[GNC] Budget Issue

David T. sunfish62 at yahoo.com
Wed Dec 19 08:06:24 EST 2018 

Peter, Adrien,

I will start by saying that I am not a programmer, and am not the person to whom you should go to request software updates to GnuCash. 

Having said that, I am going to rain on the parade. In my 13 years using Gnucash, I've seen very little developer time or interest in the budget module. 

Here is a summary of the status of budget bugs currently in Bugzilla:

Resolution	Count	Average of Changed
---	33	6/2/16
DUPL	15	5/24/14
FIXE	36	7/18/14
INCO	4	12/18/13
INVA	3	7/14/14
NOTA	6	5/13/15
OBSO	3	4/23/13
WONT	4	5/18/13

Note that there are nearly as many open bugs as resolved ones. The “Average of Changed” figure is a quick and dirty evaluation of the last action taken on a given bug by category. It is based solely on the last date of action on a given bug, which says nothing about the overall age of a given bug. The table shows that the *average* date of resolution of FIXED bugs is in 2014, while the average date of new bugs is two years newer, suggesting that bugs continue to be filed, whereas resolutions are further in the past. Again, this is based on the last date any action was taken on a given bug; the oldest open bug in the data set (Bug 327636) for example, has a Changed date of 12/25/2015, whereas it was added on 1/18/2006; clearly, the age of open bugs is much greater than my quick measure, only amplifying my point.

Next, an examination of the github repository shows only a couple of technical changes to the main budget file (gnc-budget.c) over the last two years, while the last copyright date is 2006. I will note that I am not a programmer, and am certainly not skilled enough to determine the complete change history of this or other files in the GnuCash repository. There may have been changes to these files when the version control system was svn, rather than git.

There was some work by Phil Longstaff on gnc-budget-view.c in 2013 (based on the copyright statement), and some adjustments to what appear to me to be cosmetic aspects (based on github) in the last couple of years.

If you turn to the documentation, you will see practically nothing available in either the Tutorial or the Help. I have worked on the documentation for a number of years; when I attempted to solicit information on the lists about the budgets and the budget reports, I received very little assistance, and was unable to improve the docs in these areas.

All of this reinforces my belief that the budget system is for the most part a “what you see is what you’re going to get” piece of code. The significant issues that have been raised over the years have largely remained in place, and no one has embraced the challenge of rebuilding it (let alone documenting it). By all means, you can file bugs, but I wouldn’t expect to see any changes until and unless you’re willing to take them on yourself.

David


On Wed, Dec 19, 2018 at 7:42, Adrien Monteleone
<adrien.monteleone at lusfiber.net> wrote:
Peter,

I don’t generally maintain a working Windows system for testing and I probably can’t acquire a Win10 system easily though I have access to Win7. I can play around a bit, but otherwise, can’t help more—very sorry, maybe there is another Win10 user out there using the budget module on a regular basis who can chime in.

As for bugs/RFEs, your best bet is to simply file them, the sooner the better. It is possible one of the current developers is familiar with that particular part of the code and can jump right in. There’s also the possibility this is a section of code that doesn’t have an active maintainer and the solution might take more time. But at least a bug report will document and time-stamp the issue.

The budget module has seen very little ‘development’ as far as I can tell from its original implementation. I think it has only seen minor bug fixes. If you have some improvement RFEs, please submit them to scope the use case(s) that the developers can use if they tackle the project.

As for timeline, I think the developers have mentioned a few times here and on the gnucash-dev list that their current focus is cleaning up transition bugs from the migration away from 2.6.x and gtk2. When that is done, they intend to get back on track with the general development course outlined on the wiki. RFEs will follow after that unless they are really simple to implement on a quicker time frame. Of course, if any of the developers chime in with other info, their word holds, I’m just a daily user who helps out a bit in the community on the mailing list.

