[GNC] OFX Home Sunset Announcement

[Jim DeLaHunt]

On 2021-04-25 14:02, Derek Atkins wrote:

> Is this something we should take over?
>
> -derek
>
> On Sun, April 25, 2021 3:34 pm, John Ralls wrote:
>> I happened to be on https://ofxhome.com today and noticed that the owner
>> had posted this on 28 February:
>>
>>> Beginning in August of 2021 (6 months from now) OFX Home will go read
>>> only. In February of 2022 (one year from now) I will shut down OFX Home
>>> completely.
>>> I have kept the site limping along but I haven't done any work on it in
>>> years. I think there are a lot of really cool things that could be done
>>> with it. But sadly I am not the person to do it.
>>> If you are interested in taking over the site, please read me post here:
>>> http://www.ofxhome.com/ofxforum/viewtopic.php?id=49812
>>> Thanks for reading.
>> Another nail...


I hate to see accumulations of knowledge like this taken down entirely. 
That apparently is the current admin's intention for Feb 2022.

It looks like the current admin has been looking for a successor since 
2019, and no volunteer has worked out. Part of me agrees with Derek 
Atkins. I think that this is a great opportunity for someone from this 
community, or from AqBanking, to step forward, become the successor, 
preserve the knowledge, and even move it forward. Ideally, that is 
someone who isn't already giving their full capacity to Gnucash proper. 
That way it becomes a stimulus to grow capacity.

On the other hand, part of me thinks David Carlson has a great point. 
How valuable is the knowledge in OFX Home now, and will that value 
likely decay regardless? The system-to-system connection protocol (OFX 
DirectConnect is the name for this?) relies on banks supporting it, and 
on client software using it, and the banks valuing the clients which use 
it. It looks like Intuit is moving Quicken to its own proprietary 
protocol, Microsoft Money has been abandoned for over 10 years, and we 
other client software are not valued by the banks. Thus, I have to 
imagine that bank support for OFX DirectConnect may well dry up. So why 
bother?

It would help to know how many GnuCash and other users get value from 
using OFX DirectConnect now, and whether that number is growing or 
shrinking. (I used to use it, for one of maybe 20 financial 
institutions, but I no longer do.)

It would help to know many institutions support OFX DirectConnect, and 
how fast that number is declining.

It would help to have ideas on how continuing OFXHome, or doing new 
things, would create value for our community.

I don't have good ideas for that.  What do you all think?

       —Jim DeLaHunt, Vancouver, Canada