[GNC] Report - Income Statement - Layout problem

Carl-Kensaku HERBORT it at digiene.ch
Wed Mar 23 11:26:23 EDT 2022


Hello,

Yes, I know GnuCash is an open-source volunteer effort, hence all the 
thank you, and answering sometimes to the same questions several times 
from different people. It's normal in a volunteer project.

I am myself a long-time grateful and enthusiastic open-source software 
user and IRL helper (you won't find me in many forums answering 
questions but I am doing it in the physical world).

But, I don't think users should be sorry or ashamed to have some level 
of expectation that a software will work when it comes to a core, basic 
and widely used/needed function (even if it is an open-source volunteer 
project). For most SMEs (at least in my country), the whole point and 
sole purpose of an accounting software is to produce two reports: Income 
Statement and Balance Sheet (non-multicolumn). It is a legal requirement 
for most SMEs for the tax declaration and other formalities.

It didn't work out in GnuCash (so far). No problem, no hard feelings and 
certainly no blame: it is a wonderful piece of software. And I am happy 
if it gets solved sometime in the future by some hard-working generous 
programmers giving their free time.

But I will not feel sorry or ashamed to just have expectations.

On the other hand, I am really sorry if that hurt your feelings, that 
wasn't the intent. My apologies.

Again, thank you all so much for all your help.

Best regards

--
Carl-Kensaku HERBORT
DIGIENE
Case postale
CH-1002 Lausanne
Suisse

+41 (0) 21 320 22 66

Le 23.03.22 à 15:21, Christopher Lam a écrit :
> Please be aware that GnuCash is a volunteer effort. In so many (20+) 
> years of users there have been no complaints about this particular 
> layout issue in the Income Statement. A fresh pair of eyes, however, 
> found this genuine layout issue. The Multicolumn Income Statement report 
> in the Experimental menu may be more suitable; it is much more capable 
> and has a more conventional layout.
> 
> Meanwhile, now that this is now known, and Adrien has kindly found the 
> root cause, it is likely that the developers will be able to fix the 
> Income Statement.
> 
> On Wed, 23 Mar 2022 at 13:49, Carl-Kensaku HERBORT <it at digiene.ch 
> <mailto:it at digiene.ch>> wrote:
> 
>     Hello,
> 
>     Thanks to everyone for your help and time.
> 
>     It is a shame that it is so complicated to make the Income Statement
>     report look normal, like the Balance Sheet report, which also has two
>     sections (Assets and Liabilities) that have no problem at all.
> 
>     I already have to use two separate software: an ERP/CRM for invoicing
>     and daily accounting and GnuCash for heavier monthly/yearly accounting,
>     mainly to produce the Income Statement Report and Balance Sheet report
>     (or so was my plan). I didn't know that GnuCash was not made for that
>     and that a third software (or SCHEME/HTML coding & modifications) was
>     needed just to get even basic reports that all SME business need.
> 
>     I guess there is a first for everything: I am giving up.
> 
>     Again, thanks a lot to everyone who took on their free time to
>     answer my
>     questions.
> 
>     Have a nice day
> 
>     Best regards
> 
>     --
>     Carl-Kensaku HERBORT
>     DIGIENE
>     Case postale
>     CH-1002 Lausanne
>     Suisse
> 
>     +41 (0) 21 320 22 66
> 
>     Le 22.03.22 à 05:24, Adrien Monteleone a écrit :
>      > I stand corrected, this can happen regardless of the depth
>     preference.
>      >
>      > The issue is entirely caused (best I can tell) by using separate
>     tables
>      > for the Income & Expense sections.
>      >
>      > Since the browser will adjust the label column to fit the
>     content, if
>      > those content widths differ, you'll see misalignment.
>      >
>      > In my case, due to some long account names, my Income section was
>      > slightly wider than the Expense section despite being depth
>     limited to
>      > 4. (the reverse of the OP's image and what I found at depth > 4)
>      >
>      > The quickest solution is simply to put the Income & Expense
>     sections in
>      > one HTML table element. This will cause the browser to size all
>     1st <td>
>      > elements on each row to the same maximum to fit the widest content.
>      > (effectively sizing the first column all the same)
>      >
>      > There might be a complication with the ordering since there is a
>     report
>      > option to turn off 'default Income section first' in the report.
>      >
>      > One small additional issue, is that this approach provides no
>     spacing
>      > between sections.
>      >
>      > This can be solved by adding:
>      >
>      > <tr><!--presentation hack to provide spacing between P&L sections-->
>      >      <td>
>      >           
>      >      </td>
>      > </tr>
>      >
>      > after the first section's total row. (this generates a blank
>     table row
>      > with content height as a visual spacer, which can be adjusted with a
>      > font-size declaration if desired.)
>      >
>      > I don't like that approach, but it is quick and easy. (the report
>     HTML
>      > is full of presentation hacks, and one such hack, possibly
>     causing this
>      > problem, is the use of   being inserted as an account label
>      > indention mechanism rather than generating additional columns.)
>      >
>      > I'm not sure of the table semantics with this approach either.
>      >
>      > Technically, the report is a single entity, so perhaps a single
>     table is
>      > better in that regard even though each section has its own subtotal.
>      >
>      > I did play with adding cell padding-right to the first label-cell
>     and it
>      > worked, but that requires some calculation based on which column
>     will
>      > end up wider, and very likely a magic number or two for
>     refinement, so
>      > that's likely out as a solution.
>      >
>      > It might also be possible to calculate and add em-based
>     padding-left to
>      > the account label cells, (rather than multiple   entities)
>     but that
>      > doesn't really solve the variable overall column-width problem.
>     (it just
>      > changes how the indention is accomplished)
>      >
>      > Fixed-width would very likely be a mess too. (and still have to be
>      > calculated, and that might break on a per-browser basis)
>      >
>      > There might still be an out playing with box-sizing and/or display
>      > properties but I don't really see any magic happening since the
>     widths
>      > are calculated independently.
>      >
>      > One final stretch might be to play with the size of the
>     containers of
>      > the two tables, but I seriously doubt it as that affects overflow
>      > usually, not expanding something smaller.
>      >
>      > Regards,
>      > Adrien
>      >
>      > On 3/21/22 9:47 PM, Adrien Monteleone wrote:
>      >> For me, this only happens at depths 5,6, & ALL.
>      >
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