[Kmymoney-devel] Re: request for interest in CSV2QIF filter (written in Perl)

[aga]

On Sat, 26 Mar 2011 13:06:52 +0100
Teus Hagen <teus at theunis.org> wrote:

> After using KMyMoney for two years now with firstly a quite simple
> Perl program during the time of KMM2 use extended CSV to QIF filter
> on a few dutch banks (ING, ABN-AMRO, Rabo, NIBC, Bank of Scotland)
> for a handful persons and about 20 bank account I rewrote lately the
> program so it is more adaptive and more useful for others as well. De
> Perl filter is heavily modular and is easy to extend for other types
> of CSV fin. records as well.
> 
> The filter is quite self supporting. For vCards management it depends
> on Text::vCard. vCard handling is optional so it will be turned off
> if the Perl module is not available in the system.  The INI file at
> the payee info section will suffice then. The filter does not use the
> Text::CSV module as I discovered some people have trouble installing
> Perl  modules.
> 
> What does it do:
> - tunable account naming via INI file
> - automatic category detection on input patterns
> - check of account numbers in use
> - payee name automatic correction
> - payee location detection
> - building payee data base
> - payee info management as eg bank accounts, customer reference
> - interaction with vCard database so KAdddressBook can deal with it
> and correct payee info update payee info as well vCard DB
> automatically
> - intelligence to create a consistant payee DB within KMM2 on names
> in use (eg via account as ref model)
> - ready for output in stead of QIF as well OFX
> - add unique transaction numbers when needed to avoid double records.
> - OFX is on the to do list (a CSV2OFX converter) and should be easy.
> - the script is in Perl. This is a religious choice :-)
> 
> The filter is for now in development state as it needs more testing
> by others as myself. Rabo bank is not tested as I wrote the routine
> from the description I found on their web site.
> 
> More banks are needed as I did not find documents and test sets of
> those banks.
> 
> What do I need from KMM2:
> KMM2 does not handle bank account numbers in payee info (and it
> should imho). KMM2 should handle QIF payee records fully (address
> info, etc) so it can take up this way eg info provided from CSV
> records (yes address info is sometimes available via that way) or in
> this case via vCards with KAddressBook. Is there interest in that
> part?
> 
> What am I asking:
> - more descriptions and test sets for other banks
> - a location at KMyMoney development tree to make this filter more
> general available and get help.
> - feedback
> 
> Respond to me directly if you want a preview of the CSV2QIF filter so
> I send you the Perl script.
> 
> teus
> 
> NB yes I know there exists a PHP script which logs into ING accounts
> and should be able to download CSV records in an automatic and
> periodic way. If KMM2 is able to run in batch style it could import
> the records fully automatic. Warning: this opens the door for others
> to break into your bank account. Eg build this as app into your
> mobile and even if the bank is checking operations via SMS it will
> succeed fully. Food for security people...
> 

Growing interest in CSV use, it seems!  Good.

Could I make a polite comment  first of all, please.  A while ago I
wrote a simple script called csv2qif, which one or two users may
still be using.  If your script uses that same name, there could
possibly be some confusion.  No copyright involved, and there could
even be others also with that name!  No big deal, though.

You make specific mention of KMM2, but, with it being a script,
presumably it would work with the KDE4 version of KMM?

There is also a CSV plugin available which avoids the need for
conversion to QIF format, and which has a GUI which allows users to
select which columns to use for which purpose.

I have a sample Rabo csv another user provided some while back, so I
can't guarantee it is up to date.

Allan