Transfers & Payments appear out of order

David Carlson david.carlson.417 at gmail.com
Fri May 5 21:03:52 EDT 2017


Adrien,

You got Dave H and I speculating about things going on under the hood when
neither of us are actual developers of GnuCash code.

We agree that GnuCash is not working as we think it should work.

I hope that one of the actual developers chimes in soon with more insight.

David C


On Fri, May 5, 2017 at 6:08 PM, Dave H <hellvee at gmail.com> wrote:

> Hi David C,
>
> Yeah I haven't got a Payment button either so I guess as you say that's
> part of the Business features which I also never use.
>
> I know there were changes to ignore the time somewhere along the line, but
> it's almost like Gnucash is sorting on Date AND Time and these button based
> transactions are created with a time that's earlier than manually created
> txns which may use the current time.  Just my thoughts which could be
> totally off base :-)
>
> Cheers Dave H.
>
>
> On 6 May 2017 at 08:57, David Carlson <david.carlson.417 at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Dave & Adrien,
>>
>> I do not use the the transfer button either.  Now that I look, I do not
>> see a payment button, unless it is any of those in the Business menu which
>> I do use either...
>>
>> I too would expect transactions created by any method to sort by the same
>> rules or lack thereof.  I know that some sophisticated sort algorithms do
>> scramble the order of records that match the same criterion, but I doubt
>> that is what is happening here.
>>
>> David C
>>
>> On Fri, May 5, 2017 at 4:15 PM, Dave H <hellvee at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> No I'm with Adrien on this one, it's not just a Business Feature issue
>>> either...
>>>
>>> I've got a couple of existing transactions on 4 May. If I click the
>>> Transfer button (never used it before as I always just duplicate a previous
>>> transfer transaction :-) and transfer funds from the open account to
>>> another account Gnucash inserts the transaction as the first one for 4
>>> May.  If I duplicate a previous funds transfer it inserts it as expected by
>>> me as the last transaction for 4 May.  Entering 0, 1, 2 in the "Num" column
>>> sorts all the other transactions for the day in Num order, but when I enter
>>> 3 for the Num for the transfer from the Transfer button it just stubbornly
>>> sits at the first position for the day !!!
>>>
>>> To my eyes a bug :-)
>>>
>>> Cheers Dave H.
>>>
>>>
>>> On 6 May 2017 at 06:39, David Carlson <david.carlson.417 at gmail.com>
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Adrien,
>>>>
>>>> It appears that we are still not quite on the same page in our
>>>> interpretation of the issue.  Are you saying that in a given account the
>>>> payment and transfer button transactions sort differently than
>>>> transactions
>>>> created by other methods?  If so, that may be a bug.  Or not.  A
>>>> developer
>>>> may know.
>>>>
>>>> I am a long-time user, but not a user of business features.
>>>>
>>>> In general, GnuCash does not claim to manage intra-day balances.  It
>>>> essentially claims to balance at the end of the day.  IMO, If you
>>>> actually
>>>> have a need to have that level of granularity you may need to look
>>>> elsewhere.
>>>>
>>>> David C
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> On Fri, May 5, 2017 at 12:59 PM, Adrien Monteleone <
>>>> adrien.monteleone at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> > Sorry I wasn’t clear.
>>>> >
>>>> > If I enter three transactions (not using the post payment or transfer
>>>> > button functions) they retain the order in the register in which I
>>>> entered
>>>> > them. (we’re talking transactions all posted with the same date here)
>>>> If I
>>>> > entered them out of actual time order, I simply use the NUM field to
>>>> fix
>>>> > this. Payments posted using the business features and the Transfer
>>>> button
>>>> > don’t behave this way.
>>>> >
>>>> > Let’s say I enter some expense transactions, then I post a customer
>>>> > payment to me, then I enter a transfer from a savings account to
>>>> cash, even
>>>> > though all have the same date and even though I put in sequential
>>>> numbers
>>>> > in the NUM field to intentionally order them in the register, GC will
>>>> list
>>>> > these transactions in the following order:
>>>> >
>>>> > Transfers
>>>> > Payments
>>>> > Expenses (or any other transactions)
>>>> >
>>>> > It does not matter if I enter the other transactions before posting
>>>> the
>>>> > payment, the payment always jumps to the first transaction of the day
>>>> in
>>>> > the register. It also does not matter if I put a 1 in the expense
>>>> > transaction NUM field and a ‘2’ in the payment NUM field. Those
>>>> numbers are
>>>> > there, but GC refuses to place the expense transaction before the
>>>> payment
>>>> > transaction.
>>>> >
>>>> > The same goes for transfers using the transfer button. (but manually
>>>> > moving money from one asset account to another, or any other
>>>> ‘transfer’
>>>> > DOES show up in the order it was entered and DOES respect the
>>>> ordering of
>>>> > the NUM field)
>>>> >
>>>> > This has been an issue for me because I may have issue finding
>>>> ‘missing
>>>> > money’ or even just reconciling my cash, and I usually resort to
>>>> matching
>>>> > up how much I had on hand after particular transactions. If they
>>>> refuse to
>>>> > appear in the correct order, that can be difficult to impossible.
>>>> >
>>>> >
>>>> > > On May 5, 2017, at 12:27 PM, Derek Atkins <derek at ihtfp.com> wrote:
>>>> > >
>>>> > > Adrien,
>>>> > >
>>>> > > On Fri, May 5, 2017 1:09 pm, Adrien Monteleone wrote:
>>>> > >> Something that’s been nagging me for some time, and my apologies if
>>>> > there
>>>> > >> has been discussion of this in the past, but is it intended
>>>> behavior for
>>>> > >> transfers and payments to always appear as first entries on a
>>>> particular
>>>> > >> date instead of the order of when they are actually entered? Is it
>>>> also
>>>> > >> intended behavior to have transfer and payment transactions ignore
>>>> the
>>>> > NUM
>>>> > >> field so that they cannot be manually ordered? Or is this a bug?
>>>> > >
>>>> > > Default sort order is:
>>>> > > * Post Date (i.e., the date you select in the register)
>>>> > > * Number (this is a numeric compare; any non-numeric entries get
>>>> treated
>>>> > > as 0)
>>>> > > * Date Entered (this is the order you enter your transactions).
>>>> > >
>>>> > > So yes, by default your entries are sorted based on the date you
>>>> assign
>>>> > to
>>>> > > them, not when you enter them.
>>>> > >
>>>> > >> Thanks,
>>>> > >>
>>>> > >> Adrien
>>>> > >
>>>> > >> Please remember to CC this list on all your replies.
>>>> > >> You can do this by using Reply-To-List or Reply-All.
>>>> > >
>>>> > > -derek
>>>> > >
>>>> > > --
>>>> > >       Derek Atkins                 617-623-3745
>>>> > >       derek at ihtfp.com             www.ihtfp.com
>>>> > >       Computer and Internet Security Consultant
>>>> > >
>>>> >
>>>> > _______________________________________________
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>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
>


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