Some UI irritations.

Colin Scott gnucash at double-bars.net
Sat Mar 6 12:40:00 EST 2010


This is not a complete list, just a few of the things that have bugged me
during the past 24 hours.

All these comments are based on 2.2.9 under Windows XP, so I don't know
if they are specific to Windows, or more general.

1.  Autocompletion is overly officious, and can be a complete pain. there
are several irritations in this, but in my experience the one that gives
me the most trouble is the way it conflates upper and lower case.  None
of this would be a problem if there were some key combination that would
disengage  autocompletion until the cursor moves on to the next field.

2.  It can be very disconcerting when the transaction you are editing
simply "disappears".  This can happen if you are entering or editing a
transaction and change the date, or if you change the accounts so there
is no split affecting the current register.  It would be much more
user-friendly if the transaction remained locked into its current
position in the current register until it has been completed, regardless
of what is changed during the editing process.  Alternatively, a
transaction should not be edited in-place in the register, but in a
separate panel.

3.  There is no "undo" function beyond the "cancel" mechanism, which only
permits one to undo non-completed changes to a transaction.  The ability
to undo a completed change (multi-level would be good, but single level
would be OK) would be useful.

4.  When dealing with files (eg, exporting reports, opening an accounts
file, etc) gnucash does not remember the last directory used.

5.  When exporting reports, gnucash does not suggest a file name.  It
would be helpful if it generated a default file name based on the name of
the report.

6.  When one has a report open, a change to the accounts is not
automatically reflected in the report, and there is no clear method of
forcing the report to refresh.  Not automatically updating the report is
a perfectly justifiable position.  However, in that case I would expect
to find a "refresh reports", or possibly a "refresh current report"
button, or a "refresh report" option in each report's right-click menu.
Currently to refresh an existing report one has to fiddle about with the
report options...

Colin


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