transfer of files between PCs

[Robert Heller]

At Fri, 12 Jan 2007 14:14:00 -0500 hendrik at topoi.pooq.com wrote:

> 
> On Fri, Jan 12, 2007 at 10:58:28AM -0500, Derek Atkins wrote:
> > hendrik at topoi.pooq.com writes:
> > 
> > > I've toyed with the idea of using a distributed revision control system, 
> > > like monotone, to do this.  In theory if you make changes on both 
> > > systems it should be able to merge them.  IN practice, I suspect it 
> > > might occasionally merge lines in such a way as to violate XML syntax.
> > > (the gnucash files were XML the last time I looked).
> > >
> > > Is there a DRCS that recognises XML syntax when merging?
> > 
> > You DEFNITELY to not want to use any kind of tool to try to
> > merge gnucash files.  The reason: gnucash doesn't maintain a
> > consistent file.  What I mean by this is that even if you make
> > no changes to your data file and then force gnucash to save,
> > the newly saved data file WILL be different than the previous
> > version.  GnuCash does not maintain a consistent order of objects
> > in the data file, so it's possible that the data objects get
> > moved around between subsequent saves.
> > 
> > This fact will confuse automated tools, so your merged data WILL
> > be wrong.
> > 
> > You should treat the gnucash data file as a binary object.
> 
> Nonetheless, I tracked down an annoying reconciled imbalance a few month 
> ago by simply using diff between the gnucash files that did and did not 
> have the imbalance.
> 
> That was with 1.8.  Has it changed for 2.0?  Or was I just lucky?

Mostly luck, probably.  Also, 2.0 compresses the file. (zdiff might
work.) What probably happened for you was spotting lines that were
'slightly' different (ie a wrong amount or wrong account, but otherwise
the 'same'). Something diff can pick out, so long as the ordering
differences are not too extreme and can be spotted by a human eye,
especially if you are looking for something specific (a known class of
transactions that are suspected of being in error).  Probably not
reliable for automated merging.

> 
> -- hendrik
> 
> q> 
> > -derek
> > -- 
> >        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                        PGP key available
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Robert Heller             -- 978-544-6933
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