MS-Money user so GNUcash newbie and first post

[Robert Heller]

At Sun, 7 Nov 2010 08:57:52 -0800 (PST) "David T." <sunfish62 at yahoo.com> wrote:

> 
> --- On Sun, 11/7/10, Colin Law <clanlaw at googlemail.com> wrote:
> 
> > From: Colin Law <clanlaw at googlemail.com>
> > Subject: Re: MS-Money user so GNUcash newbie and first post
> > To: "Ian Waddington" <iwaddox at gmail.com>
> > Cc: gnucash-user at gnucash.org
> > Date: Sunday, November 7, 2010, 1:46 AM
> > On 7 November 2010 09:11, Ian
> > Waddington <iwaddox at gmail.com>
> > wrote:
> > > Hi
> > > [...]
> > >
> > > 1, I am used to recording a Payee for each
> > transaction. This helps me find
> > > things at a later date. Is there a way to record this
> > information?
> > 
> > First make sure you are using the registers in double line
> > mode (View
> > > Double Line).  To make this the default go to
> > Edit > Preferences >
> > Register Defaults and select Double Line Mode.
> > Then you can use the description field for Payee.
> 
> Actually, the Description field in each transaction is the Payee, and it is visible at all times in the register. Or perhaps I am misunderstanding you? 

Actually, the destination account is effectivey the 'Payee'.  GnuCash
is a double entry bookkeeping system.  Every transaction goes from one
account to another account.  Money always comes from somewhere and
always goes somepace.  Money never appears out-of-the-blue and never
vanishes in the wild blue yonder.  If you write a check to the power
company to pay for your electric bill money goes from Assets::Checking
to Expenses::Utilities::Power-Company, where 'Power-Company' is the
Payee of the check.  Whether you name the account 'National Grid'
(which is the name of electric company where I live) or 'Electricity'
does not really matter -- it is just a label.  Note that 'searching' by
Payee is somewhat moot -- one can just open up the
Expenses::Utilities::Power-Company account and see all transactions to
the power company, presumably each of your monthly electric bill
payments.  You can, if you prefer, name the account
'Expenses::Utilities::Electricity' and put 'National Grid' as the
description (where 'National Grid' would be the name of the electric
company). OTOH, putting in the power company's invoice number in the
description might be more useful.

> 
> > 
> > > 2, I make extensive use of classifications to give an
> > extra dimension to
> > > reporting and tracking, two examples, to track
> > household decorating project
> > > to track all expenditure against that project
> > irrespective of the account
> > > (or category), or to track the total cost of a
> > holiday, a classification
> > > allows you to report on a quite disparate set of
> > transactions.

Actually, what *I* have done is create an account for the project. And
list what I bought (and possibly where I bought it) for the project in
the description.  In some cases the 'project' is ongoing (I have an
account for my recumbent tadepole trike and record things like buying
tires or replacement parts (eg shift cables or brake pads).


> > 
> > I am not sure how one would do this.
> 
> To be more specific: Gnucash does NOT specifically support classification in this way, although there have been requests for this feature, and such a feature would be greatly welcomed by both the community and the developers, were it submitted for consideration. Perhaps this will happen, but it has not yet occurred. (Maybe you'll be the one who catches the fever and writes the code? It could happen!)
> 
> That said, your original email hinted that you might want to modify the database structure to accommodate this. As Elizabeth noted, Gnucash 2.3 is the development (unstable) version, and while it is very close to being released as Gnucash 2.4, I think you should wait to use it (and its database back end) for your real data. I wouldn't want to go through a 40MB data migration only to find that I had to do it again because of some unnoticed quirk in the unstable software.
> 
> If you DO decide to stay in the database version, it is important for you to realize that if you modify the data structure, it will make future upgrades difficult (to say the least). Now, because this is an Open Source program, you are fully able and encouraged to do this. But perhaps you could then offer your designs back to the community.
> 
> In the meantime, I know that others have made creative use of accounts (and the fact that Gnucash allows you to create an unlimited number of accounts and subaccounts) to "categorize" their transactions. It seems pretty unwieldy to me; I've simply made do with a detailed set of accounts that allow me to track household expenses and tax categories in enough detail to (a) get through tax season and (b) tell whether my family is spending outrageous amounts of money on groceries this month/quarter/year.

-- 
Robert Heller             -- 978-544-6933 / heller at deepsoft.com
Deepwoods Software        -- http://www.deepsoft.com/
()  ascii ribbon campaign -- against html e-mail
/\  www.asciiribbon.org   -- against proprietary attachments