> Usable compared to hand-rolled FoxPro?
 
I had to read that a few times to conclude that it's a (FoxPro) compliment.  :)
 
Thanks hugely for the further info and links.  That "backward compatible extensions via KVP's" is a ridiculously compromised architecture, and has me seriously considering not pursuing GnuCash any further.  Since GnuCash updates are always available for free (and include a boatload of bug fixes every time), there is not the slightest reason to maintain this backward compatibility, just forward compatibility (old file can be loaded into next newer GnuCash version, but not saved backward).
 
I have also been considering several other "roll my own" options for the last few years, notably MySQL/MariaDB/PHP.  Being a heavy-duty algorithmic programmer, I am very intolerant of inadequate software, and "roll my own" often becomes my best choice.
 
If you're wondering why I have to leave FoxPro, it's because Microsoft is letting it disintegrate, despite it still being officially a currently supported product.  In fact, as I rudely discovered a year ago, it wouldn't even install on Windows 10 without a special patch being run first.  I.e., Microsoft didn't even test the installability (let alone proper operation) on Windows 10 of a currently supported product of their own!
 
GnuCash is visually very well done, though, I must say!  And it is quite feature-laden.
 
Hartmut W Sager - Tel +1-204-339-8331


On 13 March 2017 at 19:03, Glen Ditchfield <GJDitchfield@acm.org> wrote:
On Monday, March 13, 2017 6:27:53 PM CDT Hartmut W Sager wrote:
> Oooh, thanks, this is valuable!  I will experiment further with what you
> did.  And I presume that this is within the specs or design intentions of
> GnuCash, so that it should remain usable in further GnuCash versions?

Usable compared to hand-rolled FoxPro?

But, yeah, I'd go with it.  "It's been the (unfortunate) practice through most
of Gnucash 2's development to use KVP to add or extend new variables to
Gnucash because doing so allows older versions of Gnucash to open the data
file."  (http://gnucash.1415818.n4.nabble.com/what-is-the-table-slots-good-for-td4658122.html)

Keep in mind that GnuCash has database back-ends, too.  I wouldn't trust the
front end to handle anything unless all the back ends support it.  There's
some weak documentation at https://wiki.gnucash.org/wiki/GnuCash_XML_format
and https://wiki.gnucash.org/wiki/SQL.

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