[GNC] Setting start/end dates on "General Journal" and "Balance Sheet (eguile-gnc)

[Michael or Penny Novack]

>
> The "Balance Sheet (eguile-gnc)" report takes an "end date" which we 
> can manually configure, but the start date is not defined in the UI. 
> Presumably the software uses the date the account was first defined in 
> GNUcash — which will get increasingly less useful each month: members 
> would have to dig up *last* months' report and do a subtraction to see 
> month-to-month deltas.  Without setting a start date for the report, 
> eventually we'll have financial tallies that represent years worth of 
> financial records.

THAT isn't really a gnucash matter but an accounting matter, definition 
of the Balance Sheet.

The "Balance Sheet" isn't defined for a date interval but a single date 
(state of the ledger at the end of a single date). And that is what 
gnucash is producing.

I rather suspect what you want/need (and what is usually provided to the 
board, etc.) are TWO balance sheets, one for the start or the interval 
(the end of the previous interval) and one for the end of the interval. 
Usually printed side by side to make comparison easy. I used to do this 
"manually", exporting, and then using a favorite editor. In other words, 
Balance Sheet before, Balance Sheet after, and Statement of Revenues 
(and Expenses) for the interval between (what a non-profit calls the 
Profit and Loss Re[port of a for-profit)

I should explain that as a retired pro, though not really fluent in LISP 
(scheme is a LISP dialect) I proposed coding a custom report Balance 
Sheet report to that (when you are fluent in half a dozen computer 
languages, what's one more). But the BoD member who was an 
accountant/lawyer said, "Mike, don't bother. Export the two and 
combine/edit OUTSIDE gnucash where you have the full power of general 
purpose editor. That's what any of us accountants would do." WHY -- 
because in general you will want to "pretty print", hide unwanted 
detail,  and want to insert annotations to highlight an unusual numbers. 
<< I might add that I was on the BoD and Treasurer for several 
non-profits >>

That was good advice, so I will pass it on.