When Will OSS Financial Apps Catch Up? 134
RomulusNR asks: "One sticking issue preventing small groups such as small business and nonprofits from wholly migrating to Linux, or even open-source application software, is the sub-adequate feature scope of accounting applications. QuickBooks is the standard, easier for non-technical people to learn, and is free or extremely cheap for nonprofits, and comes built-in with nearly every tax form and chartered accounting reports imaginable. Open source software seems like a natural fit for nonprofits, but if they can't fulfill their legal financial obligations with it, it's a non-starter. Add to that the fact that most people are not terribly tech savvy, and some have spent a lot of time learning the few aspects of QuickBooks that are most relevant to them; retraining on a totally different app is not a practical endeavor. Is there any hope that the field of OSS accounting apps will catch up to the practical needs of those who would theoretically best benefit from them?"
The linked article is from Newsforge which, like Slashdot, is owned by OSTG.
What about crossover office (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:What about crossover office (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:What about crossover office (Score:1)
Re:What about crossover office (Score:2, Interesting)
If you can eliminate 80% of your software cost by using linux and wine and quicken, why do you reject the entire plan because you still have to use quicken?
Why does the solution have to be 100% FOSS? Large companies aren't. My current company uses WINXP, HPUX, Linux, and I'm guessing some more esoteric OSes on the manufacturing robots.
Why must a small business be 100% FOSS?
Makes no logical sense, makes no fiscal sense.
SQL Ledger (Score:3, Informative)
Re:SQL Ledger (Score:2)
Re:SQL Ledger (Score:2)
Re:SQL Ledger (Score:2)
Re:SQL Ledger (Score:2)
Re:SQL Ledger (Score:2)
Accountants are in many respects a species of geek, just like the computer geek. They may not speak each other's language natively, but they can learn. A computer geek will ask "what is the right way to handle books?", and an accountant will give him a rather complex and technical answer, which is just what the computer geek expects and in fact wants.
Financial Applications aren't fun to write (Score:2, Interesting)
The blurb is incredibly deceptive (Score:5, Informative)
It's not about lack of software, it's about "network affects" and the irrationally high premium many people but on avoiding change.
Re:The blurb is incredibly deceptive NO ITS NOT. (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:The blurb is incredibly deceptive NO ITS NOT. (Score:5, Insightful)
At least as I see it, unless a piece of software interfaces with my bank, it's not worth anything. Once you've used software that just sucks the transactional data directly from your bank and dumps it into your ledger, does all your reconciliation automatically, etc., etc., you can never go back. Ever.
It's the sort of thing that's valuable enough that it would be worth keeping a dedicated PC sitting around to do nothing else, if I had to use computers that couldn't run the package that did it.
From a small-business perspective, it saves hours of work a week, and in some cases might be the difference between just having the business owner do all the books themselves and hiring someone to keep track of receipts/bills/whatever (or perhaps more likely, hiring another regular employee so that they can devote their time to keeping track of the books).
As I understand it, GNUCash will download bank transactions from banks in Europe, because they use a standardized protocol for it. But here in the U.S., the de facto standard is the system used by Quicken, and it's all proprietary or similarly hobbled, thus no Free solutions that will do it. If anyone else can substantiate what the story is, I'd be interested.
But anyway, I agree -- a "general ledger" program that requires the user to input every transaction is not going to satisfy most people anymore. That might have been impressive 10 or 20 years ago, but what most people who use Quicken or Quickbooks want and expect is something that will integrate with their bank, get all their data, and do the balancing/reconciliation/reporting/tax-preparatio
That said, I don't think it's what's keeping people from transitioning to Linux: keeping Quicken going requires that you have ONE Windows PC, somewhere in a corner someplace. It's not the sort of thing that stops you from migrating a business, if you really wanted to switch. (How many businesses only have one computer? Not very many, and the ones that do, aren't very significant.) What I think is keeping people on Windows is inertia, pure and simple. Linux is different, people hate things that are different. You could have replacements for every application on the entire Windows platform and people would still find SOMETHING to keep them from switching, in order to rationalize their basic fear of leaving their comfort zone. The problem isn't that Linux doesn't have application x, the "problem," to a lot of people, is that Linux is not Windows. As long as Linux is not Windows, they will always find reasons not to switch to it. I call these people idiots, but they're a large percentage of the population.
Re:The blurb is incredibly deceptive NO ITS NOT. (Score:2)
It's the reason one of my two Windows systems at home is still running Windows, and a source of frustration for me.
