Version details: Fluxbox Distribution/Version: Debian Sarge 1. Open GnuCash (it will load the current database). 2. Open a second instance of Gnucash. Gnucash will come up with a screen that says (paraphrasing) "Cannot obtain a lock for <database name>. <Quit> <Open Anyway> <Create New File>". There's no "Open a different database option". This is a pain if you want to open two different databases to compare them like I do. Thanks.
It would probably be appropriate to have both an "Open" and an "Open Recent" option (though one button could lead to a dialog that handled both).
As a workaround, you could start gnucash with the --nofile command line option...
Or just hit 'Cancel'.
(In reply to comment #3) > Or just hit 'Cancel'. Err, the three buttons are "Open anyway", "Create new file", and "Quit". There is no "Cancel", is there? On gnucash-de there were more proposals: - Either to have only two buttons, "Open anyway" and "Don't open anything" (which could just as well be labeled "Cancel"), which will result in the empty gnucash screen. Pro: In the empty gnucash screen it is totally obvious how to open a different file or a "Recently used" file or a new file or Quit gnucash. Contra: If people start to use the button "create new account" in the empty gnucash window, IIRC we run into all sorts of problems because there isn't a clearly defined new empty gnc-book. OTOH the empty gnucash window still shows up if people press "cancel" in the new file druid, so this has to be dealt with anyway. - Or have three buttons, "Open anyway", "Open a different file", "Create new file"
*** Bug 355500 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
To revisit this again: Which of the buttons represent a use-case that is actually really used? - "Open anyway" - gnucash has crashed. Probably used regularly. - "Create new file" - does anyone actually use this one here at this location? - "Quit" - was added as a specific RFE in bug#92191 which said "most of the time, this means you accidentally opened a second copy of gnucash when one was already open". I propose to add the button - "Open a different file" - if you want to run two gnucash instances with a different file each. And we should think about throwing out the button "Create new file", because I think the decision of starting a new file is seldomly made at this accidental startup dialog. Actually this used to be the option "Don't open anything", but as this in turn is even more confusing, it was replaced by "Create new file" here http://svn.gnucash.org/trac/changeset/7244 (wow, that's a long time ago).
I'll second the proposal to add "Open a different file" and remove "Create New File". IMHO this would seem the best solution to the Debian bug reports too. '--nofile' is already documented in the manpage for anyone who needs to use that option.
On IRC there was even more agreement on "Open a different file". So someone (heh) needs to implement that.
Just for the records: This is still not implemented in 2.2.6.
Ten years later release 2.6.17 this bug is still languishing. If the user finds that GnuCash is trying to open a different file than the one he wants to use, there is no option to open a different file. it might not be very convenient to start over from the command line, especially if the file is buried down a long path or even on a remote resource. Is it so hard to add a button to open a different file?
I pushed a change for version 4.3 that changes the 'New File' option to 'Open with No File'. That way the main Gnucash Window will allow you to do 'File->New' to create a new file, 'File->Open' to browse for a file or use the history.
