based on the assumption that 2.0 can tell when its opening a 1.8 file, and I don't know about that. If not, then it should be fairly simple to tag the file as being a 2.0 file, so all others default to the warning.

As a heavy user, I'd be more than satisfied with the above solution. It would allow me to try out 2.0 for a little while, and if I don't like it, I can regress to the old version and the backup file and only have to recreate a few days of material.

my .02

A

> 
> Just a couple of unsolicited cents.
> 
> Andrew
> 
>  
> 
> 
> 
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