I've moved our laptop from Windows to Ubuntu. It's an old beast that was running W98SE, so it made sense to move to a modern OS. My wife has taken to it and for the most part (we have some problems with Firefox not displaying properly and not downloading necessary extensions, but that's another gripe) is quite happ
Re:The blurb is incredibly deceptive NO ITS NOT. (Score:2)
Re:The blurb is incredibly deceptive NO ITS NOT. (Score:2)
GNUCash allows the import of ofx/qfx files - In my case with the web interface of my various accounts I download the (quicken formatted data), open
Re:The blurb is incredibly deceptive NO ITS NOT. (Score:2)
How will you ever know if yuor checkbook doesnt match your bank statement if you havnt done the figures yourself. It's great that the data is available...I use gnucash and my accounts never add up until I go online and look at my bank records and realize I lost the reciept from chipotle and thats why my checking account is $8.05 short...but I want to be in con
Gnucash supports OFX and QIF downloads (Score:2)
Gnucash does transaction matching too. (Score:2)
"Improved Import Transaction Matching
The development of OFX and HBCI support has also resulted in an improved transaction matching system that more accurately recognizes duplicate transactions during file import."
With bookkeeping I completely understand your reluctance to switch, just pointing out that Gnucash is technically pretty much there when it comes to replacing ms money, quickbooks etc. The difficulty as yo
Re:The blurb is incredibly deceptive (Score:2)
For instance, almost everything done in my business is invoicing. That means I want a basic, but complete, chart of accounts. I want to see how much was spent on office supplies l
SQL-Ledger (Score:2, Informative)
Re:SQL-Ledger (Score:2)
Re:The blurb is incredibly deceptive (Score:2)
In other areas, I might agree with you, but this is financial software we're talking about. Changing the way you do things generally increases the potential for something going wrong. If you change your project management software, maybe you miss a milestone or lose some e-mails or something, which is annoying but generally recoverable. Having basically anything go wrong in the financial arena is a big deal, though. You can't tolerate is
Re:Financial Applications aren't fun to write (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Financial Applications aren't fun to write (Score:2)
O. Wyss
Probably never. (Score:5, Insightful)
Financial apps are also not of major interest to developers - not only they require the attention to detail noted above, but attention to boring detail. Most developers are interested in development, not the nuts and bolts of small business accounting or something similar. As a result, I think it will be a very long time, if ever, before Linux "catches up." Of course, if more people were writing these apps instead of waiting for others to write them or writing about why others haven't written them, the choices would be much better.
Re:Probably never. (Score:2, Interesting)
So the Gub'mint should make it available in machine-readable form. This way, all you need to do is feed it into your program and everything works.
But hey, we don't live in a reality where stuff works in a sensible manner...
Re:Probably never. (Score:1)
Open format readable form, too.
Re:Probably never. (Score:2)
The govt. isn't the answer, it is usually the problem. There are already some great apps on the market for accounting. The problem is not that we need more regulations, it is that we need them to run on more platforms.
There IS room both OSS and proprietary applications for
Re:Probably never. (Score:2)
Re:Probably never. (Score:2)
They were bought out by a company that is more of a pain in the ass than Best was. My priorities are still the same, would rather run Peachtree on OSS, although it would be better if Peachtree had a more open data format.
Re:Probably never. (Score:2)
I'm working on it... (Score:2)
Believe it or not, there's a small business who recently hired me to get them out of the mess that is FileMaker 5.0 -- if that, I think the majority of their machines run 4.0. I basically told them that to recreate their FileMaker database as anything relational (which they understand and want) will take about the same amount of time, whether I do FileMaker 8.0 or something else. Chances are, I'll take something like Glom [glom.org] or Rekall [rekallrevealed.org], maybe even Gnu Enterprise [gnuenterprise.org], create their database in that, and extend it.
Re:I'm working on it... (Score:2)
I know I shouldn't, but I've hated Filemaker ever since. I also hate bosses that have idea diarrhea. Our goals were constantly chan
Re:I'm working on it... (Score:2)
The biggest reason I have to help these guys is they have a badly designed Filemaker system in that it isn't relational. It's great for keeping track of single pieces of information, but it relate
Re:Probably never. (Score:2)
This is seen with most open source games. The engine is usually awesome, the content is usually lacking.
