Thanks for this, but I wonder if you have read the previous thread I linked to fully? It discusses what I believe (from admittedly only a quick scan) are the same techniques you describe here, and the problems I ran into with those.
Or did I miss something? Thanks again, I do appreciate any alternative approaches, it seems quite likely I've missed a better way. On Fri, 20 Oct 2017, at 23:58, Michael Cooper wrote: > Ah, I misunderstood your original problem, apologies. > > Dodging your question again (since I really don't know the answer), I've > also found that storing values in non-leaf accounts gets me into all > sorts > of trouble. It generally is confusing and my automation doesn't > understand > it. If this example were in accounts, I would do this: > > 2017-10-01 * Opening Balance > Assets:CurrentAccount:Real $1000 > Equity:OpeningBalance > > 2017-10-02 * Savings > Assets:CurrentAccounts:Savings $100 > Assets:CurrentAccounts:Real > > This works with the "assert account(...).total" style of assertion, but > totally fails with the Reconcile method I posted (it thinks that there is > $0 in Assets:CurrentAccounts). The assert style still doesn't show you in > what direction it is wrong, unfortunately. > > Alternatively, this sounds sort of like the envelope-budgeting system I > use. Would something like the below be interesting for you? > > 2017-10-01 * Opening Balance > Assets:CurrentAccount $1000 > (Budgets:SpendingMoney) $1000 > Equity:OpeningBalance > > 2017-10-02 * Savings > [Budgets:Saved] $100 > [Budgets:SpendingMoney] > > 2017-10-03 * Reconcile > [Assets:CurrentAccount] $0 = $1000 > > The "Budgets" subtree are accounts made entirely of virtual transactions > to > track how money has been allocated, whereas the Assets subtree is about > where money really is. I have scripts that help make sure that in > transactions like 2017-10-01 the amount that the asset increases by > balances with the amount the budgets increase by. I then have rules to > automatically pair up Expense and Budget transactions. > > On Fri, Oct 20, 2017 at 1:46 PM John Lee <j...@pobox.com> wrote: > > > Hi Michael > > > > If you take a look at my previous thread here from a week or so back > > you'll see the problem you run into when trying to apply that to the > > transactions I posted in this thread. > > > > https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/ledger-cli/bqu-qNr6cjM > > > > Consider: > > > > 2017-10-01 * Opening Balance > > Assets:CurrentAccount $1000 > > Equity:OpeningBalance > > > > 2017-10-02 * Savings > > Assets:CurrentAccount:Savings $100 > > Assets:CurrentAccount > > > > 2017-10-03 * Assertion > > [Assets:CurrentAccount] $0 = $1000 > > > > > > That final balance assertion fails for the same reason I mentioned in my > > second post in the earlier thread: that assertion refers not to the > > summed-up total of everything in *or under* Assets:CurrentAccount (as > > you'd see in the output of ledger b Assets:CurrentAccount), but the > > amount that lives in that *exact* location (which you might write in a > > balance command as > > '^Assets:CurrentAccount$'). So $1000 errors, and $900 does not. That > > means I can't record the total balance of that real account, which is > > what I'm after. That's what motivated my use of assertion value > > expressions, with which I guess I've either run into a bug, or I don't > > understand something (see my previous post in this thread). > > > > I get the impression that transferring between subaccounts in this way > > suggested here earlier, is a bit of a dark corner of ledger that's not > > terribly well supported? > > > > I'm keen to hear about other approaches, but so far I'm running into > > roadblocks whichever way I try to tackle using ledger the problem I set > > out in that first thread (which is the same basic problem I'm trying to > > solve here in this thread, though my question here was about a detail). > > > > I guess I should either dust off my very dusty C++ and try to fix it, or > > try one of the ledger spinoffs like beancount... maybe there are > > beancount / hledger people here who can comment re whether those systems > > have ways to tackle the problem from the thread linked above? > > > > On Thu, 19 Oct 2017, at 23:54, Michael Cooper wrote: > > > This isn't a direct answer to your question, but this is how I do these > > > kind of balance checks: > > > > > > 2017/01/01 * Opening Balance > > > Assets:Checking $1000 > > > Equity:Opening > > > > > > 2017/01/02 * Savings > > > Assets:Savings $100 > > > Assets:Checking > > > > > > 2017/01/03 * Reconcile > > > [Assets:Checking] $0 = $900 > > > [Assets:Savings] $0 = $100 > > > > > > 2017/01/04 * Savings > > > Assets:Savings $100 > > > Assets:Checking > > > > > > 2017/01/05 * Reconcile > > > [Assets:Checking] $0 = $800 > > > [Assets:Savings] $0 = $200 > > > > > > This works well. I read these reconcile transactions as "If $0 is added > > > to > > > the account, the balance should be $800". > > > > > > If I instead change the last reconcile to "[Assets:Checking] $0 = $700" > > > (that is, make it $100 off) I get this error: > > > > > > While parsing file "/home/mythmon/tmp/foo.ledger", line 18: > > > While parsing posting: > > > [Assets:Checking] $0 = $700 > > > ^^^^ > > > Error: Balance assertion off by $-100 (expected to see $800) > > > > > > This shows me both the value I said it should be ($700), the value Ledger > > > says it should be ($800), and the difference ($-100). All of these end up > > > being very useful at different times. > > > > > > I leave these in my ledger files. This gives me both a history of > > > balances, > > > and also a sort of test suite. If I change the organization of my files, > > > change rules, or do other refactoring, these assertions give me > > > confidence > > > that I didn't break anything. > > > > > > -Michael Cooper > > > > > > > > > On Thu, Oct 19, 2017 at 3:43 PM John Lee <j...@pobox.com> wrote: > > > > > > > An example that currently has me puzzled: the first assert below > > passes, > > > > and the second fails. I'm interested both in learning why in this > > > > particular case, and more important, learning how to use ledger to > > debug > > > > problems like this in general. > > > > > > > > 2017-10-01 * Opening Balance > > > > Assets:CurrentAccount $1000 > > > > Equity:OpeningBalance > > > > > > > > 2017-10-02 * Savings > > > > Assets:CurrentAccount:Savings $100 > > > > Assets:CurrentAccount > > > > > > > > assert account("Assets:CurrentAccount").total == $1000 > > > > > > > > 2017-10-03 * Savings > > > > Assets:CurrentAccount:Savings $100 > > > > Assets:CurrentAccount > > > > > > > > assert account("Assets:CurrentAccount").total == $1000 > > > > > > > > > > > > This surprises me because if I comment that last assert out and run > > > > ledger b '^Assets:CurrentAccount$' I get $800, and ledger b > > > > '^Assets:CurrentAccount:Savings$' prints $200 -- which adds to $1000, > > > > and indeed ledger b '^Assets:CurrentAccount' prints $1000. Bug?? How > > > > can I see what ledger *thinks* the total is when it evaluates the > > > > assert? > > > > > > > > > > > > On Thu, 19 Oct 2017, at 23:13, John Lee wrote: > > > > > Sometimes the assert expressions I'm adding to my ledger file fail > > and I > > > > > don't immediately know why. If I have something like this: > > > > > > > > > > assert account("Assets:CurrentAccount").total == $123.45 > > > > > > > > > > and I'm wrong about the total, then I'll just be told that I'm wrong, > > > > > and not what the correct value is. What's the easiest way to get > > ledger > > > > > to compute and print the correct value? > > > > > > > > > > Maybe there's a way to print out account values at a given point in a > > > > > ledger file? In particular, maybe there's a way to print the values > > of > > > > > value expressions as the ledger file is evaluated by a command like > > > > > balance? > > > > > > > > > > I realize it's good to be able to see what the answer is before one > > > > > writes it down, but sometimes it just saves time to have the computer > > > > > work it out so you can see quickly what you did wrong. > > > > > > > > -- > > > > > > > > --- > > > > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google > > Groups > > > > "Ledger" group. > > > > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send > > an > > > > email to ledger-cli+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. > > > > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. > > > > > > > > > > -- > > > > > > --- > > > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > > > "Ledger" group. > > > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > > > email to ledger-cli+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. > > > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. > > > > -- > > > > --- > > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > > "Ledger" group. > > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > > email to ledger-cli+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. > > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. > > > > -- > > --- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "Ledger" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to ledger-cli+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. -- --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Ledger" group. 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