Re: Budgeting bug (account hierarchies and matching)

[James Blachly]

Thanks to both of you for your input, and to Lifepillar for introducing me to 
the “budget” command. I had previously not used it because I had ledger aliased 
to 'ledger -E -V’ ; interestingly running the budget subcommand with those 
options in combination (but neither singly) will crash the program.

> On Oct 2, 2016, at 3:33 PM, Lifepillar  wrote:
> 
> On 2016-10-02 17:35:07 +, John Wiegley said:
> 
>>> "L" == Lifepillar   writes:
>> L> Re (1), I believe that it is a good idea not to have nested accounts in 
>> the
>> L> budget, the way you have. In other words, I think that reports would make
>> L> more sense if you used:
>> Although, there's a useful meaning here.  Say my budget were:
>>~ Monthly
>> Expenses:Food   $50.00
>> Expenses:Food:Dining$20.00
>> Assets
>> This says that I want to spend no more than $50 on food in a given month; and
>> that further, of that $50, I'd like no more than $20 to be spent on dining.
> 
> Sure, but that does not seem well supported by Ledger, e.g., `ledger budget` 
> outputs:
> 
>  0   $70.00   $70.00 0  
> Expenses:Food
>  0   $20.00   $20.00 0Dining
>      -
>  0   $70.00   $70.00 0
> Actual BudgetedRemaining  Used
> 
> Ditto for --budget. At least, you should do this instead:
> 
>>~ Monthly
>> Expenses:Food:Dining$20.00
>> Expenses:Food   $30.00
>> Assets
> 
> Say you spend $40 on food and $10 on dining out, then you'll get:
> 
> $50.00   $50.000  100%  
> Expenses:Food
> $10.00   $20.00   $10.00   50%Dining
>      -
> $50.00   $50.000  100%
> Actual BudgetedRemaining  Used
> 
> 
> which is a fine report. The problem is that the budget seems inconsistent with
> the report. IMHO, avoiding subaccounts is a good compromise, e.g.,
> 
> ~ Monthly
> Expenses:Food:Other $30.00
> Expenses:Food:Dining$20.00
> Assets
> 
> 2016/10/02 * Other
> Expenses:Food:Other   $40.00
> Expenses:Food:Dining  $10.00
> Assets
> 
> ledger budget exp
> 
> $50.00   $50.000  100%  
> Expenses:Food
> $10.00   $20.00   $10.00   50%Dining
> $40.00   $30.00  $-10.00  133%Other
>      -
> $50.00   $50.000  100%
> Actual BudgetedRemaining  Used
> 
> I still see that I am within budget overall. Besides, the report looks in 
> accordance
> with the way the budget is defined. It does give the impression that I've 
> overspent
> in a category, though.
> 
> In this example, one may prefer the former method, but in a more complex 
> budget
> it may get confusing, I believe.
> 
> Life
> 
> 
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Re: Budgeting bug (account hierarchies and matching)

[Lifepillar]

On 2016-10-02 17:35:07 +, John Wiegley said:



"L" == Lifepillar   writes:


L> Re (1), I believe that it is a good idea not to have nested accounts in the
L> budget, the way you have. In other words, I think that reports would make
L> more sense if you used:

Although, there's a useful meaning here.  Say my budget were:

~ Monthly
 Expenses:Food   $50.00
 Expenses:Food:Dining$20.00
 Assets

This says that I want to spend no more than $50 on food in a given month; and
that further, of that $50, I'd like no more than $20 to be spent on dining.


Sure, but that does not seem well supported by Ledger, e.g., `ledger 
budget` outputs:


  0   $70.00   $70.00 0  
Expenses:Food

  0   $20.00   $20.00 0Dining
      -
  0   $70.00   $70.00 0
 Actual BudgetedRemaining  Used

Ditto for --budget. At least, you should do this instead:


~ Monthly
 Expenses:Food:Dining$20.00
 Expenses:Food   $30.00
 Assets


Say you spend $40 on food and $10 on dining out, then you'll get:

 $50.00   $50.000  100%  
Expenses:Food

 $10.00   $20.00   $10.00   50%Dining
      -
 $50.00   $50.000  100%
 Actual BudgetedRemaining  Used


which is a fine report. The problem is that the budget seems inconsistent with
the report. IMHO, avoiding subaccounts is a good compromise, e.g.,

~ Monthly
Expenses:Food:Other $30.00
Expenses:Food:Dining$20.00
Assets

2016/10/02 * Other
 Expenses:Food:Other   $40.00
 Expenses:Food:Dining  $10.00
 Assets

ledger budget exp

 $50.00   $50.000  100%  
Expenses:Food

 $10.00   $20.00   $10.00   50%Dining
 $40.00   $30.00  $-10.00  133%Other
      -
 $50.00   $50.000  100%
 Actual BudgetedRemaining  Used

I still see that I am within budget overall. Besides, the report looks 
in accordance
with the way the budget is defined. It does give the impression that 
I've overspent

in a category, though.

In this example, one may prefer the former method, but in a more complex budget
it may get confusing, I believe.

Life


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Re: Budgeting bug (account hierarchies and matching)

[James Blachly]

Dear John et al,

The workaround (re-ordering the periodic transactions as described in #415) 
fixes the assignment issue for both the minimal example I posted as well as my 
production data.

Do others use the ~ Periodic + —budget mode, or am I in a very small minority?

Kind regards
James


> On Oct 2, 2016, at 1:52 AM, John Wiegley  wrote:
> 
>> "JB" == James Blachly  writes:
> 
> JB> If anyone can weigh in on whether this behavior is likely to change (bug
> JB> reported by John in 2010...), I can decide how best to structure all my
> JB> accounts (as I am a new user, I am still trying to find the best system of
> JB> accounts / hierarchies). At a minimum, it would be nice if this key fact
> JB> is mentioned in documentation (section 9.1).
> 
> JB> Lastly, if this has gotten no attention because literally no one actually
> JB> uses the periodic transactions + --budget, and instead uses something else
> JB> like virtual accounts, or automatic postings to envelope-type accounts,
> JB> please let me know!
> 
> I haven't heard anyone else complain about it yet, although it's certainly a
> bug.  Does the workaround described in #415 work for you?
> 
> -- 
> John Wiegley  GPG fingerprint = 4710 CF98 AF9B 327B B80F
> http://newartisans.com  60E1 46C4 BD1A 7AC1 4BA2
> 
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