Using Gnucash from multiple computers?

[Mark Phillips]

The only point of my email was to point out the potential issue so you are
aware of it, and to make sure my upstanding is correct. John is far more
knowledgeable than I am about the inner workings of Gnucash!

Mark
On Oct 14, 2014 11:07 AM, "Sean Clarke" <seanchk at gmail.com> wrote:

> Mark,
>
> I don't want multi user, just multi computer.
>
> I have a desktop box and 2 laptops all running Linux Mint.
>
> I do a fair amount of traveling often for long stretches of time,  so
> would like to have the data files on Dropbox or Google Drive so I can
> access my accounts no matter where I am or which of my laptops I'm using.
>
> I don't want to be limited to only doing my accounts from one machine.  I
> will however only be using Gnucash on one machine at a time.
>
> Cheers,
>
> Sean
> On 15 Oct 2014 01:00, "Mark Phillips" <mark at phillipsmarketing.biz> wrote:
>
>> John,
>>
>> I remember some earlier posts on this topic which included a warning that
>> Gnucash is not designed to be a multi-user program. The so-what to this
>> fact is that Gnucash reads the entire database into memory when it starts,
>> and then saves the database when it closes. So, one can lose data if one is
>> not careful. For example, one computer has the data file open and another
>> computer adds a transaction and then exits. The data from the first
>> computer will over write the database when it closes, and the posted
>> transaction from the second computer will be lost. There is a setting in
>> Gnucash to update the db more frequently, but even so, I think there is a
>> small chance of losing data this way. Is this caveat still true, or did I
>> misunderstand the issue?
>>
>> Thanks,
>>
>> Mark
>> On Oct 14, 2014 7:08 AM, "John Ralls" <jralls at ceridwen.us> wrote:
>>
>>> Dang it, after preaching about copying the list, I forgot to copy the
>>> list.
>>>
>>> On Oct 14, 2014, at 1:20 AM, Sean Clarke <seanchk at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>> > Hi John,
>>> >
>>> > by GNC_DOT_DIR do you mean the .gnucash directory in /home ?
>>> >
>>> > If not then what am I looking for?
>>> >
>>> > Also I don't have a .bashrc in /home  which is where I was expecting
>>> it.
>>> >
>>> > Can you give me a little more help please.
>>> >
>>> > At the moment I have all (?) the .gnucash account data files in a
>>> folder on Google Drive and apart from having to remember to exit the
>>> program on one machine before opening it on another (because of the LCK
>>> file), everything seems fine.
>>>
>>> Please remember to copy the list on all replies: Use "reply all" or, if
>>> your email client supports it, "reply list".
>>>
>>> GNC_DOT_DIR is an environment variable. If it's not set the default is
>>> $HOME/.gnucash, where HOME is another environment variable pointing the
>>> user's home folder, which on Linux is /home/<username>. You want to set it
>>> like this:
>>> GNC_DOT_DIR="$HOME/Google Drive/gnucash"
>>> or something similar.
>>>
>>> .bashrc is one of several possible names for startup files, see the bash
>>> manpage for a complete list. Note that none of them will exist unless the
>>> user explicitly creates them, and nthat bash looks for them in a particular
>>> order; once it finds one it stops looking for more.
>>>
>>> Regards,
>>> John Ralls
>>>
>>> > On 14 October 2014 09:29, John Ralls <jralls at ceridwen.us> wrote:
>>> >
>>> > On Oct 13, 2014, at 4:58 PM, Sean Clarke <seanchk at gmail.com> wrote:
>>> >
>>> > > Hi,
>>> > >
>>> > > Is it possible to stick the Gnucash settings file on Google Drive
>>> and then
>>> > > be able to use the same settings from multiple computers?
>>> > >
>>> > > I want to have Gnucash on all my computers so depending which one
>>> I'm using
>>> > > I have access to my financial analysis.
>>> > >
>>> > > Or will I run into problems?
>>> >
>>> > Nope, piece of cake: Just set GNC_DOT_DIR to a folder on your Google
>>> Drive. You didn't say what OS you're using,
>>> > so in Linux you can just set it in .bashrc. On OSX you'll want to edit
>>> Gnucash.app/Contents/MacOS/Gnucash. On Windows
>>> > the easiest way is to edit the shortcut in the menu (right-click on it
>>> and select Properties from the context menu).
>>> >
>>> > Regards,
>>> > John Ralls
>>> >
>>> >
>>>
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>>