online balance info

Linas Vepstas linas@linas.org
Mon, 25 Jun 2001 12:15:59 -0500


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On Thu, Jun 21, 2001 at 11:29:06PM -0400, John Klar was heard to remark:
> Linas wrote: (2nd point)
> > OFX also seems to loose inter-account transfer info, and has
> > mal-formed, badly capitalized and cryptic info in 'payee' and
> > 'memo' fields, at least based on samples I've looked at.
>=20
> v1.02 doesn't seem to have a Payee :( and memo looks like whatever string
> the payee emitted to your FI
>=20
> > Its a bit cleaner than QIF to parse (e.g. it should indicate the
> > currency of the transaction).  But its not a double-entry system;
> > all you know is that money came, or went, but you are never clear
> > on to whom, or how or why.
>=20
> I'm not seeing this. =20
>=20
>  <FITID> should be "unique", but I'm detecting some rollover compared
>          to a statement pulled from last year.
>  <TRNTYPE> gives me "how" (CHECK,CREDIT,DEBIT,CASH,XFER)
> 	C&D are electronic
>  <NAME> gives me "why" (SH DRAFT,DEPOSIT,PURCHASE,WITHDRAW,
> 			TRANSFER TO mumble)
>  <CHECKNUM> correlates the check
>  <MEMO> includes additional detail.  In the case of 102, this
>         is where the PAYEE info is.

Some banks are better than others.   The following from the=20
gnucash samples driectory, a canadian bank:

<STMTTRN><TRNTYPE>DEBIT<DTPOSTED>20010102225126.000[-5:EST]<TRNAMT>80.00<FI=
TID>2001010201648450<NAME>**PAYMENT THANK YOU - PAIEMENT</STMTTRN>

whazzat? where'd it come from?  why? what memo?

(having the unique id in fitid is indeed batter than what QIF supports
and makes it easy to detect multiple instances of teh same trasnaction).

the problem is that gnucash can indeed debit one account by 80,
but what account should be credited by a matching 80 ? We'll
need to develop some heuristics, or possibly take some ugly default
values.   The 'ideal' interface would have some wizard pop up and ask
'hey next time we see one of these 'PAYMENT THANKYOU' things, what=20
account should we put it in?', and remember the user's answer.


--linas

--=20
Linas Vepstas -- linas@gnumatic.com -- http://www.gnumatic.com/

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