Associating Saved Reports and Preferences with Data File.

[Bob Taylor]

So far on this list I seem to raise only issues already known and discussed.  Thanks for your efforts.  

After reading the several messages about this subject, let me state my rather emphatic opinion:  all options, all preferences, all custom reports need to be associated with the company file.  Sharing this stuff would be very dangerous.  Suppose, for instance, Jones Plumbing has a fiscal year ending August 31 and I forget to change the date option and generate a report for Smith Auto Parts which is a calendar year client.  As long as I'm doing my own stuff, no problem, but not for clients.

Perhaps it will help to describe my workaround.

Each data file is placed in its own folder. (This seems to be a practical necessity with GC anyway.)
The folder contains a copy of the working files (.gcconf, .gcconfd, etc.)  These directories contain the saved report definitions and options (somewhere).
The folder also contains a altered copy of the "environment" file, which is in C:\Program Files\gnucash\etc\gnucash
This copy of the  "environment" file has a statement added
HOME=path of data directory

I always start GC with a batch file.  (A batch file is a text file containing DOS commands.  Most os have something similar.)  
This batch file does two things:
It copies the altered  "environment" file to C:\Program Files\gnucash\etc\gnucash which overlays the file that is there.
It then starts GC for the data file in question.

This workaround solves several problems.  It cleans things up a bit and associates both saved files and preferences with the data.  I don't think GC makes any use of the windows registry (the worst idea microsoft ever had)  so I am hoping that this is ALL the data which can be altered by the program.

In XP a zip file can be used as a directory, so all this can be put in a zip file, which can be saved or transmitted as a single file.



Thanks to all who contributed to this excellent product.
Bob Taylor


-----Original Message-----
>From: Derek Atkins <warlord at MIT.EDU>
>Sent: Mar 14, 2012 12:09 PM
>To: Bob Talor <philologos at mindspring.com>
>Cc: gnucash-user at gnucash.org
>Subject: Re: Associating Saved Reports and Preferences with Data File.
>
>Hi,
>
>Bob Talor <philologos at mindspring.com> writes:
>
>> I have converted both my (accounting) business and my personal
>> accounts to Gnucash 2.4.8 on WinXP SP2 and commited to use GC for the
>> indefinite future.
>>
>> The saved reports and preferences are apparently shared between the
>> two.  The reports are saved in .gnucash\saved-reports-2.4.  I have
>> experimented with swapping the file names, but this is rather awkward.
>> Since I also plan to use GC for client data this problem will become
>> more acute.
>>
>> Is there perhaps some more convenient way to attach the preferences
>> and saved reports to a particular data file?
>
>Alas, right now there is not a good separation of preferences into which
>are per-user, per-datafile, or per-user-per-datafile.  There has been
>significant discussion about restructuring them, but no progress as of
>yet.
>
>There has been no discussion on similar work for saved reports, but you
>are right that it needs to happen.
>
>> Best Wishes,
>>
>> Bob Taylor
>
>> Please remember to CC this list on all your replies.
>> You can do this by using Reply-To-List or Reply-All.
>
>-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