[GNC] Memory demands and system performance of Gnucash (Was Re: GC4.10 on Win10 Crashing)

Wed Jul 20 03:01:41 EDT 2022

Geoff, 

Taking up the issue of Gnucash system demands and performance...

I'll assume that your data file is not compressed. 

My data file is compressed and just over 5Mb on disk. On startup, Gnucash uses about 125Mb of memory. I haven't time startup or saving; startup is noticeable, but not problematic for me. Saving can take a couple of seconds. Also not a big deal (unless you're planning on doing it after every transaction edit).

What I alluded to earlier, however, is that on my machine there is a significant lag when I Alt-tab from another application back to gnucash. For example, from a pdf reader (with my account statement loaded) back to gnucash. By "significant lag" I mean 45 seconds (I timed THAT one!).

I have no idea why that would be, but I'm assuming that it's something to do with my specific computer. I just have no clue what to look for. Task manager doesn't show anything particularly egregious, although one cloud storage app seems to consume a lot of cycles continuously. (It's not Dropbox or Google) I've got a support query in on that. I do seem to have several different threads for various cloud services (including Dropbox and Google) and I wonder whether all that querying and checking affects performance...

David T.

P.S. it's fine to hijack a thread, if you rename the thread. Just saying. 

On July 20, 2022 3:34:43 AM GMT+03:00, Geoff <cleanoutmyshed at gmail.com> wrote:
>[Apologies to David T for diverting this thread.]
>
>FYI my main data file is 36MB on disc (XML format) and GnuCash has 85MB of RAM allocated when I open it.  It typically takes about 15 seconds to start up and open, and about 3 seconds to save to disc (SATA SSD).
>
>Windows 10, 8GB RAM, Intel i7-3770 CPU, 10+ years old hardware.
>
>GnuCash 4.8, not crashing.
>
>Geoff
>=====
>
>On 20/07/2022 6:27 am, David Carlson wrote:
>> My data file is so big that it seems to tie up 1.5 gigs of Ram or more when
>> open, so most of my computers cannot run a web browser simultaneously with
>> GnuCash without using swap space and grinding down to a crawl.  Even on my
>> highest performance machines it takes several seconds to save but I usually
>> do it before starting any activity that will take more than a few minutes.
>> 
>> On Tue, Jul 19, 2022 at 1:43 PM David T. via gnucash-user <
>> gnucash-user at gnucash.org> wrote:
>> 
>>> Adrien,
>>> 
>>> Thanks for the suggestions.
>>> 
>>> It would seem to me that Finish/Ctrl-S is pretty reduced.
>>> 
>>> I currently have about 12 tabs open. 10 registers, the CoA, and one report
>>> (granted, it's a multicolumn report).
>>> 
>>> Saving after every edit is a remarkably annoying idea, especially given
>>> how long each save takes. I won't be doing that.
>>> 
>>> As for a backup, I'm not sure why I'd go to a backup. The problem doesn't
>>> always happen, so I don't believe it's a problem with data corruption. I'm
>>> trying to move forward with my books, not backward.
>>> 
>>> Nothing is holding me back from 4.11.
>>> 
>>> David
>>> 
>>> On July 19, 2022 3:57:55 PM GMT+03:00, Adrien Monteleone <
>>> adrien.monteleone at lusfiber.net> wrote:
>>>> First, I'd reduce the steps before trying to save as a way of narrowing
>>> down the trigger of the crash.
>>>> 
>>>> If you normally have many tabs open, particularly reports, perhaps
>>> consider closing everything but the CoA, and then keep only the register
>>> you need at one time.
>>>> 
>>>> Since it is so easy to do, perhaps saving after each new transaction or
>>> edit?
>>>> 
>>>> Then try reconciling. Then save. (does that reconcile still take longer
>>> than usual?)
>>>> 
>>>> Do you have a backup, or recall at what point your file didn't crash?
>>>> 
>>>> Anything holding you back from 4.11? I don't see anything particularly
>>> noted for solving a crash of this type in the release notes, but perhaps
>>> programming fixes were made that *might* avoid this issue.
>>>> 
>>>> Regards,
>>>> Adrien
>>>> 
>>>> On 7/19/22 7:21 AM, David T. via gnucash-user wrote:
>>>>> Hello,
>>>>> 
>>>>> I'm running GC4.10 on Win10, and I've been running into numerous
>>> crashes in the last few days while trying to catch up on my finances.
>>> Ironically, many of these crashes happen when I attempt to save my file.
>>>>> 
>>>>> My usual workflow when catching up is to open the pdf bank statement
>>> and work through it to catch any omitted transactions, which I then enter
>>> into GC. After entering the transactions, I will then perform a reconcile
>>> for the account. Upon completing the reconciliation, I save my file. Over
>>> the last two days, GnuCash has crashed several times when I Ctrl-S at this
>>> point to save the file. (When I say crashed, I mean GnuCash simply
>>> disappears from the task bar, and a restart gives the usual file lock
>>> errors). This is, to say the least, frustrating.
>>>>> 
>>>>> I have checked the trace files for the days in question, but there is
>>> nothing that seemingly refers to the crash. The trace mostly contains
>>> thousands of iterations of:
>>>>> 
>>>>> * 13:32:51  WARN <qof> [gnc_numeric_to_decimal()] Rounding required
>>> when 'never round' specified.
>>>>> 
>>>>> As for what I might be doing to cause the crashes, I really can't say,
>>> but I wonder if there is a conflict that happens when I click "Finish" in
>>> the reconciliation and then click Ctrl-S shortly after. I have noticed on
>>> my machine that there is a noticeable delay in the program between when I
>>> finish the reconciliation and when the program returns control to my input.
>>> (There's actually noticeable delays in *everything* I do in GnuCash on my
>>> machine, which is another issue that may or may not be related to my
>>> machine). I wonder if the software crashes because Ctrl-S interrupts the
>>> reconcile closing process, and leaves something corrupted.
>>>> 
>>>> 
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>> 
>> 