No worries. Never took your comments as scoffing. The issue I have is pretty much a combination of
a) being horrifically undisciplined/lazy/busy/scattered/what-have-you and b) looking for sw that is more than a simple digital representation of an analog process (think about PIM's - they are little more than a translation of a handwritten planner into digital form with just the tiniest amount of "smarts" attached.) Basically I will frequently forget or put off going through my finances when I really should be spending more time checking them. A system like I described would sort of actively put them in front of me at least once per day (or more, depending on my preferences). A much simplified version would be some script that simply launched MW at a particular time every day - sort of a poor man's version of an agent that puts these numbers in front of my eyes on a daily basis. A fairly poor substitute though. I don't think the bank issue is much of an issue (unless your bank does not allow downloading of your statement - in which case the biggest new feature of MW will also not appeal to you). Basically the sw would download your transactions 2 to 3 times a day (early morning, mid day, evening). Once the data has been downloaded it would scan through it (and your previously downloaded transactions) and apply the rules. There wouldn't, I don't think, be any polling of the data while it is still hosted by the bank. It would all happen to the downloaded transactions on your local machine. You are correct that the applet would have to have some sort of a messaging component. Ideally it would be a combination of email, SMS, twitter, and pop-up windows. Ultimately, it would also be nice if you could "reply" to the message via the same method (i.e. tell the applet via email or SMS or a button on the popup that the flagged transaction is ok, or to mark it for further analysis). Personally, I suspect I would just have email and pop-up windows... I don't really need to be notified via SMS while driving or some such thing. But it is good to cover the bases. I actually have a fairly involved notification scheme envisioned - but that is for some other discussion (I'm actually working with another programmer to see about getting some of these interface ideas into an iPhone app) As to trusting it... that is a thornier issue. The problem is if you get complacent thinking that you are "protected" when, in fact, the rules could be incomplete, the sw buggy, the applet accidentally turned off, etc. That said, I don't see that as a much of a problem. For some (though definitely not all) cases it might be able to program safeguards. In general, though, it behooves the user to not rely on it completely... though there are many many examples in our society that we have given over trust to automated warning systems (think hospitals, or even credit reporting services). This system, as described, is little more than a mildly intelligent agent that a) only does what you ask of it (i.e it does not take independent actions that would endanger your finances) - sort of like a proxy "Dave" that stays active all day long, and b) *only* serves as a warning system: it merely applies the same rules you would if you were scanning your finances. It is basically just a set of eyes that never stop scanning your data. Of course, by now you must know some of my ideas enough to know that I wouldn't stop there :) Eventually I would like a system like this to start "suggesting" actions. I.e. if my checking account gets below a certain level, payday is still a ways off, and I have some cash in savings, it would throw up an alert that it might be a good idea to transfer a certain amount of money (based on my average daily spending for that time of year and the number of days till a typical pay day) from savings to checking. If I agree (most likely only via a pop-up - not email or SMS for security reasons) then the system will carry out the action. If I thought about it, I am sure I could think of a thousand other "suggestions" that the system could take (checking interest rates, checking for missed e-bills, etc.). Of course, once you allow it to start taking actions, you do introduce a small amount of risk. That said, why would clicking "transfer" on a pop-up be much different than clicking "transfer" inside of MW or on a web page? At any rate, I'm just a dreamer :) At the very minimum, MW does the one thing that I have been missing from so many other financial apps: it downloads my transactions directly from the bank - and that is reason enough to start using it (I know Quicken can do it too, but Quicken has *such* a horrible interface it would give me migraines whenever I tried to use it). I'm going to check out Hazel (I've never heard of it). Sounds like just the thing (aside from very long forum postings) to keep me from doing my work today :) Ben On Dec 11, 8:47 pm, Dave <[email protected]> wrote: > Ben, > > Actually, now I understand a little more about what you are asking. > You are wanting something very basic that is like Hazel (rule utility > for the Mac). Except for personal finance. > > I envisioned the functionality you described as MUCH more indepth and > involved; sort of a sit back and let your financial management handle > itself kind of approach. (I'm sure that should be hyphenated!) > > I can be wrong, it happens a lot, but I would think that this would be > the most problematic from the bank side: polling for triggers from the > bank when many banks seem to not even have OFX working yet. To truly > make it useful it would have to have some sort of messaging would it > not? Some way to let you know what was going on? > > I don't know if I would be one to trust a system to that level any > time soon. > > So, don't take my comments as scoffing on a dream. More like, I simply > don't understand the reason "why" you would want it because I want to > make my finances simpler to manage with a very low amount of room for > technical error. (If there's an error, I want to make it!!) : ] > > Dave > > On Dec 11, 7:06 pm, bvz <[email protected]> wrote: > > > Of course. That make sense. Thanks for all the quick replies. It > > bodes well for my user experience when I buy MW! > > > Ben > > > On Dec 11, 3:36 pm, Kevin Hoctor <[email protected]> wrote: > > > > On Dec 11, 2008, at 5:31 PM, bvz wrote: > > > > > I can appreciate the difficulties. Looking forward to a Wells Fargo > > > > compatible version. > > > > > One last thought/idea/request/on-my-knees-begging-session: Could some > > > > of the usability I am looking for be exposed via applescript? > > > > Basically, make the app scriptable and include the raw information > > > > such that someone with the programming chops (like, say, me!) could > > > > extract the necessary data and then code the interface/warning system > > > > themselves? > > > > > One would need to be able to (via applescript): > > > > > automatically make MW download the latest info from the selected > > > > banks. > > > > be able to parse the downloaded transactions for the individual data > > > > items they need (transaction type, transaction recipient, amount, > > > > date, etc.) > > > > be able to parse the entire database for the same info > > > > > obviously security would be an issue, but perhaps each of the > > > > applescript calls would have a username/password argument embedded in > > > > it. > > > > > This would sort of put the pain/risk of my system on the end user, but > > > > still make it possible. > > > > > I can totally respect that you most likely have bigger fish to fry... > > > > just hoping and wishing here. > > > > Hi Ben, > > > > I'm quite aware of the rule to make every Mac application scriptable > > > so customers can make it do more all by themselves but given the > > > target audience for MoneyWell, I have to push that type of > > > functionality down the priority list a bit. Sorry. I'll review this > > > ability again when coding the 2.0 release. > > > > Peace, > > > > Kevin Hoctor > > > [email protected] > > > No Thirst Software LLChttp://nothirst.comhttp://kevinhoctor.blogspot.com --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "No Thirst Software User Forum" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/no-thirst-software?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
