Troubleshooting Section?

[Geert Janssens]

On Sunday 11 September 2016 07:46:04 John Ralls wrote:
> > On Sep 10, 2016, at 10:49 PM, David T. via gnucash-user
> > <gnucash-user at gnucash.org> wrote:
> > 
> > Being a long time user of GnuCash and subscriber to this list, I
> > have experienced firsthand and seen others struggle to get various
> > aspects of GnuCash working or fixed. Many times, the solution is
> > found by searching the list history, or by consulting the Wiki.
> > This is not something that is apparent to many new users of the
> > software.
> > 
> > I wonder whether it would be useful or productive to create a
> > separate Troubleshooting section in the Tutorial and Concepts
> > Guide, with chapters covering broad areas of the software, that
> > address some of the more common issues that come up.
> > 
> > Thoughts?
> 
> I'd think that that would work better on the wiki than in the static
> documentation; in fact the FAQ page has a lot of troubleshooting info
> already.

The FAQ has a lot if troubleshooting info indeed. However I believe in it's current form it's 
difficult to query. I think the FAQ has become too long to be practical and not really well 
structured. I can imagine people look at it and get lost quickly.

Note the FAQ starts with "The contents of this FAQ will eventually be merged into the official 
GnuCash documentation" which actually encourages David's idea...

My primary reservation is duplication of effort. Having both a FAQ and troubleshooting 
documentation in the guide means both have to be maintained. From experience I see the wiki 
has a lower barrier to contribution than the static documentation has (for all good reasons).

If we decide to each troubleshooting item in either the faq or the static documentation, the 
burden is moved on the user's shoulders who now has to search two places to get help.

Having said that I'd welcome a higher quality kind of trouble shooting guide for users. Perhaps 
John's suggestion to do this on the wiki may be a good first experiment.

Regards,

Geert