Re:Probably never. (Score:2)
When working on tax software becomes interesting (Score:5, Insightful)
"Well, I'm really interested in starting an open-source project. A game? Naaah
I always thought it was one of the acknowledged shortcomings of open source stuff that it concentrated all the work in the high-profile, high-geek-factor areas?
Re:When working on tax software becomes interestin (Score:2)
"Well, I'm really interested in starting an open-source project. A game? Naaah
I always thought it was one of the acknowledged shortcomings of open source stuff that it concentrated all the work in the high-profile, high-geek-factor areas?
Actually, accounting software is really interesting from the code angle. There's all sorts of neat stuff you can do with the numbers.
Re:When working on tax software becomes interestin (Score:2)
Re:When working on tax software becomes interestin (Score:2)
Don't count on it. I've been working on an accounting system on and off for a few years now. It's just now starting the coding stage. And I have a feeling it'll regress into design at least one more time before I finally get the damn thing coded.
My motivation was my intense hatred for the idiocy of Peachtree and my bewilderment at how their software could possibly suck so hard and yet be so popular. It se
Re:When working on tax software becomes interestin (Score:2)
Never. (Score:4, Insightful)
Even if the basic software functionality was created, you still won't be able to connect with your bank via the software. You won't be able to download cancelled checks, write new ones/pay bills, or any of these other functionalities. You won't be able to because the bank gets a nice kickback from the financial software publishers to open their systems up to them, and the bank has essentially no incentive to work to open it up.
Publishers now have online collaboration tools for this stuff.. open source never will catch up. At most it'll be useful for low-complexity personal accounting, nothing on the scale that satifies enterprise needs.
-Cliff
Re:Never. (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Never. (Score:2)
Re:Never. (Score:2)
You trust Samba, don't you? That was byte-by-byte reversed from the (broken) Microsoft SMB protocol, and continues to evolve under that context. You send, receive and share files, data, print jobs and other things using Samba, all without a single lost byte. Why wouldn't you trust your account details with the same level of confidence?
Not Sure About Your Reasons (Score:1)
What about OFX? I can download my bank info in XML format, and have been able to do so for years. So, the banks have already "opened their systems", probably enough so that this isn't the problem with OS financial apps.
As for bill-pay and other functionalities, most banks of any size probably already have either web-based a
Re:Not Sure About Your Reasons (Score:1)
(Yes, I've looked into this - I've contributed to www.divifund.com - an open-source budgeting tool for (at least) Linux and Windows)
When? Here's a hint... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:When? Here's a hint... (Score:3, Funny)
Easy answer (Score:2, Interesting)
Probably just a little after you start writing all those AAA game titles for linux.
Re:Easy answer (Score:2)
I'll call it QuakeBooks III Team Accounting. From the back of the box:
The deadlines of the alien accountant Xaero are narrowing, impassively double-entry booking as transactions transform high-ranking clientele into spineless bankruptcy, but the seedy stench of Accounts Receivables isn't enough to cloud your judgement: abandoning every ounce of common sense and any trace of doubt, you lunge
When you find a FOSS acountant (Score:2)
Linux? or OSS? (Score:3, Interesting)
Or do you want open-source accounting software?
Your question is worded so that it only make sense if we pretend that the only software available for linux is open source.
Re:Linux? or OSS? (Score:2)
I know someone will come up with a dozen examples, but really, I think one would be hard pressed to find broadly useful open source software that only has a Windows port.
There are Solid F/OSS Accounting packages (Score:5, Informative)
There isn't an open source QuickBooks clone. But many F/OSS applications do have features which QuickBooks lack (and vice versa, of course). Rather than looking for a "clone," one should clearly define their requirements & look for the app or apps that may fit those needs. If some are "close," money and/or labor can be spent refining the F/OSS applications. If all are far from your requirements (such as a requirement like "I need software which does exactly what QuickBooks does & has the exact same interface"), then suck it up & purchase QuickBooks. It doesn't cost an arm and a leg! If you find your organization doing this a lot, then re-evaluate your software selection practices--alternative software usually doesn't mean cloned software (whether F/OSS or proprietary) & you will never be able to benefit from very good software which is monetarily cheaper, uses open formats, and is functional.
Re:There are Solid F/OSS Accounting packages (Score:3, Insightful)
I realize that, of course; but an OSS app that is to QuickBooks what Gimp is to Photoshop, or what OOo is to MSO, would be about the desired neighborhood of similarity. It doesn't have to clone, but it can't be so arcane, esoteric, or alien that the user has to be entirely retrained on how to navigate to everything they need. I figure it takes a person who knows Word maybe half an hour to understand their most commonly used functions OOo Writer.
