Account Hierarchy Template

Creating localized Account Hierarchy Templates

Motivation

Sometimes the standard GnuCash account hierarchy template needs a bigger rework before it fits the requirements of your government - especially for business purposes. In this case it might be better to start creating a new hierarchy template from scratch.

An almost normal Start

Start with an new empty gnucash file. Create the account hierarchy, which is according your needs.

Before you save to file, uncheck "Edit->Preferences->General->Files:Compress Files" to get an uncompressed xml file.

FIXME: I am not quite sure whether "Save file" or "Export hierarchy" is the better choice currently. One obvious difference: export saves no transactions, but also other parts will be ignored. (E.g. what will happen with taxtables, but it seems only accounts can be created.)

Changing the Header

After you saved your template, you must manually adjust the first lines (the "header") of your new created file as follows. Otherwise the "New File Wizard" would not know how to handle your template. The file name itself does not matter (it will not be shown anywhere), but the first lines of the file must contain the following information:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>
<gnc-account-example 
  xmlns="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/"
  xmlns:act="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/act"
  xmlns:addr="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/addr"
  xmlns:bgt="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/bgt"
  xmlns:billterm="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/billterm"
  xmlns:book="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/book"
  xmlns:bt-days="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/bt-days"
  xmlns:bt-prox="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/bt-prox"
  xmlns:cd="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/cd"
  xmlns:cmdty="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/cmdty"
  xmlns:cust="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/cust"
  xmlns:employee="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/employee"
  xmlns:entry="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/entry"
  xmlns:fs="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/fs"
  xmlns:gnc="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/gnc"
  xmlns:gnc-act="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/gnc-act"
  xmlns:invoice="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/invoice"
  xmlns:job="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/job"
  xmlns:lot="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/lot"
  xmlns:order="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/order"
  xmlns:owner="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/owner"
  xmlns:price="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/price"
  xmlns:recurrence="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/recurrence"
  xmlns:slot="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/slot"
  xmlns:split="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/split"
  xmlns:sx="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/sx"
  xmlns:taxtable="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/taxtable"
  xmlns:trn="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/trn"
  xmlns:ts="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/ts"
  xmlns:tte="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/tte"
  xmlns:vendor="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/vendor">
<gnc-act:title>
  IGAS-2099
</gnc-act:title>
<gnc-act:short-description>
  Inter Galactical Accounting Standard, Stardate 2099
</gnc-act:short-description>
<gnc-act:long-description>
  This is the Base Module of the Inter Galactical Accounting Standard as transmitted on stardate 2099-01-01. You might also need the module "starfleet" or "klingon". ~Cpt. Picard
</gnc-act:long-description>
<gnc-act:exclude-from-select-all>1</gnc-act:exclude-from-select-all>
<gnc:account version="2.0.0">
  <act:name>Root Account</act:name>
  <act:id type="new">e24772da4864456b196be5a6301c6756</act:id>
  <act:type>ROOT</act:type>
  <act:commodity-scu>0</act:commodity-scu>
</gnc:account>

Annotations:

• Line 1: encoding

You must save your file in the appropriate character encoding and note the used character encoding here! For possible values refer Locale Settings.

• Line 2ff: Namespace

The parser in GC 2.2.x makes no use of it, but future versions might change.

Some details can be found in [1] or in the source docs. Defining the namespace has the benefit, you can check the syntax of your file later with xmllint.

• gnc-act:title

Enter a short, unique Name, which is shown in the table in the "New File Wizard" so that the user can choose this template. This name is usually also part of the filename, but the file name itself does not matter and is never shown to the user. This name is restricted to ONE line.

• gnc-act:short-description

A one-line description shown in the table in the "New File Wizard"

• gnc-act:long-description

A somewhat longer description which is shown in a text box in the "New File Wizard" if the user chooses this template. This should explain the content of the template to the user.

• gnc-act:exclude-from-select-all

Whether this template should be selected if the user clicks the button "Select All". The business-related templates are probably rather special and should not be mixed with a general home-user account structure, so you should probably enable this flag by writing a "1" in here.

