GNU cash 2.4.11 trial balance bug?

[David Carlson]

On 3/15/2015 8:30 PM, Mike or Penny Novack wrote:
>> There are still a few cases where there are errors that humans can make
>> which the trial balance can at least assist with finding.  One is
>> transposing digits when entering a value
> Precisely what the trial balance was for in the old days and precisely
> what the computerized system prevents. If you transpose digits in an
> amount on one side of a transaction the transaction you entered will
> not be in balance and gnucash will put the difference into the
> Imbalance account. If you transposed the digits on both sides of the
> transaction (what you entered WAS in balance, just not the numbers you
> intended to enter) then the trial balance will not detect this. It
> will be in balance. That your books do not reflect "the real world" is
> a different sort of error.
>
>>   and the other that is commonly
>> used in GnuCash is to detect incorrectly calculated capital gains in
>> closing investment transactions.
> Same argument. Incorrectly dividing the gain between ordinary income
> and capital gains won't throw a trial balance out of balance. Leaving
> a balance behind in an account you should have taken to zero will not
> throw a trial balance out of balance. There are many other sorts of
> errors you might make which also will not affect a trial balance. Even
> accidentally reversing a transaction won't (switching debits and
> credits while entering, but doing so consistently).
>
> Please, I am NOT saying I can't think of things to do with the trial
> balance report. But those wouldn't be how this was used in the old
> days (find out whether or not the entire ledger was in balance). For
> that, just seeing of there are zero balances in Imbalance and Orphan
> will do.
>
> Michael D Novack
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The trial balance report as implemented in GnuCash calculates some
values that are not explicitly shown in other transaction reports, and
the key one, in my opinion, is unrealized gains.  If a closing
investment transaction or currency trtansaction does not correctly zero
out the unrealized gain in that particular security account or currency,
the easiest way to find the problem is by using the trial balance
report.  Granted, in a real world data file there are many ways to
complicate things so that it is still nearly impossible to find an
errant unrealized gain, but it is a start, and knowing the range of
dates used in the report greatly helps the search.

Since unrealized gains are calculated by inference using the internal
security price tables, accuracy therein is critical, as well. 

The trial balamce report uses a particular format that assists in
finding such unbalances, and if there were some documented help in using
it, that would be greatly appreciated by this user, who has no formal
accounting training.

I think that the report should ignore transactions dated before a
selected start date, at least when certain options are selected, and if
it does not, that would be a bug.

If there were some other report that specifically reported unrealized
gains subtotaled by security and/or currency, for example, then I would
be as happy as a puppy in a puddle to use that report instead.

David C