Re:There are Solid F/OSS Accounting packages (Score:2)
Inventory/Warehouse Management (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Inventory/Warehouse Management (Score:2)
The rule of thumb I apply when looking for free/OSS solutions to an issue is:
"Does it fail the Groupware Bad [jwz.org] test"?
ie. "Is it the kind of thing an individual (rather than a business) would have a need to develop?" If the answer is "no", chances are that very little in the way of Free/OSS solutions exists.
Re:Inventory/Warehouse Management (Score:2)
Re:Inventory/Warehouse Management (Score:2)
Therefore even after your company's written their own software, there's still a good chance that there won't be any half-decent Free/OSS inventory management solutions.
Re:Inventory/Warehouse Management (Score:2)
Re:Inventory/Warehouse Management (Score:2)
GNUCash is rewriting (Score:4, Informative)
They actually do have some fairly complex accounting in the current versions.
Re:GNUCash is rewriting (Score:4, Insightful)
It would be really cool if SQL-Ledger [sql-ledger.org] could share the same database as GNUCash.
This would be ideal for Small businesses and small NGO/NPO's that need to outsource accounting but spend a healthy fraction of their money for accountants on travel time.
Integration with CiviCRM, SugarCRM, Vtiger, OSCommerce, and VirtueMart and you would have a compelling package.
Re:GNUCash is rewriting (Score:2)
Funny you should mention that - that was the question I asked at the presentation. The speaker wasn't opposed to the idea but didn't know how well their data models would map and didn't want to do something that would slow down development too much. I haven't followed up on it.
Obviously I think it's a great idea.
Re:GNUCash is rewriting (Score:2)
GNUCash exists... (Score:2)
Re:GNUCash exists... (Score:2)
Disclaimer: I've used GnuCash for many years, and have never had an upgrade problem. I also don't use Mandrake. Coincidence? Perhaps...
GnuCash tutorial teaches accounting: try it! (Score:5, Interesting)
Here we go:
Carol Champagne
Email: carol@io.com
Chris Lyttle
Affiliation: GnuCash Documentation Team
Email: chris@wilddev.net
Jon Lapham
Affiliation: GnuCash Documentation Team
Email: lapham@extracta.com.br
Many thanks, Carol, Chris and Jon.
If you haven't tried tracking your own finances, give it a whirl. I found, to my surprise, that it not only gave me a sense of power to know everything about my money (I learned a few surprising things about my spending), but it actually made it enjoyable to be stingy. The less I splurged, the better I felt because I could see the effect of my money being saved. It sure beats seeing how much disk space I saved by compressing my files.
I did end up having to spend about 20-30 hours writing a Python program to help massage my GnuCash files; thank goodness GnuCash uses a completely transparent XML format. (A true geek would probably have been able to do it in half the time.) This is because, I have to admit, I use GnuCash the lazy way.
What's supposed to happen is that, every day before I climb into bed, I enter all the transactions I made that day: $1.49 for the hamburger, $35.18 for the book I bought, $999.99 for the tank of gasoline, etc. Later that month, I download my bank statement and credit card statement from my bank's web site (QFX/OFX format), and import it into GnuCash. GnuCash checks that the statement matches with what I've entered, and marks each entry as reconciled.
Well, I have better things to do than to enter transactions every day. So, instead, I just let GnuCash do it for me by importing my bank statements and credit card statements. GnuCash says for each transaction: "What's this?? $1.49 from 'MCDONALDS FOODLIKE SUBSTANCE CORP'? I never saw this entry before!" and so on for each entry. My Python program looks at the entry description to figure out where it should be categorized; e.g. if it matches "(?i).*mcdonald'*s.*", then it classifies it under the "fast food, unhealthy" account. And so I can see exactly how much I've spent for groceries, transportation, entertainment, etc.
I did try KMyMoney, since I am a KDE fan (thank you to KStrauser for pointing it out), but I found GnuCash to be a more mature application. Incidentally, my wife bought Microsoft Money, tried it out but found it confusing, couldn't think of a good reason why that program kept wanting to connect to the Internet (blocked by ZoneAlarm), and decided not to trust it.
I agree with my sibling poster that Mandrake is no longer a great distro to use. I used it previously, and have switched to Ubuntu Dapper where I happily compute away, really using the desktop rather than having to tinker with it. So, load up your k/Ubuntu (it's a live CD now, for those of you clinging to Windows) and give GnuCash a whirl.
