Tracefile

Error Messages

and optionally more details are usually during a GnuCash session collected in a trace file. The content of this file is very important when reporting a bug.

For Crashs of the Program

also a Stack Trace is desired.

At Each Program Start

a new trace file will be created and all configured output during the program run will be appended to that file. See Logging to fine tune the capabilities and save your settings in a configuration file.

Linux and macOS users

want to save a copy before the next GnuCash start if the file contains relevant infos.

Third party components

have their own log facilities. If you use AqBanking, you might also wish to read about AqBanking Debugging.

Name and Location

Linux, *BSD etc.

On Linux, the most recent gnucash.trace file is located in /tmp. Some BSD variants use /var/tmp instead.

• Rename or move it as you like to safeguard it against overwriting.

macOS

On macOS, Gnucash creates the tracefile, gnucash.trace, in the operating system's current temp folder, located in /var/folders. The rest of the path has the form yy/yy_lots_more_hex_characters/-Tmp-/gnucash.trace. Most systems have several of these, so the easiest thing to do on older systems is to open Terminal and run

find /var/folders -name gnucash.trace

and it will print out the path for you.

MacOS 10.13 (High Sierra)

has added a convenience environment variable TMPDIR so if you have that or later you can easily find the tracefile with $TMPDIR/gnucash.trace

Windows

On Windows these files are named gnucash.trace.ABCDEF, where the .ABCDEF suffix is changed randomly on each start of gnucash. They are usually located in the folder

Since Vista

C:\Users\myname\AppData\Local\Temp

Windows XP

C:\Documents and Settings\myname\Local Settings\Temp

for a user named myname.

Notes

• The folder name Local Settings might be named differently in your native language like in German Anwendungsdaten.
• Windows Explorer hides the AppData directory, so after opening c:\Users\myname click in the path bar at the top and type "\AppData" and press return. The AppData folder will open and you can continue to navigate normally.
• It might also be a hidden system folder which is shown only if you change the folder properties to Not hide system files/folders in your file manager like Windows Explorer.
• If you set the Windows environment variables TMPDIR, TMP, or TEMP – in DOS mode use the SET command – this location may change.

If you experience unexpected behavior or crashes, check the latest of these files (or the one created when the problem started) and add all interesting-looking lines of that file to your error reports (e.g. in Bugzilla). Please include at least the lines with the keywords WARN (for warning) and CRIT (for critical warning).