• Root Account

Only the base module should have exactly one.

The accounts in the optional modules linked over <act:parent type="new">...</act:parent>

If you decide to copy&paste this template, please replace the root guid by a self generated by

gnucash-make-guids

.

... and the Footer

Close to the end of the file, you should replace

</gnc-v2>

by

</gnc-account-example>

.

Syntax Check

Finally you should run

xmllint --noout <mytemplate>

to verify the syntactical correctnes of your file.

A sample script for big templates

If the template is really big - as the german - and you have it as text file, it might be less work to adjust the following script from [2] to create the gnucash template.

#! /bin/bash

# This applications takes an text input file $FILE
# and converts it into a gnucash account scheme with a random name.
# The input file is read line by line where each line
# should be formatted as
#  number name (no leading spaces)
# or
#  category name (one leading space)
# .
# Empty lines are not allowed, number is expected to have 4 digits.
# The output is a two layer structure
# of all accounts. Whenever the first
# digit of number changes, a new source group is created.
# Whenever a new category line is passed, all following
# accounts are put below.
#
# Example:
# input:
#   1234 A
#   2000 B
#    Type B1
#   2001 B1a
#   2002 B1b
#    Type B2
#   2010 B2a
#   2011 B2b
# output:
#   Class 0
#   Class 1
#    \- 1234 A
#   Class 2
#    \- 2000 B
#    \- Type B1
#       \- 2001 B1a
#       \- 2002 B1b
#    \- Type B2
#       \- 2010 B2a
#       \- 2011 B2b
#
# (C) 2009, Michael Braun, michael-developer@fami-braun.de
# Distributed under GPL v3.0 or newer.
# see http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html for details

echo "start"

FILE="<source>.txt"

if [ ! -f "$FILE" ]; then 
 echo "no such file $FILE"
 exit 1;
fi

getuid()
{
 dd if=/dev/urandom bs=1 count=32  2>/dev/null | md5sum | awk -F' ' '{print $1}';
}

OUT="$(getuid).gnucash"

ROOT=$(getuid);
NUM=$(cat $FILE | wc -l)
NUM=$(expr $NUM + 1);
ID=0

echo -n > $OUT;

cat >> "$OUT" <<EOF
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>
<gnc-v2
     xmlns:gnc="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/gnc"
     xmlns:gnc-act="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/gnc-act"
     xmlns:act="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/act"
     xmlns:book="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/book"
     xmlns:cd="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/cd"
     xmlns:cmdty="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/cmdty"
     xmlns:price="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/price"
     xmlns:slot="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/slot"
     xmlns:split="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/split"
     xmlns:sx="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/sx"
     xmlns:trn="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/trn"
     xmlns:ts="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/ts"
     xmlns:fs="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/fs"
     xmlns:bgt="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/bgt"
     xmlns:recurrence="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/recurrence"
     xmlns:lot="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/lot"
     xmlns:cust="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/cust"
     xmlns:job="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/job"
     xmlns:addr="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/addr"
     xmlns:owner="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/owner"
     xmlns:taxtable="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/taxtable"
     xmlns:tte="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/tte"
     xmlns:employee="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/employee"
     xmlns:order="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/order"
     xmlns:billterm="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/billterm"
     xmlns:bt-days="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/bt-days"
     xmlns:bt-prox="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/bt-prox"
     xmlns:invoice="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/invoice"
     xmlns:entry="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/entry"
     xmlns:vendor="http://www.gnucash.org/XML/vendor">
<gnc:count-data cd:type="account">$NUM</gnc:count-data>
<gnc:account version="2.0.0">
  <act:name>Root Account</act:name>
  <act:id type="new">$ROOT</act:id>
  <act:type>ROOT</act:type>
  <act:commodity-scu>0</act:commodity-scu>
</gnc:account>
EOF
LAST=0
CURR=$(getuid);
CURRSUB=$CURR;