Umm... did I go a bit off topic?
Re:GnuCash tutorial teaches accounting: try it! (Score:2, Insightful)
think whoever wrote the GnuCash docs deserves kudos. Wait, lemme see ...
And then you thank them by publishing their emails on a public forum, ready for spambots to catch them. That is really so nice of you....
Re:GNUCash exists... (Score:2)
I wonder if this could be Debian bug #347390 [debian.org]?
Daniel
Re:GNUCash exists... (Score:2)
http://kmymoney2.sourceforge.net/ [sourceforge.net]
Re:GNUCash exists... (Score:3, Insightful)
If you think about it, that's actually a good reason to switch to GNUCash! Think what would happen if MS Money stopped working -- you'd be screwed because all your important data is in a proprietary format. And the longer you keep using MS Money, the more data will be lost when that happens. Just like with the government and OpenOffice, you should switch to GNUCash ASAP to preser
Legal Problems? (Score:3, Insightful)
Related to this last point is that there is a lot of obligation related to writing financial software and as a free software developer I really don't want that hanging over my head. Even with the standard "not fit for any purpose" disclaimer, I would be afraid that I would have someone coming after me if some bug in some code I wrote meant that each company paid a few million less in taxes than they were supposed to.
The thing is, the code isn't the hard part of writing financial software, it's dealing with all of the law code stuff.
I think that the best way to bring this sort of software to Linux is to focus on getting companies to port their software, or getting Wine to support it.
Even moreso than with other sorts of software, I don't think that web applications are viable because of security reasons.
Here are some fine OpenSource Accounting programs (Score:3, Informative)
http://compiere.org/ [compiere.org]
http://www.erp5.org/ [erp5.org]
http://www.ofbiz.org/ [ofbiz.org]
http://www.opensourcestrategies.com/ofbiz/index.p
Don't say there aren't any such programs until you've checked out:
http://www.freshmeat.net/ [freshmeat.net]
SQL-ledger (Score:1, Informative)
Great Perl-based web app. We're using it to replace our foxpro-based accounting app. We looked at upgrading our existing accounting app and it would of cost us almost 6 digits. We've been converting to SQL-Ledger with great success.
Having the source available is bonus. (And having a perl developer on the payroll is also good) So far we've done UPS WorldShip integration, and we're planning a barcoded inventory. We will soon be integrating VendorNet support for a few of our cus
Peach Tree & WINE? (Score:3, Informative)
Now I know it isn't Open Source, but could we sway Peach Tree to make a Linux version using winelib. We can point to the recent port of GoogleEarth as a recent success story. Or maybe we could ask PeachTree to open up their code in exchange for publicity and a huge jump in market share.
There is GNUCash,
KMyMoney
http://kmymoney2.sourceforge.net/index-home.html [sourceforge.net]
Re: (Score:2)
Specifically... (Score:2)
A CPA's Perspective (Score:5, Insightful)
I doubt there is a volunteer group with enough programming and accounting skills to write OSS accounting and tax software. I have dabbled in programming and tax is definitely not my strong suit. Remember too that for the big companies, they use systems like Oracle Financials, SAP, etc. Many of these run on Linux or in some sort of *NIX environment. Tons of companies also still keep their General Ledger (G/L) on internally developed mainframe or AS/400 style systems. As other posters have said, there is a lot of money to be made writing a good system and selling it. The flip-side to that coin is that the end-user customer/business has a lot to lose (money, non-compliance with regulations, other reporting requirements, etc.) from having something half-way put together or something that is entirely wrong.
Much as I hate to say it, I can't find anything... (Score:3, Informative)
I've tried GnuCash - with version 2.0 approaching, it looks pretty good. But it's not nearly as slick as Quicken. Other alternatives are attractive for various reasons but have other problems.
My needs are very simple! I'd like multi-user access (Quicken doesn't offer this either - GnuCash may to a certain extent but it's not 100%), suitable reports for the Australian Tax Office (I know I can customise my own), fast to open and save its data files (GnuCash is very slow with 20 years of data - the multi-user requirement probably covers this because it uses Postgres), and it's go to be quick to enter invoices, payments etc. (GnuCash is horrible!). I'd prefer cross-platform and/or FOSS. If I'm going to move, it will be to something that has an open format for its data files.
Does anybody have any clues?
