Invoice Importer

[Phil Longstaff]

I've had thoughts of a generic importer, so I'll lay them out here and you can use some or all or none of them.

I have used an accounting system in the past which allows CVS files to be imported.  You specify the CVS file and which CVS column contains which internal data field and then let it run.

Each data object in gnucash is a GObject (see http://library.gnome.org/devel/gobject/unstable/) and most (maybe all, but don't quote me) of the internal fields are available as gobject properties.  A generic CVS importer engine would just match column with property (property type can be determined to specify what column interpretation is needed).  Then, this engine could be used by the invoice importer, the job importer, the customer importer, ...  I think a transaction importer would be a special case because the CVS lines really provide data for both transactions and splits which are different (though related).

 Phil
---------
I used to be a hypochondriac AND a kleptomaniac. So I took something for it.




________________________________
From: Mike Evans <mikee at saxicola.idps.co.uk>
To: gnucash-user at gnucash.org
Sent: Wed, June 9, 2010 9:00:28 AM
Subject: Re: Invoice Importer

On Monday June 7 2010 17:17:10 Mike Evans wrote:
> On Sunday June 6 2010 22:40:17 Sebastian Held wrote:
> > Am Sonntag, 6. Juni 2010, 10:26:38 schrieb Mike Evans:
> > > On Saturday June 5 2010 22:29:19 Derek Atkins wrote:
> > > > Munroe Sollog <sollog at digiraticonsulting.com> writes:
> > > > > I would like to see what kind of interest there is for an invoice
> > > > > importer.  I see it on the Wish List page, but I don't see any
> > > > > discussion about it.  We use a web based invoicing system and would
> > > > > love to be able to import/dump invoices into GnuCash.  This would
> > > > > save a lot of time for the bookkeeper.  If our situation is
> > > > > uncommon then I fully understand this feature being
> > > > > ignored/postponed/niced. If we are not alone, what have other
> > > > > people done to solve this inconvenience?  We are currently
> > > > > entering the invoices in twice (once to GnuCash and once to our
> > > > > invoicing system).
> > > > 
> > > > I'd certainly be interested in seeing something that would pull in
> > > > items out of gnotime (Gnome Time Tracker) and build an invoice out of
> > > > it.  So yes, something to import invoices would be nice.
> > > > 
> > > > -derek
> > > 
> > > I track my clients billable time using a mysql based application and
> > > was hoping do this using the Python interface, so far though I've been
> > > unable to figure out how to get the python gnucash_business functions
> > > working.
> > 
> > I did some work on this topic already:
> > http://tellico.dyndns.org/drupal/node/1
> > 
> > I'm not sure, if the patch applies to the current development version.
> > But it may serve as a start point... I've no time to finish the patch.
> > 
> > best regards,
> > Sebastian
> > _______________________________________________
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> 
> Sebastian
> 
> I have your patch compiling and running but I need to test the import, do
> have a test.csv for invoices, or an example of the format it expects?
> 
I now have it creating invoices and importing a limited number of columns but 
I have two queries.  What would be a suggested csv format that's likely to be 
compatible with sales software.  From a coding aspect I need to attach a new  
invoice to customer and I'm not sure how to do this yet, It's probably obvious 
but any clues are welcome.

Mike E


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