How to properly close accounts and use beancount with emacs?

[AV]

Hi,

I have some questions. Imagine the following scenario: I want to keep track of payments of a couple of room rentals. Each year the guest is different, therefore I create new accounts each year. So far I had a different file per year, but I think it would be easier to have one file with org-mode sections per year.

Here is an example of the accounts:

*** Accounts opening

2018-09-01 open Income:E:A:Banking:U:S:A:MrA  EUR

2018-09-01 open Income:E:A:Banking:U:S:A:MrB  EUR

*** 2018-10

2018-10-09 * "Mr. X: 30"

    Assets:E:A:Banking:U:S                                                           30 EUR

    Income:E:A:Banking:U:S:A:MrA                    -30 EUR

2018-10-16 * "Mr. Y: 30"

    Assets:E:A:Banking:U:S                                                           30 EUR

    Income:E:A:Banking:U:S:A:MrB              -30 EUR

Then, the period ends and I need to close the account

2019-09-01 close Income:E:A:Banking:U:S:A:MrA

2019-09-01 close Income:E:A:Banking:U:S:A:MrB

Now a new period starts and I open a new account

2018-09-01 open Income:E:A:Banking:U:S:A:MrC  EUR

2018-09-01 open Income:E:A:Banking:U:S:A:MrD  EUR

And the whole thing repeats...

First question: Would those definitions be correct and make sense?

Second question: I guess I cannot (or should not) close MrA and MrB accounts if they are not zero in balance, however I would like to keep track of what I earned in the Assets:E:A:Banking:U:S banking account. I would like MrA and MrB accounts to disappear when I use bean-report, but I would like to keep track of the money. I thought of creating a 2018 account an balance against that account but I am unsure if this is the correct procedure. What would be the correct way of doing this?

Third question: I use spacemacs and I would like to use emacs with beancount to have autocomplete and format correctly the transactions. The more the automation and less manual typing, the better. What would be the good way to go?

Fourth question: Is it possible to embed beancount chunks within org-mode files (with org-babel)? What would be the way to go, beancount files alone or org-mode files with beancount chunks? I guess I cannot use bean-report and the other tools with org-mode files with beancount chunks, right?

Thanks.

[Martin Blais]

On Sun, Sep 1, 2019 at 7:26 PM AV <von...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Hi,
>
> I have some questions. Imagine the following scenario: I want to keep track of payments of a couple of room rentals. Each year the guest is different, therefore I create new accounts each year. So far I had a different file per year, but I think it would be easier to have one file with org-mode sections per year.
>
> Here is an example of the accounts:
> *** Accounts opening
> 2018-09-01 open Income:E:A:Banking:U:S:A:MrA EUR
> 2018-09-01 open Income:E:A:Banking:U:S:A:MrB EUR
>
> *** 2018-10
> 2018-10-09 * "Mr. X: 30"
> Assets:E:A:Banking:U:S 30 EUR
> Income:E:A:Banking:U:S:A:MrA -30 EUR
>
> 2018-10-16 * "Mr. Y: 30"
> Assets:E:A:Banking:U:S 30 EUR
> Income:E:A:Banking:U:S:A:MrB -30 EUR
>
> Then, the period ends and I need to close the account
>
> 2019-09-01 close Income:E:A:Banking:U:S:A:MrA
> 2019-09-01 close Income:E:A:Banking:U:S:A:MrB
>
> Now a new period starts and I open a new account
>
> 2018-09-01 open Income:E:A:Banking:U:S:A:MrC EUR
> 2018-09-01 open Income:E:A:Banking:U:S:A:MrD EUR
>
> And the whole thing repeats...
>
> First question: Would those definitions be correct and make sense?

Yes (except the dates on your last two, but I think you clearly meant
those to be 2019)

>
> Second question: I guess I cannot (or should not) close MrA and MrB accounts if they are not zero in balance,

See https://bitbucket.org/blais/beancount/src/tip/beancount/plugins/check_closing.py

> however I would like to keep track of what I earned in the Assets:E:A:Banking:U:S banking account. I would like MrA and MrB accounts to disappear when I use bean-report, but I would like to keep track of the money. I thought of creating a 2018 account an balance against that account but I am unsure if this is the correct procedure. What would be the correct way of doing this?

Your asset (and other) accounts' balances will be unaffected by a
closing directive.
All the closing directive is used for is:
- to indicate to reports that they don't have to include this account
if the reporting period starts after the account is closed
- to detect errors, e.g. issue a warning if you're attempting to post
an amount to a closed account

>
> Third question: I use spacemacs and I would like to use emacs with beancount to have autocomplete and format correctly the transactions. The more the automation and less manual typing, the better. What would be the good way to go?

https://bitbucket.org/blais/beancount/src/tip/editors/emacs/

Here's my config
https://bitbucket.org/blais/beancount/src/tip/etc/emacsrc

>
> Fourth question: Is it possible to embed beancount chunks within org-mode files (with org-babel)? What would be the way to go, beancount files alone or org-mode files with beancount chunks? I guess I cannot use bean-report and the other tools with org-mode files with beancount chunks, right?

We used to use org-mode as a container with a minor mode for Beancount.
However, this has changed, and beancount-mode is now a major-mode, and
uses outline mode as a minor mode for folding.
(I don't know anything about chunks, I just use the folding features anyway.)



>
> Thanks.
>
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