[H-GEN] Is GnuCash ready for prime-time? Was: RFC: SCO

Paul Gearon pag at PISoftware.com
Tue Jun 17 20:34:32 EDT 2003


[ Humbug *General* list - semi-serious discussions about Humbug and     ]
[ Unix-related topics. Posts from non-subscribed addresses will vanish. ]

On Tue, 17 Jun 2003 ben.carlyle at invensys.com wrote:

<snip/>

> The main thing, though is the fact that when it crashes it takes any
> unsaved data with it. All the other problems make me want to contribute
> to fix them, but that one is the one that makes me not want to use it at
> all.
>
> IMHO It's not quite ready for prime time and I don't think it'll get there
> unless someone fixes this file saving paradigm. Real software crashes
> occasionally, and there must be a mechanism to make sure it doesn't take
> your finances with it :)
>
> Does anyone else have any solutions/corrections/comments?

If you really do like it (with the exception of these crashes) then I'd
suggest you at least try and have a quick look.  Maybe it's something that
the main developers aren't getting due to some different settings.

So, assuming you're willing to put in the time, build it yourself with
debugging on, and then run it.  As soon as it crashes attach gdb to it and
find out where it is.  If you're lucky then it's not a big deal and you
can fix it.  If not, then file a bug report.

If it's just a config issue then sometimes you can even get away with a
"strace" and then tail your output file when it crashes (though this will
only tell you what it's waiting for, rather than why).  Not always
successful, but it's less effort than a full debug build.

Obviously this is not the sort of thing that you'll do for most software
(gnome-terminal crashed for me all the time, but I couldn't be bothered
fixing it when I could just go to Konsole instead), but if it's nearly
there then it can be worthwhile to try this.  I managed to get several
pieces of misbehaving software going like this, and it gives you a good
feeling to contribute something back to an OSS project.  :-)

Not meaning to lecture you on what you probably already know, but
sometimes having someone tell us to do what we know we *should* do can
prompt us into actually doing it.  ;-)  Hmmmm.  Maybe I should look at
that gnome-terminal bug after all.....

Regards,
Paul Gearon

Software Engineer                Telephone:   +61 7 3876 2188
Plugged In Software              Fax:         +61 7 3876 4899
http://www.PIsoftware.com        PGP Key available via finger

Catapultam habeo. Nisi pecuniam omnem mihi dabis, ad caput tuum saxum
immane mittam.
(Translation from latin: "I have a catapult. Give me all the money,
or I will fling an enormous rock at your head.")



--
* This is list (humbug) general handled by majordomo at lists.humbug.org.au .
* Postings to this list are only accepted from subscribed addresses of
* lists 'general' or 'general-post'.  See http://www.humbug.org.au/



More information about the General mailing list