addkontenklasse() {
echo
echo -n "add kontenklasse $LAST";
cat >>"$OUT" <<EOF
<gnc:account version="2.0.0">
  <act:name>Kontenklasse $LAST</act:name>
  <act:id type="new">$CURR</act:id>
  <act:type>ASSET</act:type>
  <act:commodity>
    <cmdty:space>ISO4217</cmdty:space>
    <cmdty:id>EUR</cmdty:id>
  </act:commodity>
  <act:commodity-scu>100</act:commodity-scu>
  <act:description>Erträge</act:description>
  <act:slots>
    <slot>
      <slot:key>placeholder</slot:key>
      <slot:value type="string">true</slot:value>
    </slot>
  </act:slots>
  <act:parent type="new">$ROOT</act:parent>
</gnc:account>
EOF
echo " done";
}

addkontenklasse;

addkontengruppe() {
echo
echo -n "add kontengruppe $1";
cat >>"$OUT" <<EOF
<gnc:account version="2.0.0">
  <act:name>$ID $1</act:name>
  <act:id type="new">$CURRSUB</act:id>
  <act:type>ASSET</act:type>
  <act:commodity>
    <cmdty:space>ISO4217</cmdty:space>
    <cmdty:id>EUR</cmdty:id>
  </act:commodity>
  <act:commodity-scu>100</act:commodity-scu>
  <act:description>$1</act:description>
  <act:slots>
    <slot>
      <slot:key>placeholder</slot:key>
      <slot:value type="string">true</slot:value>
    </slot>
  </act:slots>
  <act:parent type="new">$CURR</act:parent>
</gnc:account>
EOF
echo " done";
}

addkonto() {
cat >>"$OUT" <<EOF
<gnc:account version="2.0.0">
  <act:name>$1 $2</act:name>
  <act:id type="new">$(getuid)</act:id>
  <act:type>ASSET</act:type>
  <act:commodity>
    <cmdty:space>ISO4217</cmdty:space>
    <cmdty:id>EUR</cmdty:id>
  </act:commodity>
  <act:commodity-scu>100</act:commodity-scu>
  <act:description>$2</act:description>
  <act:code>$1</act:code>
  <act:parent type="new">$CURRSUB</act:parent>
</gnc:account>
EOF
}

while (true); do
 LL=$REPLY
 read
 if [ "x$REPLY" = "x" ]; then
   echo
   echo "end of file after $LL";
   break;
 fi
 REPLY=$(echo "$REPLY" | sed 's/\s\+/ /g');
 KTOID=$(echo "$REPLY" | sed 's/ .*//');
 NAME=$(echo "$REPLY" | sed 's/^[0-9]\+ \+//');
 if [ -z "$NAME" ]; then
   NAME="dummy";
 fi
 #echo "$REPLY => $KTOID | $NAME";
 echo -n "$KTOID "
 if [ -z "$KTOID" ]; then
   CURRSUB=$(getuid);
   ID=$(expr $ID + 1);
   addkontengruppe "$NAME";
 else 
  if [ $KTOID -gt "$LAST"999 ]; then
   # new cat
   LAST=$(echo $KTOID | sed 's/\(.\).*/\1/');
   CURR=$(getuid);
   CURRSUB=$CURR;
   ID=0
   addkontenklasse;
  fi
  addkonto "$KTOID" "$NAME"; 
 fi
done < "$FILE"

echo "</gnc-account-example>" >> "$OUT";
echo "done: written to $OUT"

Annotations

There are a few terms in the script, you might wish to adjust or at least understand:

• Kontenklasse: account class, first level in the account hierarchy.
• kontengruppe: account group, lower node in the tree, but no leave.

Both above are placeholders.

• Konto: account.
• Erträge: earnings.
• <cmdty:id>: 3-letter ISO-currency symbol.
• <act:commodity-scu>: smallest currency unit, in most cases 100 {C/S}en[t]*|P[f]en* or whatever.

Eventually you wish the account code $1 only in <act:code> and not in <act:name>.

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