Cannot find text or value inside a split

[John Ralls]

On Feb 17, 2013, at 11:15 AM, David Carlson <carlson.dl at sbcglobal.net> wrote:

> On 2/16/2013 3:38 PM, Colin Law wrote:
>> On 16 February 2013 16:15, John Ralls <jralls at ceridwen.us> wrote:
>>> On Feb 16, 2013, at 12:21 AM, Colin Law <clanlaw at googlemail.com> wrote:
>>> 
>>>> On 16 February 2013 00:58, DonM <dm413-gc at intielectronics.com> wrote:
>>>>> ...
>>>>> The register page displays ALL the splits for a transaction -- for example
>>>>> when looking at my checking account it shows not only the split that credits
>>>>> the register account, but also shows all the splits that debit the expense
>>>>> accounts. When I look at any single account I am looking at more than just
>>>>> the splits that affect that account, I am looking at all the related splits.
>>>> I am guessing that is because it only shows the splits for one
>>>> transaction at a time.  The problem is that it needs to search all the
>>>> splits for all the transactions at once and that is not available when
>>>> the search is performed.
>>>> 
>>>>> That leads to another thought -- if the data can be displayed in the
>>>>> register page, I would think it would be accessible from the search dialog
>>>>> as well. Both of them start knowing only that they are supposed to display
>>>>> information about a specific account -- the register displays all the
>>>>> associated splits, but the find dialog does not.
>>>>> 
>>>>> Why can't you replicate whatever logic is used to display the register? What
>>>>> am I missing?
>>>> The fact that the register only shows splits for one transaction at a time.
>>> That's not correct. Select View>Transaction Journal to see all of the splits for all of the transactions. It's the default view for "Find" results windows.
>>> 
>>> It's not that we can't replicate the logic, it's that the Find code *doesn't* replicate the logic, because the author wasn't thinking of the use case that we're discussing here.  Patches welcome.
>> It was the fact that someone earlier in the thread (was it Derek?)
>> suggested that it would be challenging to implement that made me
>> assume it was a more fundamental problem.
>> 
>> Colin
>> 
> Going back to John's comment about patches being welcome... Now that the
> transition to SVN is complete, is it any easier for somewhat savvy users
> to take a more active but part time role somewhere in the development
> process?  If so, how can we help?
> 

We've been using SVN for a long time. What we just finished was a step in converting to git. Aside from fixing some errors in the git history which required reinitializing local repos, the only people affected were Derek and me.

What can "savvy users" do to help? 

1. Test:

* We have 165 open bugs [1] which were filed against Gnucash 2.2 or earlier and 46 more against the previous development version (2.3) [2]. See if you can reproduce them, and add a comment on the bug saying what you found.

* We'll be starting a new series of unstable releases soon -- I hope sometime next week (we're waiting on a couple of feature branches to get merged). Learn how to build Gnucash in your distro if you use Linux, or use the unstable AIO packages for Win32 and Mac which we'll put up on SourceForge. Try to break it, then write bugs or if there's already a bug report that describes the problem, add to it.

Some notes on bugs:
*  Just because a feature doesn't work the way you want it to doesn't make it a bug. A feature will be designed the way the developer wants it to work. The more complicated a feature the more likely it is that it will work only one way. Read the documentation, ask for help, and discuss behavior before filing a bug.

* Crashes are always bugs. They may not be Gnucash bugs (meaning that they might be bugs in one of the many libraries Gnucash depends on), but they're still bugs.  

* Describe the problem thoroughly but succinctly. Don't try to guess the cause unless you're familiar with the code.

* Try to find as many ways as you can of causing the bug to manifest, and describe them as specifically as possible. If you can make a small account file that illustrates the problem that's an immense help to the developer working on understanding it.

2. Document:
As good as it's gotten in the last couple of years (and it *has* gotten much better), there are still plenty of features that need more or better documentation. 

3. Translate:  http://wiki.gnucash.org/wiki/Translation

Regards,
John Ralls


[1] https://bugzilla.gnome.org/buglist.cgi?query_format=advanced;bug_severity=blocker;bug_severity=critical;bug_severity=major;bug_severity=normal;bug_severity=minor;bug_severity=trivial;bug_status=UNCONFIRMED;bug_status=NEW;bug_status=ASSIGNED;bug_status=REOPENED;bug_status=NEEDINFO;version=1.4.x;version=1.6.x;version=1.8.x;version=1.9.0;version=1.9.1;version=1.9.2;version=1.9.3;version=1.9.4;version=1.9.5;version=1.9.6;version=1.9.7;version=1.9.8;version=2.0.0;version=2.0.1;version=2.0.2;version=2.0.3;version=2.0.4;version=2.0.5;version=2.0.x;version=2.1.0;version=2.1.1;version=2.1.2;version=2.1.3;version=2.1.4;version=2.1.5;version=2.2.0;version=2.2.1;version=2.2.2;version=2.2.3;version=2.2.4;version=2.2.5;version=2.2.6;version=2.2.7;version=2.2.8;version=2.2.9;version=2.2.x;product=GnuCash;known_name=gnucash-engine;query_based_on=gnucash-engine

[2] https://bugzilla.gnome.org/buglist.cgi?query_format=advanced;bug_severity=blocker;bug_severity=critical;bug_severity=major;bug_severity=normal;bug_severity=minor;bug_severity=trivial;bug_status=UNCONFIRMED;bug_status=NEW;bug_status=ASSIGNED;bug_status=REOPENED;bug_status=NEEDINFO;version=1.4.x;version=1.6.x;version=1.8.x;version=1.9.0;version=1.9.1;version=1.9.2;version=1.9.3;version=1.9.4;version=1.9.5;version=1.9.6;version=1.9.7;version=1.9.8;version=2.0.0;version=2.0.1;version=2.0.2;version=2.0.3;version=2.0.4;version=2.0.5;version=2.0.x;version=2.1.0;version=2.1.1;version=2.1.2;version=2.1.3;version=2.1.4;version=2.1.5;version=2.2.0;version=2.2.1;version=2.2.2;version=2.2.3;version=2.2.4;version=2.2.5;version=2.2.6;version=2.2.7;version=2.2.8;version=2.2.9;version=2.2.x;product=GnuCash;known_name=gnucash-engine;query_based_on=gnucash-engine