GnuCash is right. It's also why I built my own finance app
1–10 of 32 posts
Re: GnuCash is right. It's also why I built my own finance app
#2Author here. I'm a certified accountant. I ran my own finances in a double-entry Excel/VBA system for years because the off-the-shelf options forced a choice I didn't like: GnuCash (correct, but heavy enough that even I dreaded the daily entry) or the app-store budgeting apps (pleasant, single-entry, cloud-hosted, usually wanting a bank login).
So I built a local-first double-entry desktop app — a plain local database file on your own machine, no telemetry, no aggregator. Happy to talk about the local-first trade-offs (no auto bank sync is the price), or why I went one-time-purchase instead of subscription. Not here to pitch — genuinely interested in how others in this crowd handle their own books.
Re: GnuCash is right. It's also why I built my own finance app
#3See also https://hledger.org/
and plain text accounting in general
Re: GnuCash is right. It's also why I built my own finance app
#4> Accounts you can create inline as you go. Scheduled and automatic movements that just happen.
Things Gnucash does.
Re: GnuCash is right. It's also why I built my own finance app
#5See also https://hledger.org/ and plain text accounting in general
came to say this. the fact that I don't have to launch a seperate program to add a transaction or my bank's csv is what finally got me to actually keep track.
Re: GnuCash is right. It's also why I built my own finance app
#6Author here. I'm a certified accountant. I ran my own finances in a double-entry Excel/VBA system for years because the off-the-shelf options forced a choice I didn't like: GnuCash (correct, but heavy enough that even I dreaded the daily entry) or the app-store budgeting apps (pleasant, single-entry, cloud-hosted, usually wanting a bank login). So I built a local-first double-entry desktop app — a plain local databas…
What's the difference betweeen this and either Quicken or Microsoft Money?
Re: GnuCash is right. It's also why I built my own finance app
#7See also https://hledger.org/ and plain text accounting in general
Big fan of hedger! It's not easy to start but I think it's one of the best ways to keep track of accounting, PTA files are very convenient.
They leave you with lots of options though, which could be a problem if you're starting into accounting
Re: GnuCash is right. It's also why I built my own finance app
#8See also https://hledger.org/ and plain text accounting in general
This is what I use & like as well, but I definitely think there's space for a more GUI-focused option that isn't Quickbooks or Gnucash. It's not a good fit for me, though, I require my important tools to be open source. Closed source software has way too many misaligned incentives for me to use it for anything important.
Re: GnuCash is right. It's also why I built my own finance app
#9Author here. I'm a certified accountant. I ran my own finances in a double-entry Excel/VBA system for years because the off-the-shelf options forced a choice I didn't like: GnuCash (correct, but heavy enough that even I dreaded the daily entry) or the app-store budgeting apps (pleasant, single-entry, cloud-hosted, usually wanting a bank login). So I built a local-first double-entry desktop app — a plain local databas…
Did you write the blog post entirely on your own? It reads like AI slop to me but maybe I'm just getting more sensitive. I can't decide whether we are all starting to mimic the same turns of phrase that LLMs like to use or whether just nobody writes anymore. I suspect the latter.
Re: GnuCash is right. It's also why I built my own finance app
#10Author here. I'm a certified accountant. I ran my own finances in a double-entry Excel/VBA system for years because the off-the-shelf options forced a choice I didn't like: GnuCash (correct, but heavy enough that even I dreaded the daily entry) or the app-store budgeting apps (pleasant, single-entry, cloud-hosted, usually wanting a bank login). So I built a local-first double-entry desktop app — a plain local databas…
Did you write the blog post entirely on your own? It reads like AI slop to me but maybe I'm just getting more sensitive. I can't decide whether we are all starting to mimic the same turns of phrase that LLMs like to use or whether just nobody writes anymore. I suspect the latter.
The comment you're replying to is clearly AI slop as well...