Unable to open 2nd set of accounts on one MacBook Pro

[D]

Actually, I believe the Mac situation *is* unique, in that a user cannot double click a Gnucash file from the operating system and have Gnucash open that file. Maybe it is also this way on Windows and Linux, but that is not my understanding. In this "point and click" world, people expect that when they double click on something, that is what gets opened.

Moreover, I never said the developers were wrong to make this decision; I said it is a choice that many users find surprising. There is a difference there. Don't put words in my messages that aren't there.

Finally, I disagree on your assessment of the rarity of wanting to open different files. There are many such use cases (archives, test files, multiple books, etc.). You yourself presented some of these, and then downplayed them, for reasons I don't understand.

Since the OP seems to have been satisfied by the explanations, I will leave this discussion alone from here.

David

On November 25, 2017, at 1:51 AM, Mike or Penny Novack <stepbystepfarm at dialup4less.com> wrote:

On 11/24/2017 10:24 AM, D wrote:
> Michael, your "shortcuts" are essentially the command line entry I provided. The OP could put that in a text file and make it executable on a Mac, for sure. It's a little more involved to set up.
>
> They are both still methods to work around a default behavior that many users find surprising, especially on a Mac.
>
It is not just on a Mac. Nor do I agree that the developers were wrong 
to make the default "last file" because perhaps 90% or more of gnucash 
users only keep one set of books. Those who have only one set of books 
ALWAYS want "the last file open" and would probably complain "why do I 
have to go through an extra step to select which file I want when I only 
have one".

The PROGRAM cannot know how many books it is being used to keep. Nor is 
it necessarily true that the users with just one set of books ALWAYS had 
just one set << might originally have had a test set, now only very 
rarely if ever used >>

It is only those of us who are keeping multiple active sets of books 
within the same user log in who have the problem and might want to set 
the parameter to "nofile". I say "might want to" because even in the 
case of having multiple sets of books within the same login it is 
possible that one of those sets of books is used MUCH more frequently 
than all the others combined*. In which case you like the "last open" 
default since only rarely having to from there open a different set of 
books.

Michael D Novack

* Example? My virtual set of books for the solar system is rarely 
opened. There are scarcely three dozen transactions for the entire year 
and the purpose of this virtual set of books is just to track the solar 
system AS IF it were a real entity in which we had invested. I maybe 
enter transactions quarterly (from having written them down on the sheet 
of the last reports run).

     In other cases, activity in a set of books might be very 
"seasonal". During the active phase, would be opening frequently to 
enter transactions but the rest of the year scarcely at all. Accounting 
for an annual event would be like that, with 90-95% of the transactions 
concentrated within the weeks right before and right after the event.