Enhancement request: 'Native' importing of '.CSV' files

[Dave]

On Tue, Jan 20, 2009 at 3:59 PM, Dennis Muhlestein
<djmuhlestein at gmail.com>wrote:

> Derek Atkins wrote:
>
>> It's in GnuCash Trunk in SVN.
>>
>> -derek
>>
>> Quoting Dave <dave at davestechshop.net>:
>>
>>  Derek,
>>> The reason we are working on a free-standing tool is that 1) I wasn't
>>> aware
>>> of the CSV importer in gnucash code, 2) the developer I'm working with
>>> didn't mention it, and 3) and we have already started and made good
>>> progress
>>> going in this direction. That said, I would be interested in learning
>>> more
>>> about the CSV importer code. I assume this basic existing CSV import
>>> functionality is not compiled into the release version of gnucash...
>>> Regards,
>>> Dave
>>>
>>>
> Dave you're correct that you don't get CSV support in the released version.
>  You'd need to build the development version manually.
>
> I also wasn't aware of the CSV start on Trunk yet.  Dave's CSV format is
> quite custom to his needs.  (Multiple accounts in same file etc.)  There are
> a lot of issues to be dealt with when dealing with CSV data in general (like
> which column means what, who names the columns, how much does the tool do
> and how much does the user have to do.)  That aside though, I'm not opposed
> to looking at the CSV import on Trunk.
>
> I'm still working on getting the dependencies for Mac lined out to be built
> automatically (different topic.) I know a couple other developers have done
> work in this area and I wanted to collaborate with them before getting too
> far down the road though.
>
> -Dennis
>

Dennis - I'm satisfied with the direction we're going. I think this will be
a useful tool to many gnucash users even though it is free-standing. And a
free-standing tool has advantages too.  The CSV format we're supporting is
the standard Yodlee format and I think there are potentially lots of Yodlee
users who may want to get their data into gnucash. So this tool will fill an
immediate need. It would also be cool if the gnucash CSV importer eventually
utilizes some of the parser code you write for this project.

Dave