The mother of all newbie questions: how do I start? :o)

[Robert C. Ramsdell III]

Roberto,

I'll take a crack at it.  Think of _every_ transaction as a transfer from one 
account to another.  A few simple examples:

If you are just starting up and want to enter the initial balance of an 
account, then go to the 'Equity' account (I actually created a 'child' 
account called 'opening balances'), and create a transaction.  The date is 
the date you are starting, the transfer field will contain the name of 
account you are transferring to, and then put the opening balance of that 
account in the Increase field. 

To record salary income, create a transaction in the account you are 
depositing the money in.  The transfer field will then contain the account 
'Income:Salary' (or some-such).  The Deposit field will contain the amount of 
the salary.

To record your phone bill (for example), create a new transaction in the 
account you use to pay bills.  The Transfer field will contain the account 
'Expenses:Phone'.  The Withdrawal field will contain the the amount of the 
expense.  If you pay with a check, use the Num field for the check number.

In each of the above examples, create the new transaction by simply starting 
to type in the first empty line at the bottom of the account.   Also, if you 
go to the Transfer account in each case, you will see a matching transaction, 
with the the Transfer account name reversed.  You may find the names of the 
Deposit and Withdrawal fields change from account to account.  In addition it 
may be a bit confusing whether the field represent an increase or decrease in 
your fortune.  This is because gnucash changes the sense of things from 
account to account to keep balances positive.  Thus a positive liability is 
actually a debt, while a positive asset is money you own.

Lastly, this all gets slightly more complicated with splits (transactions 
with multiple accounts), and much more complicated with securities.

Clear as mud?

Robert

On Wednesday 19 June 2002 10:32 pm, Roberto Meyer wrote:
> Hi everybody,
>
> I don't know how to open the balance! :oP
>
> I setup all the accounts I imagined I'll need, but now, how do I begin?
>
> I read gnucash's help and I understood I need to create an equity account
> to do it, but gnucash keeps asking for a double entry record.  I suppose
> (never took accounting at school, hope you'll not notice :-) I must create
> some kind of Income account, don't I?
>
> TAL for your answers,