Moving from gnucash 1.8 to 2.0: startup error: "can't parse the URL"

[Derek Atkins]

The definitive answer is that you should never have saved your datafile
there.  In 2.0.x gnucash changed how it stored metadata.  In 1.8 and prior
it would store the metadata for /path/to/datafile in
~/.gnucash/books/<encoded-path-to-datafile> but as of 2.0 it changed
to storing the metadata as ~/.gnucash/books/datafile

What this means is that if you erroneously stored your data in
~/.gnucash/books then as of 2.0 gnucash would overwrite that with
the metadata.

YOU SHOULD NEVER STORE YOUR DATA IN ~/.gnucash

-derek

Quoting Bill McSpadden <billmc at cnonline.net>:

>
> I recently updated my Linux system and at the same time, gnucash was updated
> (from 1.8 to 2.0.5).
>
> When starting up, I get a "Can't parse the URL <homedir>/.gnucash/FirstTech"
> All of my accounts have a similar problem.
>
> Clearly, the new version of gnucash has touched the file: the timestamp
> has changed.
> When I examine the file, it is entirely different than what was backed
> up. The backed
> up file was a large XML file. What exists now is a small plaintext file.
>
> What happened? Why can I not open my old accounts?
>
> (Note: I've searched the mailing list archives. I found several reports
> of a similar
> problem, but no definitive answer. If there is one, could someone please
> point me
> to it?)
>
> Thanks,
> Bill McSpadden
> billmc at cnonline.net
>
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-- 
       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