Adrian, Thank you for your instructive comments on backing up and transferring gc data files. I'm happy to say that when I ran a test by transferring the files to my laptop, I successfully opened my gc book exactly to where I left of on my desk PC.
Eric, Thank you for those very insightful comments relating to transition protocols. I have to admit, you articulated exactly those details that I probably would have learned the hard way. When I meet with my understudy in a few days, I will be sure to discuss those ideas until we commit to a protocol. On Wed, May 27, 2026, 7:08 PM Eric S <[email protected]> wrote: > On Tue, May 26, 2026 at 10:19:34AM -0500, David Gray wrote: > > Now I am in the process of training an under-study [...] > > so I want to share my GnuCash Data files with him. > > > > I want to copy my GnuCash data files to a thumb drive > > > > [...] > > > > 3. Do you have any other insights on this process that I might have > > overlooked? > > Two things. First: Be aware that your data file, > WHATEVER.gnucash, has backups in the same directory called > WHATEVER.gnucash.YYYYMMDDHHMMSS.gnucash . The backups are great > in case the main file gets trashed (due to either computer issues > or the user's mistakes), but at almost any given moment, the > backups will be out of date. A question that shows up here > sometimes is, "Why are my latest transactions missing?" and the > answer is sometimes, "you were editing a backup, not the main > file." > > Second thing: During the training/handover period, I presume > you'll both be working on the organization's books. If so, > you'll need to be super careful to avoid both working on them *at > the same time*; you need to take turns. > > Otherwise you could easily find yourself in a situation where > you've each made changes (entered transactions, say) to your own > copy, and now your and your understudy's versions of the books > have diverged, with each containing work that's missing from the > other. > > Recovering from that is doable, but it's Not Fun! > > I haven't had that arise with GnuCash specifically, but only > because I've only ever used it on my own. The situation happens > often enough in general -- with word-processor documents, > spreadsheets, or whatever -- that I can pretty confidently say > it's a risk that needs guarding against whenever two or more > people are working on their own copies of the same files. > > If you're willing to put the organization's books on DropBox or > wherever, that might suffice. (I'm not sure I would; I have a > deep suspicion of the cloud when it comes to anything > confidential. But that's just one man's opinion. In any case, > it's a policy decision, not a technical one; others here will > have a far better idea of whether there are technical issues with > (GnuCash + cloud).) > > Failing that, I'd suggest coming up with a protocol between you, > for who gets to work on the books at any given point in time. > > If you choose not to use the cloud, well, you mentioned a thumb > drive, so that's an an obvious candidate for the protocol: > > (1) Don't just grab any old thumb drive that's handy, but > dedicate one specifically to this purpose, clearly label it as > such, and don't use it for anything else. (If it's low-capacity > and reasonably inexpensive, there'll be less temptation to use it > for other things as well.) > > (2) The rule is: whoever has possession of that thumb drive is > the *ONLY* one allowed to do GnuCash work on the books in > question. You wanna do some stuff? You gotta get the thumb > drive back from your buddy first! And vice versa. > > Either (3A): Both of you be scrupulous about copying the GnuCash > files off of the thumb drive when you first get possession of it, > and copying them back to the thumb drive before handing it off > again, > > Or (3B): Edit directly on the thumb drive -- "File>Open" *that* > copy of the books, *not* one on your hard drive. Make backups to > your respective hard drives, of course -- thumb drives can fail > or get lost. But consider the thumb drive to be your ultimate > "single source of truth". > > (3B) is a lot less error-prone, but there might be issues. > There's other stuff that's associated with a GnuCash file but not > stored within it (I can't recall what, offhand), and that > association might be lost if the thumb drive doesn't always show > up in the same place every time you insert it; e.g. if it gets a > different Windows drive letter. Advice from people with > experience of this would be welcome here! > > - Eric > _______________________________________________ > gnucash-user mailing list > [email protected] > To update your subscription preferences or to unsubscribe: > https://lists.gnucash.org/mailman/listinfo/gnucash-user > ----- > Please remember to CC this list on all your replies. > You can do this by using Reply-To-List or Reply-All. > _______________________________________________ gnucash-user mailing list [email protected] To update your subscription preferences or to unsubscribe: https://lists.gnucash.org/mailman/listinfo/gnucash-user ----- Please remember to CC this list on all your replies. You can do this by using Reply-To-List or Reply-All.
