[GNC] GNUcash 5 - Trial Balance

[Michael or Penny Novack]

On 4/27/2023 12:54 PM, smith54 at smith54.karoo.co.uk wrote:
> I would recommend going to tools and using Close Book to remove the previous years TB P&L figures. Then re-run the TB.
>
> Regards,
>
> David

I think this might be the place for a bit of double entry bookkeeping 
theory/terminology and how the two reports "Trail Balance" and "Balance 
Sheet" differ (as well as how they are the same).

Same:

     Both are run for a "point in time" (they have a date, not a date range)

     Both are checking that the sum of all the credits equals the sum of 
all the debits << in other words, that the ledger is in balance >>

Different:

     The "Trail Balance" is for ALL ledger accounts, both "standing" and 
"temporary". There are no virtual accounts involved.

     The "Balance Sheet" is for all the "standing accounts" PLUS a 
virtual account named something like "retained gains or losses" which 
will appear under equity and the value of which will  be the net of all 
the "temporary accounts" (accounts of type ":income" or "expense" --- 
these are actually of fundamental type equity)

Those differences and similarities for books that are "open". If the 
books have been closed by a "close the books"operation the differences 
between them goes away, especially if the display option is to leave out 
accounts with zero balance (( all the income and expense accounts will 
be zero and the "retained" amount will be zero << if virtual -- some 
entities like corporations might have an explicit "retained" account if 
allowed to pay dividends only out of retained earnings >>

Michael D Novack