Comments / Suggestions / a couple minor bugs in 1.7.5

[Matthew Vanecek]

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On Thu, 2002-12-19 at 15:43, Alex Barclay wrote:
> Brian Smith wrote:
>=20
> > Egads, my mail program sure wraps text lines short! Here's another=20
> > attempt on that loan payment screen idea:
> >
> >    LOAN PAYMENT: P + I amount:   1197.38   <--- calculated by GnuCash
> > Escrow amount:  _______   <--- user-entered (if escrow
> >                                  is applicable)
> > Tax amount:     _______   <--- only shown if tax is *not*
> >                                  paid through escrow
> > Insurance amt:  _______   <--- ditto
> > PMI amount:     _______   <--- ditto
> > Add'l amounts:  _______   <--- this could open a split
> >                                  window for extra amounts
> >
> > Total Payment:  2105.48   <--- calculated by GnuCash
> >
> I really like this idea. My only suggestion is that PMI should be=20
> classed as another amount. I don't think it's the same in every country=
=20
> although I've only ever bought a house here in the US even though I'm=20
> British. Actually, thinking about my own situation my property tax and=20
> insurance are both paid through escrow. I guess I'd set that up as a=20
> payment to an asset account then deduct the property tax once a year and=
=20
> the insurance twice a year. I really never calculate it that accurately=
=20
> though. I don't have any PMI so it wouldn't make sense for it to appear=
=20
> on the form.
>=20
> The main thing is if we could have one element in the split handle the=20
> P+I part which varies then add the others as fixed amounts.
>=20

It appears that basically what is being asked for is an entry wizard.=20
While not a bad idea, you can achieve the same sort of functionality by
setting view to Split for the loan payment.

Some issues I see with a genaralized loan payment wizard are:

	1) Rarely do people use the same account names for stuff.  PMI,
	   property taxes, warranty, whatever--people tend to create
	   names meaningful to them.  To make this work, you'd have to
	   tie the entry fields to specific accounts.

	2) To be strictly technical, accountingly-speaking, you'd want
	   to expense your insurance, PMI, taxes, etc., on a monthly
	   basis, even though you only pay them yearly.  This can be
	   engineered via the new Scheduled Transaction interface, or
	   simply by duplicating an existing transaction.

	3) Given the availability of the Split view, it's unlikely that
	   such an interface would be developed soon.  I'm considering
	   the frequency of entry here, too--unless you're a real estate
	   broker, you probably only buy a house every 5 or 10 years or
	   so.  It'd be much easier to use the above-mentioned Scheduled
	   Transaction interface (from a development perspective).

That being said, it may be possible to develop something as a plugin.
Gnucash is fairly modular--it may be easy enough to plug something into
the Gnome interface.  I don't think any of the developers would have
time for it, unless someone signed on specifically for the purpose of
creating the dialog.  After 1.8.x., Gnome2 is the next major project, I
think.

I think if you sit down, and draw on paper the interface you are
thinking of, and then consider the additionaly interface needed to hook
accounts to the options, you'll see that it's really not that much
easier than using the Splits interface.

That's just my opinion--I could be wrong.
--=20
Matthew Vanecek
perl -e 'print $i=3Dpack(c5,(41*2),sqrt(7056),(unpack(c,H)-2),oct(115),10);'
***************************************************************************=
*****
For 93 million miles, there is nothing between the sun and my shadow except=
 me.
I'm always getting in the way of something...

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