[GNC] How to save Gnucash and Lock file issues

Tue Dec 4 02:22:02 EST 2018

Lorrie,

The setting David Carlson is talking about is immediately under the Files heading on the General tab of the Preferences
dialog. You can optionally display an autosave confirmation before the autosave and set the autosave interval in the
box. I use 5 minutes. The autosave only occurs at this interval if you have made changes to the file. The third option
sets a timeout on the Save changes on closing. After that timeout period any changes are automatically saved. 

The preference settings are discussed more fully in https://www.gnucash.org/docs/v3/C/gnucash-help/set-prefs.html

David Cousens

On Mon, 2018-12-03 at 22:18 -0600, David Carlson wrote:
> Lorrie,
> 
> I am away from my computer right now so I cannot confirm the exact wording, but it s something like how often to make
> backups.  I  dont remember the default. It may be only 5 minutes, I have it set to 30 minutes but I religiously do
> manual saves before certain activities such as imports.
> 
> My tablet is messing with me, excuse the sloppy writing.
> 
> David C 
> 
> On Mon, Dec 3, 2018, 9:34 PM Lorrie Laskey <lrlaskey at gmail.com wrote:
> > Hi David,
> > 
> > Here are my responses.
> > Retain log file set to 15 days.
> > No * before the filename in the title bar.
> > What is this "the amount of time set in that preference section has passed." that you are referring to? I am not
> > finding this in the preferences section.
> > 
> > 
> > 
> > David C
> > > On Mon, Dec 3, 2018 at 8:17 PM Lorrie Laskey <lrlaskey at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > > Hi David,
> > > > 
> > > > Here's what I did.
> > > > 
> > > >    - I did a "save as" and renamed the file to "finances.gnucash" then
> > > >    closed the file.
> > > >    - Reopened Gnucash which opened the very same file.
> > > >    - Made a change and saved it which created a log file.
> > > >    - Closed the same file and repeated these steps.
> > > >    - No backup file was created . Only the original "finances.gnucash" file
> > > >    remained.
> > > > 
> > > > Is something wrong?
> > > > 
> > > > 
> > > > 
> > > > On Sun, Dec 2, 2018 at 6:32 PM David Cousens <davidcousens at bigpond.com>
> > > > wrote:
> > > > 
> > > > > Lorrie,
> > > > >
> > > > > At some point instead of opening the main file "finances.gnucash" it would
> > > > > appear you have opened a backup copy of the
> > > > > file, which is why it has the form "finances.gnucash.20181202.gnucash".
> > > > >
> > > > > Each time Gnucash is opened, it copies the file "<filename>.gnucash it"
> > > > > has just opened and renames it
> > > > > "<filename>.gnucash.<date-time stamp>.gnucash" . It also creates a logfile
> > > > > "<filename>.gnucash.<date-time stamp>.log"
> > > > > which records the changes to the file which occur during the current
> > > > > session.
> > > > >
> > > > > When you exit or when you make changes or use the Save button in GnuCash
> > > > > any changes are saved to "<filename>.gnucash"
> > > > > In your  case <filename>="finances.gnucash.20181202" instead of
> > > > > "finances.gnucash".
> > > > >
> > > > > You can restore this to the normal situation simply by renaming the file
> > > > > you are currently using as the main
> > > > > file, "finances.gnucash.20181202.gnucash",  as "finances.gnucash".
> > > > >
> > > > > See https://www.gnucash.org/docs/v3/C/gnucash-guide/basics-backup1.html
> > > > > for a detailed explanation of this.
> > > > >
> > > > > David Cousens
> > > > >
> > > > >
> > > > > On Sun, 2018-12-02 at 10:14 -0800, Lorrie Laskey wrote:
> > > > > > Hi Colin,
> > > > > >
> > > > > > I understand. Since I don't really need to know the minute and seconds
> > > > > when
> > > > > > a file is saved at this time, I will leave the file name as it is.
> > > > > >
> > > > > > My next topic, for another email, is how to set up a budget. I have tried
> > > > > > and watched videos and read documentation but never quite get it to work
> > > > > or
> > > > > > understand what it is doing.
> > > > > >
> > > > > > Thanks for  your help this morning.
> > > > > >
> > > > > >
> > > > > > On Sun, Dec 2, 2018 at 10:10 AM Colin Law <clanlaw at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > > > >
> > > > > > > On Sun, 2 Dec 2018 at 18:01, Lorrie Laskey <lrlaskey at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > Hi Colin,
> > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > The "save" option did get focus once I made a change and saved the
> > > > > file.
> > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > However, the file name doesn't look right. See below. It is using the
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > name that I created when I used "save as" though I used "save" but the
> > > > > log
> > > > > > > file name looks right. What is happening? Is this a problem?
> > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > finances.gnucash.20181202.gnucash
> > > > > > > > finances.gnucash.20181202.gnucash.20181202095503
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > If you used Save As to save to that file, then that file becomes the
> > > > > > > current file in use so when you later use Save it will save back to
> > > > > > > that file again (and that is the file that will be re-opened
> > > > > > > automatically when you open Gnucash).  Again this is exactly the same
> > > > > > > as will happen with MS Word for example.  Save As means "save the file
> > > > > > > with this new name and then keep using the new name".  If you want to
> > > > > > > give it a different name then use Save As just once to save it with
> > > > > > > the name you want and thereafter Save will save back to that file.
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > Colin
> > > > > > >
> > > > > >
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