[Kmymoney] Re: Problems entering a "Buy" investment

[Jack]

On 2011.01.15 06:12, Peter Kidd wrote:
> Hi, I am re-sending a revised version of a message I sent to another  
> forum, apologies to those who have seen it before; but I provide much  
> more detail here.
I did respond to your other message, but I'll repeat the information,  
as it does seem useful.

> I am new to KMM, using KMM 4.5.0 (I can't find instructions on how to  
> upgrade!) on Ubuntu 10.10. I have recently imported data from MS  
> Money and massaged it into shape.
Updating would depend on how you installed it.  If you are using the  
Ubuntu package, you just have to wait until they upgrade.  However, you  
can also get the latest version from  
https://launchpad.net/~claydoh/+archive/kmymoney2-kde4.

> I want to enter details of a "Buy" transaction in an investment  
> account, so I go to the account's ledger. Let's assume I want to buy  
> £125 worth of shares valued at £1.01 each
> 
> I click "New" and it produces a form with a grey drop-down lists with  
> default values, blank fields for drop-down lists, a date field, etc.  
> The first grey drop-down says "Buy shares" by default, so I leave it  
> alone. (If I do click it, and select "Buy shares" manually, two of  
> the fields disappear -- is this a bug?)
Yes, it is a known bug.  This was discussed in a bit more detail in  
response to your second message in the other list.  Those fields should  
not be shown at all unless there is a fee or interest category  
entered.  If you change the transaction to "sell" and then back to  
"buy" they will disappear until you enter a fee or interest category.

> I click the down-arrow at the right-hand side of the "Security" and  
> "Account" fields, which also produce drop-down lists, and make my  
> selections. There are no "Fees" or "Interest" to record, so I leave  
> these  and the "Memo" fields blank.

> The Help file at  
> http://docs.kde.org/development/en/extragear-office/kmymoney/details.investments.ledger.html#id2541468  
> has the following text in the "Investment Transactions" section under  
> the heading "Shares, Price & Total Amount":
> "For buy, sell, and cash dividend transactions, the number of shares,  
> the price per share, and the total amount of the transaction must be  
> established. You can enter any two of these, and KMyMoney will  
> calculate the third." [This is also how MS Money works, so this seems  
> natural and intuitive to me]
It seems that the documentation is wrong.  I don't know if this was  
possible in the past, but it is not the case now.

> I do not know how many shares my £125 will buy, and I assume KMM will  
> calculate it for me, so I do not put anything in the "Share" field. I  
> enter "1.01" in the "Price" field (I assume that this is for the  
> price per share). Below this there is an unlabelled field with "0.00"  
> in it. I do not know what this is for, so I leave it alone.
The unlabelled field is for fees - per the category dropdown to its  
left.

> I enter "125" in the "Amount" field (I assume that this is for the  
> total amount of the transaction). When I click outside this field my  
> "125" changes to "125.00" and "£ (124)" appears below it next to the  
> label "Total".  But the "Shares" field still reads "0", so KMM has  
> apparently not calculated for me how many shares my £125 will buy.
This amount field is for the amount of interest - per the category  
dropdown to its left.

> In the broad grey band between the ledger at the top, and the  
> data-entry form at the bottom, the only option that is not greyed-out  
> is "Cancel", so there is no way to save the details I have entered.

> I may be doing something completely dumb, but if so I hope that the  
> above description gives the developers an idea of how a KMM newbie  
> encounters this process.
As I said in my reply to your earlier message, you are not doing  
anything wrong.  The problem is that to allow what you want (and what  
the manual incorrectly says is possible) you would need to enter the  
total price - but excluding any fees or interest.  At the moment, there  
is no place on the form for this.  I could enter a wish-list in the bug  
tracking system - but it would require either adding a new field to the  
form or else making the total amount an editable field only if there is  
no fee or interest.

> It seems to me that the program should work the way it is described  
> in the documentation, but it does not. For the benefit of first-time  
> and new users, it would also be helpful if the documentation  
> explained what every field is for, as many labels are ambiguous (e.g.  
> does "Price" mean total price, or price per share?)
Feel free to continue to make specific suggestions for the  
documentation.  I do most of the doc maintenance, and I do have a  
backlog of changes to make, but I do prioritize based on messages in  
these mailing lists.

> I should finish by saying that I am generally enjoying using KMM, and  
> very glad to finally be free of MS Money!
I think the entire development team is happy to hear this and to have  
another convert.

Jack