[GNC] Import matcher shortcomings, OFX realm (at least)

Derek Atkins derek at ihtfp.com
Wed May 6 20:17:13 EDT 2020


What if there are no matches?
Then the LHS won't be empty.

-derek
Sent using my mobile device. Please excuse any typos.
On May 6, 2020 8:09:03 PM Christopher Lam <christopher.lck at gmail.com> wrote:

> Are you discussing qif or ofx. The main difficulty is qif code written 20
> years ago and has not modernised.
>
> The multi to multi issue will always be very difficult, hence I'd
> previously imagined a two pane register, qif/ofx on left, existing register
> on right, and drag and drop to marry up the splits. A successful pairing
> removes line on both panes out of sight. Matching is complete when the LHS
> is empty.
>
> On Thu, 7 May 2020, 3:39 am David Reiser via gnucash-user, <
> gnucash-user at gnucash.org> wrote:
>
>> Overall, yes. But this case presents a many-to-many sorting out vs. the
>> one-to-many resolution in QIF. And none of those unique IDs exist in the
>> gnucash file until the transactions have finished being imported.
>> --
>> Dave Reiser
>> dbreiser at icloud.com
>>
>>
>>
>> > On May 6, 2020, at 2:50 PM, Jean Laroche <ripngo at gmail.com> wrote:
>> >
>> > QIF is a lot worse the OFX. OFX transactions have a unique ID, which QIF
>> ones don't have...
>> >
>> > On 5/6/20 11:48 AM, David Reiser wrote:
>> >> Thanks, Jean.
>> >> I think the QIF importer has some code that detects multiple possible
>> matches and pops up a “select the right match” dialog/window. Perhaps that
>> can be reworked/incorporated. I don’t use QIF too much, but I think that
>> particular behavior gets triggered in a step a little closer to the final
>> import sequence than the General Matcher window gets to when it has decided
>> it has already identified matches.
>> >> --
>> >> Dave Reiser
>> >> dbreiser at icloud.com
>> >>> On May 6, 2020, at 2:16 PM, Jean Laroche <ripngo at gmail.com> wrote:
>> >>>
>> >>> I have run into this issue as well! Thanks for looking into it.
>> >>> I'll try to fix it. What should really be done here, I'm guessing is
>> that the matcher should not match several transactions to the same one.
>> This may not be super easy to fix, but I'll take a look.
>> >>> Jean
>> >>>
>> >>> On 5/6/20 11:00 AM, David Reiser via gnucash-user wrote:
>> >>>> Michael Fross said:
>> >>>>> I have to keep importing the same QFX file over and over until I get
>> >>>>> “nothing to import” message. If I don’t, it seems to miss
>> transactions in
>> >>>>> the file. Not sure about QIF, but Maybe it’s similar.
>> >>>>>
>> >>>>> Michael
>> >>>> Ok, I’ll split this out into another discussion.
>> >>>> The need for multiple attempts at importing the same ofx file to get
>> all the transactions imported is probably a result of a shortcoming in the
>> matcher code when multiple same-dollar-value transactions (or nearly the
>> same if Commercial ATM fee threshold is set to anything greater than 0.00)
>> appear in the ofx file. One very common cause of such cases is vending
>> machine transactions.
>> >>>> If you never enter any of the same-value transactions manually, and
>> only import them, then you’ll probably be OK, because the matcher will
>> suggest that all the transactions should be Added rather than matched.
>> >>>> If, however, you have even one of the same-value transactions entered
>> manually, and a set of 5 same-value transactions incoming in the import
>> file, the matcher’s default behavior is to display all 5 incoming
>> transactions as having a good candidate match. The problem is that all five
>> of those incoming transactions are pointed at a single transaction in the
>> gnucash file. If you blithely click OK in the Matcher window, the import
>> process matches the first incoming transaction to the existing transaction.
>> Then when the second same-value transaction gets examined, the matcher says
>> “Oh, I already matched that existing transaction, I’ll ignore this one”.
>> And all subsequent same-value transaction that had reported they had a
>> match in the file are ignored because the candidate match is already taken.
>> >>>> Matching can be even messier if you have, say, 4 transactions of
>> $2.00 entered in your data file, but 7 $2.00 transactions coming in with
>> the import.
>> >>>> The reason sequential imports work is that once a candidate is
>> matched and the import process ends, the next time the import process is
>> launched, that first transaction is no longer a candidate match because it
>> now has an imported transaction ID associated with it (and the transaction
>> ID prevents the incoming transaction from appearing at all anymore), and
>> the matcher moves on (sometimes only one candidate transaction at a time).
>> >>>> I did file a bug on this several years ago, but the matcher’s default
>> match identification has not changed. What was added is the ability to
>> double click a transaction in the matcher dialog window to see alternative
>> transactions to match against. If you see multiple transactions in your
>> matcher window with the same dollar value, you must inspect the potential
>> matches for each one and select a different one from the top candidate
>> picked by default for all the same-value transactions.
>> >>>> I hope this explanation helps reduce the number of repeat imports you
>> have to use.
>> >>>> Dave
>> >>>> --
>> >>>> Dave Reiser
>> >>>> dbreiser at icloud.com
>> >>>> _______________________________________________
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