Cryptic error message when merging recipients

[Martin Steigerwald]

Hi Jack, hi.

Jack via KMyMoney - 29.03.25, 17:17:51 CET:
> On 3/29/25 12:05 PM, Martin Steigerwald via KMyMoney wrote:
> > When I go about merging recipients to clean up different spellings of
> > the same real recipient I sometimes get a cryptic error message.
> > 
> > Cannot remove payee P[…] that is still referenced to transaction T[…]
> > ./ kmymoney/mymoney/storage/mymoneystoragemgr.cpp:280
> 
> First question is which version are you using?  If you are using a 5.1
> version, what happens if you try a development/master version?

Version 5.1.3.

I am not sure I want to compile a development/master version at this 
moment.

> > While I can assume the payee to remove I have no idea on how to
> > determine the transaction in question by the number given. So the
> > error message is not really easily actionable for me, unless I manage
> > to find the transaction by other means.
> 
> Ctl-Shift-F (Transactions/Find) and just enter that complete T....
> number.  That will show you the transaction.

That solved it. I found the transaction.

It was a transaction where KMyMoney automatically combined two 
transactions that belonged to each other but I did not yet confirm the 
combining.
 
> > However in this recent case the payee to be removed has no
> > transactions listed anymore, so I do not even know where to search for 
> > the referenced transaction.
> 
> If the Payee has no transaction, what is preventing you from removing
> it?  However, if you get a popup that you can't remove the payee because
> of a transaction, but no transactions appear in the Payee View, it
> would be important to know the details.

Yeah… but… the payee still had transactions. What I now found is that 
after trying to merge payees aborts which such an error message, for the 
payee that was about to be removed but has not been KMymoney displayed no 
transactions anymore. But also there seemed to be no change cause the save 
button was still grayed out.

As I started KMyMoney again to try the find transaction hint from you, 
KMyMoney displayed lots of transactions for that payee. So it seems after 
a failure to merge payees KMyMoney seems to become confused when being 
asked to display transactions for the payee that was about to be deleted.

It would be better if this was atomic. Either fully merged or either not 
merged at all. However as KMyMoney did not complain about saving changes 
and the save button was grayed out, actually I still had the state before 
the failed merging.

> > Any hints?
> > 
> > If not already reported I can open an enhancement report about this
> > one. Would be good to have an error message that gives better
> > guidance on what to do about it.
> 
> No need to file a bug.  The same people who would respond to it there
> are also reading here.

Okay.

Best,
-- 
Martin