getting rid of accounts

[James Kerr]

On 30/10/2011 08:00, David Carlson wrote:
> On 10/29/2011 5:23 PM, James Kerr wrote:
>> On 29/10/2011 21:06, John Ralls wrote:
>>>
>>> On Oct 29, 2011, at 10:50 AM, fastsnip-bcard at yahoo.com wrote:
>>>
>>>> Tried deleting the file you specified.
>>>>
>>>> Doing so had no effect on the list of accounts under 'file'. They
>>>> are still there.
>>>>
>>>> Must be something else.
>>
>>
>>>> From: John Ralls<jralls at ceridwen.us>
>>
>>>>
>>>> On Oct 26, 2011, at 2:33 PM, fastsnip-bcard at yahoo.com wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Moved from Kubuntu 11.04 to Kubuntu 11.10.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Booted gnucash and was playing around with new accounts. Now I
>>>>> want to get rid of the new accounts, but can find no way to do
>>>>> so. I deleted the account files, but gnucash insists on keeping
>>>>> the accounts listed under the 'File" topic. If I click on the
>>>>> accounts whose file were deleted, I get an error message that
>>>>> file cannot be found. This is confusing and un-needed.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> How do I get rid of the accounts that I created to play around
>>>>> with features?
>>>>>
>>
>>>>
>>>> The list in the file menu is of recently accessed files. Deleting
>>>> the file has no effect on it.
>>>>
>>>> The list is stored in ~/.gconf/apps/gnucash/history/%gconf.xml. You
>>>> could probably delete that with no ill effects -- but to be safe,
>>>> rename it instead, so that if Gnucash complains you can put it
>>>> back.
>>>>
>>
>>>
>>> I dunno. It certainly worked for me. (I also found it useful to
>>> "touch" the file after deleting it so that Gnucash would show the
>>> "new user" dialog.)
>>>
>>
>> What worked for me (on Windows 7) was, after deleting the history file,
>> I re-launched Gnucash by clicking on a data file (or using the
>> right-click Open dialogue if necessary).
>>
>> Re-launching Gnucash through a menu entry seemed to result in the
>> history file being re-created as it was before.
>>


>
> My observation as a user is that even if the actual data files are
> deleted or moved, they continue to appear in the recently opened list
> under File: Open.  I simply did not worry about it, since they did not
> actually exist.
>
> If that is an annoyance for you, the history list may be in the local
> preferences file that also contains your other user preferences choices
> for the program. As a Windows user I do not know how to find it on your
> computer.
>

My comment was offered as an option that the OP may wish to try, since 
it had worked for me in the past. Perhaps my comment was unclear.

After deleting the history file, re-launching Gnucash in the manner that 
I described resulted in a brand new history file being created (without 
entries for the deleted data files). Subsequently the menu link could be 
used, without the old history file being restored.

It was only if the first launch, after deleting the history file, was 
from a menu link that the old history file was restored. (I thought it 
possible that this is what was happening on the OP's installation.)

(I have a number of data files and use the recently used files list to 
switch among them. I experienced this phenomenon after renaming and/or 
re-locating several of those files.)

Jim