[GNC] Keeping two sets of books

[Stuart McGraw]

On 3/30/19 1:40 PM, taf wrote:
> Hello,
> 
> I've just started using Gnucash.  In the past I've used a basic bookkeeping package, but it's no longer available. I'm trying to keep two sets of books... one for personal accounting and one for a corporation.  I'm running Version 3.4 Build ID: 3.4+ (2018-12-30) on Windows 7; I've set up the books, saving the books into two different MySql data bases with separate users and passwords.  So far so good. I can switch between sets of books by selecting
> 
> File->Open...->
> 
> and then in the Open dialog, selecting MySql data format and specifying database, userid, and password.  This seems to be a bit klunky... am I missing something fundamental?
> 
> Ideally I'd like to have two desktop shortcuts, one to use each set of books, specifying at least format, database and user within the shortcut.
> 
> So... any help?

Running 'gnucash --help' as a command (and likely the same info is in the help somewhere) show that the gnucash command takes an argument that is the the datafile to open.  It seems 'datafile' can also be a url for a database connection.  Thus I have two desktop shortcuts that run respectively the commands:

   gnucash postgres://stuart:xxxxx@localhost/gc-home

   gnucash postgres://stuart:xxxxx@localhost/gc-business

where "stuart" is the *database* (not OS) user account, "xxxxx" the database password "gc-home" and "gc-business" the names of the databases for each set of books.  I presume something similar will work for mysql.

I do have a long persisting problem where I am asked every time for a password for my keyring (something I've never used, set up, or want) but since clicking "Cancel" results in gnucash opening fine I've never bothered to try to fix it.  (I'm running gnucash on Ubuntu linux.)

It is a big plus for me to have both sets of books available from the same OS user account.  As others point out, settings etc will be the same for both sets of books.  For me, that is an advantage.