features list redux

[Christian Stimming]

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----

On Samstag, 2. August 2003 14:40, Jon Lapham wrote:
> The features list I cribbed directly from README, and it has a lot of
> good stuff in there.  But, I think we should rearrange things a bit.
>
> I'm thinking that rather than listing the items one at a time, maybe we
> should try to group them somewhat.  That way, people can easily just
> read the "major features" and skip some of the details.

Absolutely. I totally agree with your proposal here. Sounds great!

> I'm trying to imagine the thought processes of a new user thinking about
> using personal finance software:
>
>   1) Is this going to be a pain in the ass to work with?
>   2) Can this software deal with my investments?
>   3) (outside US/Europe only) is this Yet Another Western World Only
>      software package?
>
>   99% of users have finished here  :)

totally right.

>   4) Can I use this software in my business?
>   5) What kind of accounting features exist?
>
> ===============================
>
> Now, tackling these questions in the form of a features list:
>
> 1) Easy to Use  (I think we should put this first.  We want to get
> people to try GnuCash, and the perception of most finance software is
> that is it difficult.)
>
>    a) Documentation (we have decent online docs)
>    b) Easy to Use Menus (conform to gnome human interface guidelines)
>    c) Quick and Easy Account Reconciliation
>    d) Mortgage and Loan Repayment Druid
>    e) Import methods, interacts with your other software/banks
>       (QIF, OXF, HBCI)
>    f) Reports (pre-built, supports graphical views)
>    g) Scheduled Transactions (no need to reenter repetitive txns)

In Germany things would get ordered differently: a, b, e, f, g, d, c  -- 
Account reconciliation is not a big issue here, and I "guess" this is somehow 
similar for other countries which have a banking system using wire transfers 
rather than writing checks. This is of course a matter of taste. You can just 
take this ordering proposal as one out of many, and of course the more 
important point here is that these sections are under the common first 
heading.

> There are still some features missing, I'm not sure where to put them:
> "Written in C"
> "File access is locked in a network safe manner"
> "Provides byte-stream format"

The last one is no longer true. Whatever. These three can IMHO be skipped 
anyway.

Christian
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.2.2-rc1-SuSE (GNU/Linux)

iQCVAwUBPyxQvGXAi+BfhivFAQEM7gP/bJZeCmgaY92Zz1pHrD5xOdVnyzUf9kLM
IsuANf5dVewd9pIYYxn87jTwm3RdpvcaZED0aybggGOuEfDifIrmnOr3YWPBlVg6
1XCnX3lBqnMhqv3Tp4ooHTQuaYPvglEtbFHIcp7TP9tERQr4AgxL/G9sbhG+4J/1
hxx37inxWvA=
=O5Rz
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----