Regards,
Adrien

> On Dec 18, 2018, at 6:06 PM, Peter088 <Peter088 at PeterMacDonough.Com <mailto:Peter088 at PeterMacDonough.Com>> wrote:
> 
> Hi Adrien,
> 
> I'm running Windows 10.  Everything is up to date.
> 
> Thanks for your help.  I was able to find the scroll bar.  It acts the same over here.
> 
> Unfortunately, the left and right arrows do not seem to work in Windows to move the screen.  I also tried all combinations with Shift, Control, Alt and the Page Up and Page Down keys, but nothing worked.  Also, the headings (Accounts) don't freeze when you scroll, so I'm spending and enormous amount of time trying to hit the scroll bar in exactly the right spot.
> 
> There seem to be quite a number of obvious features missing/not working in the budgeting area.  What are the chances of any changes in this area being implemented in a reasonable period of time, assuming I file all the requests?  I'm a bit surprised given that GNUCash has been around for 20 years that these things haven't been addressed.
> 
> Thanks again,
> 
> Peter
> 
> 
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: gnucash-user [mailto:gnucash-user-bounces+peter088=petermacdonough.com at gnucash.org <mailto:petermacdonough.com at gnucash.org>] On Behalf Of Adrien Monteleone
> Sent: Friday, 14 December 2018 6:02 AM
> To: Gnucash Users
> Subject: Re: [GNC] Budget Issue
> 
> It might not matter, but what OS are you using?
> 
> I’m on a Mac, the scrollbar is not visible at first. If I move my mouse down to the bottom of the screen, a very slim scroll bar appears over the bottom of the summary section. As I get closer to the scroll bar, it gets thicker so it is an easier target for my mouse.
> 
> Tabbing from a cell, say in September’s column, does not move the display to show where the focused cell is. (likely a bug)
> 
> But using the arrow keys does shift the other columns into view for me. (this is once I’m already in a cell in the far right visible column)
> 
> You can drag and re-size the Accounts column right-hand border to the left, which depending on your tree depth and account name length, might get you all or most of the year (and total column) visible. The individual month columns are not resizable. Again, another ‘bug’ but likely a ‘feature enhancement’. (unless older versions allowed re-sizing, then it is a bug)
> 
> Also, the column names are not editable. You could file that in Bugzilla as a RFE (Request for Enhancement).
> 
> The issue with the disappearing Expenses is fixable with the filter.
> 
> The filter is on the ‘view’ of the particular budget you are viewing. (notice it is in the ‘View’ menu) It is not a preference of the budget. (thus not in ‘Options’)
> 
> You have to reset the filter each time you open the budget. It would be nice to specify custom default filters for the budget so you don’t have to keep resetting them. (you could file another RFE on that, but I recall it might be filed already, you’ll need to check first.) As an alternative, just keep that tab open until your work is done. (I leave GnuCash open 24/7 as I use it daily)
> 
> The reason your expenses ‘disappeared’ is because you *also* need to reset the filter to ’Show unused accounts’.
> 
> I just tested filtering only Expenses with an unused account and its parent (also unused) and the budget did not contain them (and would have been empty if I had an empty book) until I set that option in the filter. So you need to set both options in both tabs of the filter. You’re telling the view to show you only expense accounts *and* you want to see unused accounts. (which are all of your accounts at this time)
> 
> No worries on the questions, I’m happy to help. The Budget Module is not documented well (contributions welcome) and it has some quirks that aren’t intuitive. One of those is that it does not honor the ‘reverse balance accounts’ setting properly. You may notice that credit accounts are the reverse of what you expect when dealing with the budget. I think it may even treat them differently in the budget screen than it does in the budget report. Be sure to visit Bugzilla and read over any bugs assigned to the Budget Module to get an overview of possible issues you may encounter.
> 
> You may also want to take a look at this thread about navigating the Budget using the keyboard: https://lists.gnucash.org/pipermail/gnucash-user/2018-August/079065.html <https://lists.gnucash.org/pipermail/gnucash-user/2018-August/079065.html>
> 
> Regards,
> Adrien
> 
> 
> 
>> On Dec 13, 2018, at 12:32 AM, Peter088 <Peter088 at PeterMacDonough.Com <mailto:Peter088 at PeterMacDonough.Com>> wrote:
>> 
>> Thanks Adrien.  Much appreciated.  You've solved that issue and I have more
>> I'm afraid.
>> 
>> I'm defining a budget to be 12 1-month periods.  The screen is only wide
>> enough to display 9.  I don't see a scroll bar and tabbing doesn't seem to
>> move the display, nor do the arrows.  I also don't seem to be able to adjust
>> the column widths, as I really don't need as much space as they've
>> allocated.  Can you tell me how to modify the display please?  For example,
>> is there a way to edit the labels on the budget periods?  Can I shrink the
>> column widths.  Is there a way to scroll left and right through the budget?
>> 
>> 
>> Also, I'm unclear how the filter works.  The default filter selected all
>> account types.  I'm only interested in Expenses, but when I cleared them all
>> and selected only Expenses, all my accounts disappeared from view including
>> the Expense accounts.  
>> 
>> I'm sorry to ask so many questions, but I can't find this stuff in the
>> documentation.  It doesn't seem to go to this level of detail.  Perhaps
>> there is another place to look?
>> 
>> Thanks,
>> 
>> Peter
>> 
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: gnucash-user
>> [mailto:gnucash-user-bounces+peter088=petermacdonough.com at gnucash.org <mailto:petermacdonough.com at gnucash.org>] On
>> Behalf Of Adrien Monteleone
>> Sent: Thursday, 13 December 2018 12:27 PM
>> To: Gnucash Users
>> Subject: Re: [GNC] Budget Issue
>> 
>> Peter,
>> 
>> Did you not see my last reply to this issue concerning grid lines and blank
>> child cells vs. parent cell totals?
>> 
>> Also, no need to start a new thread on the same question. It will be hard
>> for others to follow along and see what resolved it for you in the future.
>> 
>> Regards,
>> Adrien
>> 
>>> On Dec 12, 2018, at 6:05 PM, Peter088 <Peter088 at PeterMacDonough.Com <mailto:Peter088 at PeterMacDonough.Com>>
>> wrote:
>>> 
>>> Hello,
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> I'm a new user coming from Quicken.  I'm trying to create a budget and
>> have
>>> the filters set to Show Unused and Show Zero Total accounts, but I cannot
>>> see a lot of the expense accounts.  I am still not seeing any cells/values
>>> for the lowest nested level of each account.  For example,
>>> Expenses:Auto:Licensing shows an editable cell in the budget at the Auto
>>> level even though there are no transactions in that account, but not at
>> the
>>> Licensing level.  This is consistent across all the Expense accounts.  
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> Is there a way around this?
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> Thanks,
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> Peter
>>> 
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