[GNC] Backup recovery

[Maf. King]

Hi Finbar.

Comments in-line below...

On Monday, 11 February 2019 13:24:32 GMT Finbar Mahon wrote:
> Wow, this is getting (more) complicated -
> 
> You said -
> 
> [When Gnucash starts, it *normally* opens the file that was open when
> you shutdown last time around,
> 
> so it is fairly easy to get the wrong one by mistake if you've been
> digging in the folder.]
> 
> I just booted up GNUcash without any 'digging' and got  -
> 
> On the bottom of the screen.
> 
> which follows your information, as the 'second' file? right ? 

The file you have opened was originally an auto-backup of the file you called 
"GNU 5 Feb 2018 ", this backup was made after you hit Save on 5th March 2018 
at 17.16

> so, I go
> to file>open and I get -
> 
> etc., etc. None of which have the date that is on the open GNUcash file.
> Maybe it is one of the files marked 'wed'? but the dates don't match.
> 

those 2 *.log files suggest that you were editing a different "auto backup", 
one taken originally on 1st March 2018 at 12:42.  Seems you opened or that file 
on 6th Feb this year, at around 16.15.  But the log files are not your data, so 
don't worry too much about them.

> So I look further down the list of files under file > open and I finally
> come to -
> 
> The only file on these two grabs which fits your name criteria is the
> very first one above but the date is almost a year ago, and none of the
> others in the second grab seem to fit the criteria.

Looks like there is a couple of auto-backups in the image 6.png that suggest 
you had the current file open for editing yesterday at around 14.14 or so.  the 
top entry in that image suggests you also had the current file open on saturday 
at 12.45 too.

the last file in the list shown in 6.png is the "lock" file that GC uses to help 
prevent openign the data twice - the "can't get lock" message we all see 
(occasionally) at start up - it should clear away on a clean shutdown.  Proves 
that the current file is in that folder somewhere...

> 
> :-( I am truly sorry for the long sequence of q&a but I am accustomed to
> 
> assuming the file I last used opens again after I 'save' and 'quit'
> 

GC does that by default (and always on a mac).  The problem is that at some 
point after 5th March last year, you told GC to open a different file.  And it 
has been doing so ever since.


I suggest that you might like to do a file->save as and use a new name without 
the datestamps, but it is clear from 5.png that you have worked with 2 files in 
the last week (possibly more?), so you may well be missing things from the 
current file that you thought you had done, but are in the "wrong" file.  You'll 
need to look carefully at how the 2 files differ before tiding up.

Good luck,
Maf.