more newbie q's

[Divakar R (thru' VSNL)]

>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 10
> Date: Wed, 18 Feb 2004 09:38:42 -0500
> From: Derek Atkins <warlord at MIT.EDU>
> Subject: Re: more newbie q's
> To: "Anthony F. Mazza" <anthony at prometheusradio.org>
> Cc: gnucash-user at lists.gnucash.org
> Message-ID: <sjm65e4zc3x.fsf at dogbert.ihtfp.org>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
>
> Hi,
>
> "Anthony F. Mazza" <anthony at prometheusradio.org> writes:
> > i am the bookeeper at a small upstart non-profit.  i have been
> > using gnucash for about six months now.  we are using an accountant

...

>
> > 2)how do you enter fiscal year, so reports will be on a fiscal year
> > basis?
>
> You have to do this on a per-report basis.  Click on the options and
> set the date settings.  MOST reports have a start/end date; some just
> have an end date.  You can set it to a fiscal year.  UNFORTUNATELY
> right now a fiscal year is defined to be July 1 - June 30 and there
> is no way to change that.  (see bug #101519)
>
> Another issue is that once you close a report, all your report option
> settings go away.  There is no way to save the report settings and
> re-use them later once you close the report.  (see bug #104156)
>

...

So, does this mean that a GnuCash file always contains *all* data? Is 
there a way to create a new file at the beginning of each financial 
year such that all assets and liabilities are transferred from the old 
file while the income and expenses are blank in the file for the new 
year?

I am new to GnuCash, having migrated recently from Wings 2000 
(www.wingsinfonet.com). Wings 2000 had a function called 'Year end 
process' which did the job of creating a new file and optionally 
transferring just the assest and liabilities, or all, or no accounts.

I guess it is not very difficult to just make a copy of the existing 
file for the new year and delete transactions for expenses and income, 
but this would also affect the asset accounts? What is the correct way 
with GnuCash to maintain yearly accounts in seperate files so that tax 
calculation etc can be restarted every year?


--Divakar