[GNC] De-Reconciliation Settings

[David T.]

It was pointed out to me in another thread that one can reset specific warnings flags using Action->Reset Warnings. 

I’d like to raise a couple of points with this dialog, now that I have been introduced to it…

First off, the dialog is quite opaque, insofar as it is (apparently) only showing warnings for which I have selected options previously. There is no way for me to determine what (if any) other options I have here. I imagine it would be a whole lot clearer if I could have a listing of all the various options, along with their current setting. It is counterintuitive to me the way it is set up here.

Be that as it may, I have three entries listed here: “Change contents of reconciled split”“Remove a split from a transaction”“Commit changes to a transaction”

The first setting listed here refers to the behavior of de-reconciling a split in GnuCash. However, if a user changes Transaction-level data elements—such as the Description field—a split will become de-reconciled. Therefore, this preference is misnamed, and should be changed, since I should receive an alert if I change the description and the reconcile flag gets reset. Perhaps “Change reconcile flag upon edit” would be better?

Second, it seems to me that the boundary for when a split becomes de-reconciled needs to be drawn differently. I know this issue was discussed recently, and there were reasons given for why the logic falls the way it does. However, reconciliation applies to the *split*, as shown by the fact that each split in a transaction can be separately reconciled in its own account. Changing the status of the split based on a change in the transaction is inconsistent and illogical to me. 

I have transactions with as many as ten splits, in which several splits are reconciled. If, for some reason, I then change the description of the transaction, then every one of those reconciled splits will get de-reconciled-- requiring me to reconcile every linked account.

Finally, I will note that the program is at least consistent, in that when you change a description field, it does in fact change every cleared split in that transaction. I do, however, question whether that is the correct action to impose. 

David T.