Re:Much as I hate to say it, I can't find anything (Score:2)
Re:Much as I hate to say it, I can't find anything (Score:2)
[OFFTOPIC]
As you prefer cross-platform SW and develop your own software you might look at my message (http://ask.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=189954&ci d=15634627 [slashdot.org]), especially wxWidgets is quite well suite for small ISVs.
[/OFFTOPIC]
O. Wyss
Re:Much as I hate to say it, I can't find anything (Score:2)
Have you looked at MYOB [myob.com]?
I took a look at their Accounting Plus package a while back which offered a multi-currency option I was keen on and I thought it looked pretty user friendly. I think multi-user capability is tied to Filemaker [filemaker.com.au] - you have to have a multi-user Filemaker app installed.
Its Win/Mac cross-platform, no idea what data format it uses.
Two words: (Score:3, Insightful)
There is your key for getting application penetration on Linux and Windows.
-Rick
FOSS financial applications aren't used (Score:3, Informative)
That said financial FOSS applications will only become possible when they are true cross-platform, when they are available on Windows and MacOS as well. Yet that's not sufficient, they also have to look native and they have to feel native on any platform. Else people, who use computer as tools and not as gadgets, won't use them.
Ordinary people don't look with the eyes of a fan, the look with the eyes of an annoyed worker who wants it task done as fast as possible. None of the so far mentioned applications look acceptable in their eyes. At the current state none written in Java or with GTK will satisfy these people. The only choice which produces acceptable results are using the commercial QT or the free wxWidgets toolkit. It may sound harsh but that's the case, just listen to the complains these people bring up against FOSS applications (or read http://www.osdl.org/dtl/DTL_Survey_Report_Nov2005
Yet looking acceptable is only one step towards broad acceptance, the other step is feel acceptable. Sorry, a FOSS application following the Gnome UI guidelines does not feel acceptable on Windows, MacOSX, KDE, etc. If you port a Gnome application to another platform you have to take care of all the little details which are different, which annoy users when the don't fit. These little details are listed in the only cross-platform guidelines wyoGuide (http://wyoguide.sf.net/ [sf.net]).
To summarize, to make a FOSS financial application successful you have to follow these simple steps:
- Design the application cross-platform, then you get enough market share.
- Write it with an acceptable look anywhere, use QT or wxWidgets.
- Care for acceptable feel anywhere, follow the cross-platform guidelines wyoGuide.
O. Wyss
Re:FOSS financial applications aren't used (Score:2)
There's no need to have everything in FOSS, yet FOSS is needed when commercial veldors don't release for a platform. Only good cross-platform FOSS can "encurage" vendors to release their products everywhere.
Why do you think doesn't Adobe release on Linux? Simply because its market share is just a few percents and GIMP is in their eyes no competition on their market segment Windows and MacOSX. Yet why did Microsoft finally rework IE6 into IE7? Just because Mozilla draws to
patience (Score:2)
In the past, the development of such apps has been hampered by the predominance of proprietary standards and formats, but that has been changing. The more the industry moves to open formats and XML (and they do, e.g., OFX), the more open source financial ap
Re:patience (Score:2)
Are you living under a rock? Look on Freshmeat! You can already get system administration, mail readers, groupware, word processing, accounting, CRM, database frontends, file sharing, report generation, scientific data analysis, programming environments, document management, jukebox management, photo management, etc.
I think there is no good open source web-based spreadsheet or presentation package yet, but it's coming.
And what would be the point? I wouldn'
Like everything else in the OSS world: Later. (Score:2)
Quasar (Score:2)
yeah right (Score:2)
some apps simply don't have enough sex appeal...
You must be new here (Score:2)
You're new here, so let me help you with this one:
Q: When will OSS Financial Apps Catch Up?
A: When it becomes a big enough itch to scratch.
Seriously, just because YOU need an application for Linux that doesn't exist, doesn't mean there's a developer out there who is interested in writing one.
You might talk to your vendors who write applications like TaxCut, Quicken, MS Money and so on and ask them if they'll port one of theirs to Linux. Linux is still developed in the spare time of thousands of
Scratching an itch.. (Score:2)
If you think about the values and culture that drive Free Software and contrast with the values and culture that drive Quicken and QuickBooks, you'll see the immediate disconnect.
Re:Accountants, tax experts, etc do NOT work for f (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Accountants, tax experts, etc do NOT work for f (Score:2)
Re:From Quicken to GnuCash (Score:2)