Report Problem Since Updating Gnucash

[Matthew Lybanon]

Begin forwarded message:

> From: Derek Atkins <warlord at MIT.EDU>
> Subject: Re: Report Problem Since Updating Gnucash
> Date: September 4, 2015 at 8:57:28 AM CDT
> To: Matthew Lybanon <lybanon at earthlink.net>
> Cc: gnucash-user at gnucash.org
> 
> Hi Matthew,
> 
> Matthew Lybanon <lybanon at earthlink.net> writes:
> 
>> I’d appreciating some help in tailoring a Gnucash report—or choosing
>> the correct report.  Sorry about the length of this post.
>> 
>> A club I belong to has an annual show that’s big enough to have its
>> own account, and I’m the “show treasurer.”  All I need to do is
>> balance a checkbook—just income and expenditures, no salaries, taxes,
>> investments, etc.  For years I’ve used Gnucash very happily.  The
>> software is capable of a lot more than I use it for, and it does what
>> I need very well.
>> 
>> For a long time I stuck with an old version (2.4.13) of Gnucash.  I
>> recently upgraded to version 2.6.7, and everything is fine—except for
>> one report.  (I run Gnucash on a Mac under OS X 10.5.5, but I don’t
>> think that has anything to do with the issue.)
>> 
>> The report in question shows all the transactions (+ and -) for a
>> month, in chronological order, with a running balance.  Here is the
>> beginning of a report generated by Gnucash 2.4.13 (I saved the html
>> file on my hard drive), column headings and the first transaction:
>> Date
>> Description
>> Transfer
>> Deposit
>> Withdrawal
>> Balance
>> 07/06/2015
>> Check 1302 (details omitted)
>> Expenses:Check
>> 
>> $118.23 <gnc-register:split-guid=d372c061e18e55b63e9516bdeab75633%23>	
>> $13,536.49 <gnc-register:split-guid=d372c061e18e55b63e9516bdeab75633%23>
>> 
>> (I apologize if the columns don’t line up.)  The amount in the
>> rightmost column is the checkbook balance after the transaction.  And
>> here is the beginning of the same report (for a later month) generated
>> by Gnucash 2.6.7:
>> 
>> Date
>> Description
>> Transfer
>> Deposit
>> Withdrawal
>> Balance
>> 08/06/2015
>> Check 1303 (details omitted)
>> Expenses:Check
>> 
>> $4,036.00 <gnc-register:split-guid=1fcf319a36c92431d5e149e36bd67fbc%23>	
>> -$4,036.00 <gnc-register:split-guid=1fcf319a36c92431d5e149e36bd67fbc%23>
>> While the earlier report shows the checkbook balance after the
>> transaction in the rightmost column, the later report doesn’t.  It
>> shows the result of applying the transaction to a zero initial
>> balance.  (What’s more, I still have the old report in a tab in
>> Gnucash.  Instead of showing the checkbook balance after the
>> transaction, as it did before, now the rightmost column of the old
>> report shows the result of applying the transaction to a zero balance.
>> I understand that Gnucash re-generates reports each time it starts
>> up—which means now old reports have the same problem as new ones.)
>> 
>> I’m obviously not a “power user” of Gnucash, but I’ll describe how I
>> created the report.  In the Gnucash tab that shows, in effect, the
>> checkbook register (Assets:Current Assets:MyAccount), I choose Filter
>> By… in the View menu.  On the Date tab I choose Select Range/Choose
>> Date, and enter the beginning and ending dates for the period I want.
>> Then I choose Account Report from the Reports menu.  I eliminate two
>> columns I’m not interested in (Num and Memo), and there’s the report,
>> showing the transactions for the selected period.
>> 
>> As well as I can remember, that’s how I did it when I was running
>> Gnucash 2.4.13.  Can someone tell me what I need to do to have the
>> “Balance” column show the running balance from the checkbook register,
>> rather than what it shows now?
> 
> Is this ia Custom Report (that you wrote?) or is this one of the GnuCash
> reports?  If the latter, which report?
> 
> Thanks,
> 
>> Please remember to CC this list on all your replies.
>> You can do this by using Reply-To-List or Reply-All.
> 
> -derek
> -- 
>       Derek Atkins, SB '93 MIT EE, SM '95 MIT Media Laboratory
>       Member, MIT Student Information Processing Board  (SIPB)
>       URL: http://web.mit.edu/warlord/    PP-ASEL-IA     N1NWH
>       warlord at MIT.EDU                        PGP key available


Not a custom report.  It’s one of the built-in GnuCash reports.  Reports Menu:  Account Report, after selecting the date range for which I want to see transactions.