Problems Running gnuCash in Mint 17.2

Tommy Trussell tommy.trussell at gmail.com
Tue Nov 3 11:37:05 EST 2015


On Tue, Nov 3, 2015 at 3:52 AM, Geert Janssens <geert.gnucash at kobaltwit.be>
wrote:

> On Tuesday 03 November 2015 09:40:38 Pluto Crat wrote:
> > On Tuesday, 03 November, 2015 01:30 AM, iconit at comcast.net wrote:
> > > When I upgraded to Linux Mint 17.x I went to the 64 bit version of
> > > the OS. Every since then I have had problems with gnuCash. The two
> > > biggest problems have been that 1) the program runs real slow and
> > I'm running Gnucash on 64 bit Linux Mint 17.1 and .2 and no problems
> > here. Could it be something else? Do you have a massive data file?
> > Display driver problems? Stabbing in the dark a bit ... but I can
> > confirm that the OS isn't the problem per se.
> >
> > > 2) resizing the columns in the accounts is next to impossible, I
> > > have somehow hidden the Withdrawal column in the Checking Account
> > > and can't unhide it and the Description column takes up about half
> > > the width of the screen.
> > Resizing seems easy enough -- click and drag -- but I do see that the
> > Description field seems to be fixed at a certain minimum width, which
> > is possibly a bit wide on small screens. Perhaps this information is
> > held in a preferences file somewhere, which could be edited to bring
> > back your Withdrawal column. I'll defer to others on this forum for
> > advice on that.
> >
> > > The Software Manager Linux offers only install gnuCash 2.6.1 so that
> > > is what I am using.
> > Not sure if it will solve your problem, but if you use the getdeb
> > repositories, you'll be able to get the latest version.
> > http://www.getdeb.net/app/Gnucash
> > If you decide to try this note
> > a) You'll need to keep a backup of your accounts file, as loading it
> > in the newer version of Gnucash will alter its structure: you can't
> > open it in 2.6.1 after this has happened.
>
> I wouldn't expect this. The devs generally take a lot of care that minor
> releases are fully
> backwards compatible, so files manipulated with 2.6.8 should still work
> with 2.6.1. If it doesn't,
> that should be reported as a bug.
> What problem did you experience when trying to open your 2.6.8 file with
> 2.6.1 ?
>
> In addition, I know 2.6.1 had some fairly major bugs (mostly crashers). So
> it's highly
> recommended to switch to a more recent version.
>
> I have seen several people report they have no problem with the getdeb
> version of gnucash. I'm
> not using Mint or Debian myself, so I can't add much to that part of the
> discussion unfortunately.
> <https://lists.gnucash.org/mailman/listinfo/gnucash-user>
>

I use getdeb.net for my Ubuntu systems, and from this list I have learned
many folks are using getdeb.net for types of Mint that are Ubuntu
"children" (they use an Ubuntu repository for most packages). The folks who
use Mint that are Debian flavors, then getdeb.net might work, but I would
suggest getting the latest GnuCash packages from the Debian "stretch" aka
"testing" repository. You'll find 2.6.9 in there.

If your mint system seems unstable, you will get better troubleshooting
steps from other Mint people. But here are a few general thoughts:

It seems possible that a library on Mint differs from Ubuntu, making the
GnuCash package from getdeb.net unsuitable. However (with the caveat that I
am NOT a developer) I would expect a library mis-match would most likely
affect only GnuCash and not the rest of the system. Ideally the package
manager SHOULD detect such a mis-match and not even allow GnuCash to be
installed without a package change. If you did NOT have to "force" the
installation, I wouldn't expect that to be the problem.

It seems possible you installed ANOTHER package from getdeb.net that is
causing your system to be unstable. (The repository contains much more than
GnuCash.)

Finally if you have installed any OTHER applications from PPAs or other
"unofficial" repositories, it seems likely one of THOSE might cause your
system to be unstable.

But you might want to try some other basic troubleshooting first.*

The easiest way I know to list all packages from each repository is using
Synaptic (package manager). Launch it, click the Origin button on the
bottom left, and the repositories should appear in the top left. Select the
repository and the list of packages appears on the right, with its
installation status indicated. You can uninstall GnuCash from there, though
I wouldn't expect uninstalling GnuCash itself to fix instability problems
with other applications.


* If you're having system instability related to particular applications,
you can try things SUCH AS create a fresh new user account and see if the
new user has the same problem. If the problem goes away I would suspect a
corrupted settings file. If not, then I would suspect a corrupted system
installation (possibly due to one of the things listed above).

* If the instability occurs only when Firefox is open, look in its Help
menu and try some of the suggestions provided there.



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