[Kmymoney-devel] Feedback

Wed Jan 9 13:13:50 UTC 2013

Hi,

I dropped some clarifications inline.

On Wednesday 09 January 2013 11:37:19 Allan wrote:

> On 09/01/13 02:59, Elton Johnson wrote:
> > I have been looking at the KMYMoney and it looks like a great software.
> > I used Quicken until 1997 and got tired of their requirements and quirks.
> > 
> > I have several questions
> > 
> > 1.I had a hard time finding who to contact with a question
> 
> Seems like you've succeeded!  There is another list for user, rather
> than developer questions - KMyMoney Users' mailing list
> kmymoney at kde.org, plus a forum.  This (old) thread gives some idea of
> how they fit together - http://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=69&t=8043 .
> 
> > 2.It was mentioned about KDE ready desktop or something to that effect.
> > Is that something I am supposed to download before the KMyMoney.

Not on windows. The necessary parts come with the KMyMoney package AFAIK. 
KMyMoney also runs on other desktop environments, e.g. GNOME, but you get the 
best if you have a KDE environment.

> > 3.I saw the mention of a keycode for developers (which I’m not). Is the
> > user’s software encrypted or there is no cloud based interaction for
> > users so it is not needed?
> 
> I'm not fully clued up on this, as I don't use it, but it is possible
> for users to encrypt their file.  I think the developers have access to
> a key, for emergency use, should the user lose his/her key.

Usually you have your own private/public key pair to decrypt/encrypt your data 
when using the GPG encryption feature. In case you loose your private key (and 
this already happened to users, see below) you are lost: your data is 
protected and you won't be able to get it back.

For this matter, (two of) the developers have access to another key pair. The 
public part is used by KMyMoney as emergency key. In case you use it (pull it 
in your keyring and instruct KMyMoney to use it), the data is also encrypted 
for this key pair and the two mentioned devs (I am one of them) can decrypt 
the data using the private part of the emergency key pair. For this to happen, 
you need to send us the file. Be prepared that we will ask you a bunch of 
questions about the data contained just to make sure you are the owner of the 
file before we actually send it back to you. If you don't encrypt the data 
with the public emergency key we don't have a chance to get your data back. I 
hope this clears things up for you.

Statistics:

Requests since we have encryption: 4
Encrypted with emergency key in these cases: 0
Success rate to gain data back: 0%

You see, people already lost their private keys and also lost the data because 
they did not use the emergency key to encrypt their data in the first place.

> > 4.I have Windows 7: I am uncertain which of 2 versions I should download
> > 
> > a.4.6.3 for KDE Platform 4 (stable) or
> > 
> > b.4.6.2 for your Windows PC
> 
> I'd be inclined to go for 4.6.3,as it is the current stable version.
> 
> > 5.Are the plug-ins for users also? I’m particularly interested in the
> > print checks and calendar.
> 
> All the plugins ship as part of KMyMoney, and the user may enable or
> disable them, according to their requirement.
> 
> > a.I saw the one for KBanking to apparently allow for account downloads
> > from the banks. This was something always quirky with Quicken and
> > produced more screwups to correct than help. I have accounts at 4
> > different banks. All but one provide comma delimited CSV downloads. Is
> > that what the KBanking does? Or is it through Quicken files.
> 
> KBanking is used when importing OFX files, which some banks provide.  It
> seems how much success you have depends on how well your bank has
> implemented their offering.  There is another plugin - aqbanking - which
> is not part of KMyMoney, but may be used with it.  I'm not sure, but
> think it is more used in Europe as it deals also with particular
> protocols agreed there, as well as OFX.

@Allan: KBanking relies on AqBanking. See my presentation for Akademy 2008 
which you can find on http://kmymoney.org/akademy2008.html The resp. 
information is contained on slides 13-15. Everyone else is welcome to check it 
out as well ;)

> CSV import is separate, and handled by a different, provided, plugin.
> The version in 4.6.3 is more advanced, and allows the user to have
> separate 'profiles' for each bank/broker, enabling their column formats,
> etc. to be individualised. It handles bank and investment files, and,
> while it is fairly flexible, it is also fairly new, and it could be that
> a particular format is not presently handled correctly.  However, its
> developer (me) will endeavour to assist.
> 
> The other format provided is QIF.
> 
> > b.By the way as Feedback I think allowing CSV updates would be a great
> > idea. Even if not directly into the KMyMoney program there could be a
> > simple form to cut and paste the data into the correct columns and then
> > import into KMyMoney. Probably too complex for many users but I would
> > like it.
> 
> CSV import works directly with free-standing downloaded files.  In
> general, there is no need to cut and paste the data into the correct
> columns.  The only time editing - buit-in - may be required is when
> importing investment files.  Because there is no standard, a security
> name in the importing file may not be exactly the same as what you have
> setup in KMyMoney, and a ticker symbol is required for each security,
> although it does not need to be an 'official' one - you may invent your
> own, as long as it is used consistently and is unique.
> 
> I hope this is helpful for you.

-- 

Regards

Thomas Baumgart

GPG-FP: E55E D592 F45F 116B 8429   4F99 9C59 DB40 B75D D3BA
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Not everything that counts can be counted,
and not everything that can be counted counts.
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