closing entries throw off estimated budget values

[W Geoffrey O Black]

Forgot to say that I am running GnuCash 2.6.5 on a MacBook Air with OS 10.9.5. I doubt the issue I posted about is version-specific or OS-specific, but I try to provide all potentially relevant information.

W Geoffrey O Black

On Feb 4, 2015, at 12:43 AM, W Geoffrey O Black <wgoblack at gmail.com> wrote:

> 
> Hello,
> 
> I’ve been trying to create a budget and use the “Estimate” feature to automatically fill in values for each account, and I’ve run into a big problem. (Big for me, anyway.)
> 
> I am trying to generate a revenue and expense budget for calendar year 2015, with twelve monthly periods. If I select 01/01/2014 as the start date in the “Estimate Budget Values” dialog, I get accurate values (meaning consistent with my 2014 spending) for January-November, but in December I get a big negative number, and the total for the year is 0.00.
> 
> You can probably guess from the above that I close my books at the end of each year using the "Tools:Close Book” menu item. Obviously the Estimate feature is reading those closing entries just like any other entry—making the whole feature essentially useless for me.
> 
> I know that GnuCash can “learn” to ignore those closing entries, because it can generate accurate Income and Expense reports for any period so long as the “Closing Entries Pattern” is filled in in the Options dialogue. How complicated would it be to implement something similar for estimating budget values? I.E., add a “Closing Entries pattern” field to the Estimate Budget Values dialog? That would greatly enhance functionality of the budgeting feature for users like me who do close the books at the end of each year.
> 
> I guess for now I’ll probably stick to doing my budgeting in NeoOffice Calc, but I’d love to see useable budgeting tools in a future version of GnuCash.
> 
> Thanks,
> W Geoffrey O Black
> 
> wgoblack at gmail dot com
> 
> 
> 
>