151–160 of 169 posts
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90% of the features overlap. Depending on your particular needs, one or the other may be preferred, e.g. multiple currencies. I use hledger for the Haskell street cred. ;) edit: http://hledger.org/faq.html
Thanks. Looks like ledger does multiple currencies but hledger did not mention that in its features list. Will probably start with ledger then.
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None of Lynx, vim, or emacs are "command-line tools."
Indeed. They are more like GUI faked by the command line.
"The command line" isn't really involved here - they're arguably GUIs rendered in the terminal. Another term is "Captive User Interface", although a text editor is one of the few places I don't mind it.
I've been using Ledger for almost nine years, both for my personal accounts and now my business accounts. I wrote some introductory articles about it, and further articles about how I use it day-to-day: https://www.petekeen.net/finance
Have you ever thought about using a natural language interface with ledger? For example, the Mac/iOS calendar app Fantastical lets you create an event by typing or dictating a sentence like "lunch with mike at 2 on Tuesday at Wendy's", and the app will parse the input to create an event with the right parameters. I ask after reading your vacation write-up. Seems like the input side could have been a lot easier if you…
$ ledger xact 11/5 mcd dinner 10.55
2015/11/05 McDonald's
Expenses:Food:Dinner $10.55
Liabilities:Credit Card
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Comparing ledger to cleaning the parade ground with a toothbrush is misunderstanding the feature set. Similar to comparing it to Excel custom rolled solutions. This is a true double-entry accounting system that happens to have a CLI. It definitely does not have the feature set of a proper ERP, but it can effectively be used in place of an SME accounting package. Out of curiosity, what makes an accounting package "leg…
>not intended as an attack Don't worry. I knew I'd catch grief. I know HN is strong on CLI love and thin on actual accounting experience. ;) >This is a true double-entry accounting system that happens to have a CLI. Double entry has existed in paper format since before the dawn of time. Its not particularly revolutionary (CLI or not) in fact its bare minimum for sanity. Hence my comment that this is barely a step abo…
I know that Accountants are conservative, but there will never be any new accounting software if all accounting software used needs to meet these requirements.
Lastly, I think a lot of people thought "one man show" meant a business with only one employee, while it is clear after your response that you meant one book-keeper. Ledger will not be used at any company with "Accounting staff" (plural). The largest organization I'm aware of that uses it is a free software non-profit that has moral reasons for avoiding proprietary software.
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Have you ever thought about using a natural language interface with ledger? For example, the Mac/iOS calendar app Fantastical lets you create an event by typing or dictating a sentence like "lunch with mike at 2 on Tuesday at Wendy's", and the app will parse the input to create an event with the right parameters. I ask after reading your vacation write-up. Seems like the input side could have been a lot easier if you…
Ledger sort of has that built in, actually, but it only works if you have a similar transaction in the past. For example, I can say this on the command line: $ ledger xact 11/5 mcd dinner 10.55 and ledger spits out 2015/11/05 McDonald's Expenses:Food:Dinner $10.55 Liabilities:Credit Card This falls down when you're traveling to new places, because in the command `mcd` is just a regex that matches on the payee.
Separately, I saw you have also worked on a similar system for food logging. That got me thinking...what else could you track with a plain text file in this format? Fitness/workout info came to mind, as well as rewards points, sleep tracking, any others? Would be cool to have a single system to track all these things, which could be linked up to APIs like Fitbit, myfitnesspal, etc.
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Ledger sort of has that built in, actually, but it only works if you have a similar transaction in the past. For example, I can say this on the command line: $ ledger xact 11/5 mcd dinner 10.55 and ledger spits out 2015/11/05 McDonald's Expenses:Food:Dinner $10.55 Liabilities:Credit Card This falls down when you're traveling to new places, because in the command `mcd` is just a regex that matches on the payee.
Interesting, thanks. I had in mind a system that would basically regex match a string and add an entry to the ledger (similar, but it would probably be a bit more flexible than the built in system). Separately, I saw you have also worked on a similar system for food logging. That got me thinking...what else could you track with a plain text file in this format? Fitness/workout info came to mind, as well as rewards po…
Convenience trumps plain text in this case because, unlike with finance, there's no bank statement to refer back to if you fall off the data entry wagon for a day or two. That data is instead just completely gone.
Been using ledger for 9 years as well (hledger lately.) Never have a hitch. The only complaint I have is that I can't (easily) keep AR in sync with online invoicing software. minor though. Would love to have some git-style integration with my bank and other accounts. `ledger pull savings` or `ledger pull invoices`
I like that interface idea. There is ledger-autosync (in Debian and on GitHub[0]), which should pull transactions from with accounts with OFX. I haven't tried it as none of my accounts are reachable through OFX. [0] https://github.com/egh/ledger-autosync
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You ask "why" on a site named "Hacker News"?
Most people are helpful (so long as you don't sound snarky) and don't mind answering...
I've used ledger for years, but it's not a 'real' double entry system, despite what the manual says. It's more halfway between cash and double entry. The 'auto balancing' for example, which is sold as its big feature, doesn't make sense from a double accounting perspective - the whole point is to not have it be 'auto'. Other basic things are missing - the difference balance and profit/loss accounts, for example. It's…
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I mean that balance report had 0 total. More precisely, I want to convert everything to a single currency, and than have 0 balance. I.g. I want to check my net worth in USD, or my net worth in EUR. To see capital gains/losses.
After every entry, your total system balances to 0. Of course you have to enter all your entries, and not use the 'auto balancing' and unit conversion things that ledger recommends because they don't make sense. If you use ledger just as a, well, ledger, you can do what you want, of course after specifying exchange rates, just like you'd do in a real accounting system.