Customizing GnuCash

[boris@range.infoplease.com]

One particular bit of customization that I'd like to do - since I have
to switch back and forth between quicken and gnucash often for
different purposes.  Quicken accepts the . key as a separator for
dates, so you can type 8.2 for august 2nd, and on my keyboard that's
easier on the fingers than typing 8/2.

Any way to give gnucash this ability?

And while I'm posting, what does the "Enable Gnucash Network"
configuration item do?

Bng