How to setup Gnucash as a business software?

[Mike or Penny Novack]

Allan Mwenda wrote:

> Thanks for the reply. I don't mind doing some stuff manually but i 
> would like to do the majority of the bookkeeping on the software,and 
> maybe just do printouts for filing and backup perhaps on the cloud or 
> on an external drive or something.
> So,you say I can automate SOME of what I want to do,and using business 
> features i'll be able to automate SOME of the rest. I am still going 
> through the manual but if you could tell me what definitely is not 
> possible that would be great. I also noticed gnucash can print 
> cheques,what type of printer do i need for that feature?  

Sorry if I am being unclear.

By "manually" I do not mean using something other than computer 
software. Maybe it would be clearer if I took one of the things you 
talked about. Not necessarily printouts on paper. Those could be files 
you kept in a "reports" directory (maybe subdirectories for each year) 
and also backed up. BTW, I would suggest definitely doing your own 
backups (external drives, on copy perhaps kept in a different building) 
rather than trust the "cloud". I am willing to bet that the "fine print" 
in terms of use  includes no recourse if tomorrow they simply went out 
of business.

In other words, by "manually" I meant perhaps having to type in the 
transaction rather than being automatically generated. For example, 
gnucash business features currently support some automation of 
invoices/receivables but as far as I know, not payroll. Nor does it do 
"inventory" much less "point of sales". Again, by "not do" I mean no 
AUTOMATED connection.

Gnucash is NOT an incomplete bookkeeping system as long as you don't 
expect everything to have an automated shortcut. And you might likely 
find it faster/easier to export a generalized reports and then edit 
those outside of gnucash rather than to construct custom reports.

Michael