Talk:Budget History

Question about Adding/Removing Accounts to/from Budgets

I just started playing with budgets in the 2.2.0 release. When I create a new budget, by default it has all my accounts in it. The documentation implies I can select which accounts I want to track and which I don't, but I don't see any way to add or remove accounts from the default budget. Am I missing something, or has this feature not yet been implemented? Thanks! --Scbash 22:35, 1 August 2007 (EDT)

request for clarifications

• Leaf account - I couldn't find any definition of this and am not sure what you mean (not that it matters much)
• QofEntities - no idea what this is (yet...!)

thx, Tim Abell

Throwing down some history

This is just to add some clarification. When I was working on budgeting, I found 2 things that I didn't like. The first was that I really don't like C programming after all. The second was that someone on the list, I forget who (was it Matthew?) said he was going to go draw some UML diagrams of what he had in mind. I had basically said I'd be happy to implement whatever they really wanted as long as it also met my own basic needs. So he goes off to make the drawings, and then seems to have disappeared for awhile. In the meantime, I had gone in up to my neck in reading gnucash code and decided--no offense to any gnucash developers intended--that gnucash development didn't really fit on my plate or in my life. So rather than push it with that guy, I went off on my own again, figuring some day it would hurt enough that I'd write my own (or gnucash would handle it, or something to that effect). --Davefancella 23:48, 14 December 2007 (EST)

I've been doing budgets a little differently than most (I think). What I've done is setup sub accounts off my checking account for each budget category (utilities, groceries, etc). Then every month a series of scheduled transactions moves money from my checking account into these sub accounts. This has made it very easy to track where I'm at in relation to the budget amount (sub account balance tells the story). I can see what money I have in the checking account that is unencumbered, making transfers of excess funds into savings painless rather than thinking I've got the money and then having a bill come due and having to transfer back.

Probably some other good things about it, I've been using this for 3 or 4 years now and have no intention of changing it.

On a slightly different bent, I also have a sub-account for my CC bill and anytime I pay for anything with a CC I immediately move the money from my checking account to the "CC bill" account (as well as from the budget account into expense of course). It makes entry a bit more of a hassle, but generally these are the same (gas, groceries, what have you) so I only have to setup the 4 line split once.