[GNC] Where does gnucash put the lock file on Linux?

[Chris Green]

On Wed, Jan 20, 2021 at 09:04:52AM -0500, Derek Atkins wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> On Wed, January 20, 2021 8:33 am, Chris Green wrote:
> > On Wed, Jan 20, 2021 at 08:23:23AM -0500, Derek Atkins wrote:
> >> Hi,
> >>
> >> The lock file is created in the same directory as the data file.
> >> Is that directory not writeable?  That would cause the error.
> >
> > The directory is definitely writeable and there definitely isn't any
> > sort of lock file in the directory:-
> >
> >     chris$ cd tmp/pcc/2020
> >     /home/chris/tmp/pcc/2020
> >     chris$ ls
> >     building.gnucash  building.gnucash.20210120121447.log  general.gnucash
> >     chris$ ls -al
> >     total 504
> >     drwxrwxr-x 2 chris chris   4096 Jan 20 12:14 .
> >     drwxrwxr-x 3 chris chris   4096 Jan 20 12:13 ..
> >     -rw-r--r-- 1 chris chris 212992 Jan 20 12:14 building.gnucash
> >     -rw-rw-r-- 1 chris chris    381 Jan 20 12:14
> > building.gnucash.20210120121447.log
> >     -rw-r--r-- 1 chris chris 290816 Jan 20 12:14 general.gnucash
> >     chris$ gnucash general.gnucash
> >     Found Finance::Quote version 1.49.
> >     chris$
> >
> > The above sequence pops up the can't create lock file error.
> 
> The "cannot obtain lock" error has multiple causes.  Have you checked the
> Tracefile to see if there is anything printed that might suggest which
> error is happening?
> 
> The error occurs when:
> 1) There is a lock file already there, or
> 2) There is NOT a lock file already present, but gnucash cannot create a
> new lock file
> 
> If you're in case #2, then you won't see a lock file listed.
> 
> Is your disk full?  What do you get from:
>   df /home/chris/tmp/pcc/2020
>   df -i /home/chris/tmp/pcc/2020/
> 
No, my disk isn't full:-

    Filesystem     Type 1M-blocks   Used  Avail Use% Mounted on
    /dev/nvme0n1p2 ext4     48174  13344  32315  30% /
    /dev/nvme0n1p3 ext4    896193 308524 542077  37% /home
    /dev/sdb1      ext4     10016    181   9307   2% /boot
    /dev/sdb2      ext4    109596  27675  76313  27% /scratch
    /dev/sda1      ext4    938772 225049 666014  26% /bak

> Also, what kind of filesystem underlies /home/chris/tmp/pcc/2020 ?
> 
Standard linux ext4 (as you can see above).


> >> If GnuCash cannot create (and lock) the lock file then it will throw the
> >> error.
> >> If you are SURE that there is not another process running, you can "Open
> >> Anyways" and that will clear the error.
> >>
> > Yes, I realise that, but it's not "right". :-)
> 
> It depends on the underlying error.  If the lock file is actually there
> but, say, gnucash crashed, then "Open Anyways" *is* the right solution.
> Obviously that's not the case here.
> 
Yes, OK, there are cases where "Open anyway" is the right solution,
but there seems to be something else going on here.


> >> NB that gnucash may mix the metadata for two versions of the same-named
> >> file located in different directories.  The GCM file does not contain
> >> the
> >> file location information.
> >>
> > I'm not quite sure I follow that, I do have general.gnucash in two
> > different places.  Are you saying that this may cause problems and
> > that I should rename my 'previous year' accounts to (for example)
> > general2020.gnucash as well as moving them to a suitably named
> > sub-directory?
> 
> If you open a file foo.gnucash, gnucash creatres a metadata file
> foo.gnucash.gcm in $HOME/.local/share/gnucash/books.  Now, if you copy
> foo.gnucash from DIR1/foo.gnucash to DIR2/foo.gnucash, when you open
> DIR2/foo.gnucash it will use the same foo.gnucash.gcm file, because DIR1
> vs DIR2 is not encoded anywhere.
> 
> So yes, IF you decide to archive data files, you should change the name.
> 
OK, that makes sense, thank you.


> NB: there is no need to start over every year; GnuCash hapily accounts for
> multiple years of data and reports know how to handle that.
> 
That might make sense for me, I'm not quite sure.  It's not a very
busy system so I can go for a month and see if I can then generate
what the auditor requires for 2020.  If it all goes wrong I can undo a
month (I have daily incremental backups).

-- 
Chris Green