Null Account and more

[Perry Smith]

Could you explain that to me?

The documentation (design document) says that the value of an account 
is equal to the splits in it plus the sum of all of the subaccounts.  
If some are income and others are expenses, I don't see how that can be 
true.

The design document also causes me to worry because it does not sound 
like the engine is using GAP rules.  By that I mean that:

Liabilities = Assets + Owners Equity

So, the sum of the splits in a transaction do not sum up to 0, they 
balance out -- which is a more complex question.  i.e.  If I pay from 
an asset (e.g. Cash) to a liability (e.g. Note), the equation looks 
like:

-100 (Note Liability account) = -100 (Cash asset account)

It should not (from an accountant's perspective) look like:

0 = -100 (Cash account) + 100 (Liability account)

The same is true for income and expense.  If I pay for gas from my 
salary income it would look like:

100 (salary income) = 100 (gas expense)

But if gas is a child of salary, it seems to me that it would be 
incorrect:

+- 100 salary
  |-+- 100 gas

would make salary  be 200

On Jul 24, 2004, at 10:02 PM, Linas Vepstas wrote:

> On Fri, Jul 23, 2004 at 09:31:55AM -0500, Perry Smith was heard to 
> remark:
>> So, I'm hearing that an income account can have a child that is an
>> expense account.  O.k.   That seems odd to me but o.k.
>