GNOME Bugzilla – Bug 643528
New Update and Reconcile - prevent overwrite of original description
Last modified: 2018-06-29 22:54:24 UTC
The new functionality is really useful particularly in updating transaction dates. However, often the imported data that gets written to the transaction description is ugly/capitalised/not descriptive. This also causes problems with autofill on subsequent transaction input. Suggestion: allow the option to not overwrite the description, either on a per-transaction basis or overall. Sometomes the imported description may be fine, so probably better to have the option rather than just not overwrite all descriptions.
Err... I'm open for suggestions on how to change that feature. However, I'm opposed to add yet more options here (because fewer options are better than more options, and most of the times adding options is just an easy way out of making a decision here). There already is an option to switch this overall feature on or off (i.e. making that column visible or invisible), which I'd like to remove sooner or later. What do you suggest to change in this feature which does *not* require a new option? I mean, if you don't want your existing transaction changed, you can always select the plain old "reconcile" action.
In the original bug 373415, the developer, Manfred Usselmann says: "3. I'm not sure about the description, sometimes the description I have entered is better, sometimes the description of the bank contains more information." Therefore I thought it better to suggest an option. Personally I feel that if the transaction has been entered by the user then the user will have put in a meaningful description, so that does not need to be overwritten. The imported description in my opinion mostly does more harm than good, so to change the feature without an extra option I would change it to replace all details *except* description.
@Manfred: Should we change this feature so that the description field (if non-empty) is unchanged by "update and reconcile"?
To be honest I prefer the current solution, I always get more information with the descritpion from the bank. One example: Mortage payments where amortisation and interest amounts change every month and the values are mentioned in the description. This makes it easy to split the transation accordingly. I believe a new option would be justified in this case because it really depends on the use case. I agree that the option to switch this overall feature on or off could be removed without large impact.
Reassign version to 2.4.x so that individual 2.4 versions can be retired.
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