Table of contents
Introduction
Starting Puppy Money
Using Puppy Money
Viewing Entries
Printing
Backup
Troubleshooting
Disclaimer
Puppy Money is written in tcl/Tk and utilises the sqlite database. For more information about sqlite go to their home page here.
Puppy Money is meant to be a lightweight money manager for single home
use and thus does not contain all the bells & whistles that other
financial programs have.
It is designed to be simple to use and to provide you with a
means of keeping track of your finances through a simple interface. The
interface consists of a series of graphical tools that allow you to
enter and retrieve data from the database with the minimum of fuss.
Because Puppy Money is designed to be simple the interface contains a
series of buttons, labels and entry fields that have been written in
plain English to enable you to understand easily what is required to
use Puppy Money.
Puppy Money is designed to be installed and run in Puppy, if you wish
to use it in any other version of Linux you will have to unpack the
dotpup and install it by hand you will also have to compile sqlite for your version.
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When you start Puppy Money for the first time you will be presented
with a main window containing a message to read this help file and the
following menu buttons:
File
Create Account
Open Account
Help
The File button has a popdown menu with the following item:
Close
The Create Account menu contains one item:
Create New Account
The Open Account menu contains one item:
Select Account
Note: Closing the main window will close all other Puppy Money
windows that are open except for the Help, About and Main Monthly Expenses Summary windows which must
be closed by a left click on the X in the top right corner.
Create Account
Before you can start using Puppy Money you must create a personal account.
To create an account in Puppy Money click on the File menu then click on Create New
Account. This will open another window that contains buttons and entry
fields.
Note that except for the account selection box all selections in Puppy
Money are accomplished by a single click on the left mouse button.
The menu buttons are File, Edit, Help
and at the bottom of the window is a button, Create Account.
There is a button to allow you to select the currency of your country,
note that this will display the international three letter code for the
selected country and not a symbol i.e GBP for Great Britan.
The
fields are for Name of account, Your Name, Address, Phone Number, Start Date and Start
Balance.
The File menu only contains a Close entry, Edit has a Grab & Paste Text entry and Help has Help and About.
Entering Details
To enter details into the provided fields you can use use various
methods. First ensure that the field that you wish to use has the
flashing ibar in it.
This allows you type or paste into this field, to change to the next or
another field use either the tab key at the left of the keyboard or use
the mouse and left click in the field you wish to use.
1. Type the information in using the keyboard.
2. Use the Grab & Paste utility.
If you have information in a
document that you wish to enter open the document in a word processor
and highlight the information you wish to use. Return to the Puppy
Money window where you wish to enter the information and click on
Edit/Grab & Paste, this will paste the information into the
selected field.
3. Use keystrokes to copy and paste.
Follow the same procedure above
but instead of using the mouse hit the c key while holding down the
Ctrl key, ensure the field has the flashing Ibar by moving the mouse
cursor over the Puppy Money window then hit the v key while holding
down the Ctrl key.
The above instructions apply to all the different entry sections in Puppy Money.
Currency
To select your currency click on the Currency button which will open a selection box with a listing of countries
click on a country then click the OK button at the bottom this will display the currency that you have selected.
Account Name
Enter a name for your account using a single word, if
you wished to use your name e.g. John then you would enter John.
An important point to remember is that you can create more than one
account.
If you enter a name that has been previously used you will receive a
message informing you that the account
already exists and to enter a different name. You can use any name but
for display purposes try to keep it short.
The name you enter will be displayed with the last two digits of the
year that you enter i.e. john06. As you can see the name is displayed
in lower case, this is not an error but a function of the backup
procedure.
Name
The name you use for the account and the owners name can be the same as
the owners name does not affect the account.
Address
Your address is not important it is just an identifier, you could enter
your street name, city/town, state and country using abbrevations. This
field is mainly to enable you to keep track of the location of
different accounts.
Postcode
Enter your postcode or zipcode or a four digit number if you do not have a postcode.
Phone Number
Again this is just an identifier if you do not have a phone number just enter a number.
Date
This field is important, make sure that you enter the correct
date here and in the other entry windows using the format laid out
below.
Enter the date using the format ( dd-mm-yyyy ) which means the date must be entered
as the number of the day, the number of the month, and the number of
the year i.e.
01-01-2006 the first of January 2006 or
26-02-2006 the twentysixth of February 2006
do not use any other format apart from this as Puppy Money will not
recognize it and will produce an error message when you try to create your account:
click OK and you will be returned to the create account window where you can re-enter the date.
Note: This message will appear every time you try to enter an incorrect date format in any of the other sections.
Start balance
Enter the amount you wish to start your account with, if you are not using a starting balance just enter zero.
When you
have entered the details click on the Create Account button in the left hand bottom
corner. Your account has now been created.
If you wish to close the window without saving your settings click on File/Close,
this will bring up a
message asking if you wish to close without saving your settings or
not.
Clicking Yes will close the window returning you to the main window.
You must fill in all the fields, if you fail to do so an error message will appear prompting you to fill all fields:
If you make any mistakes entering data such as dates and names you
cannot remove this data from the database, wrong amounts can be
adjusted by entering the same amount in the opposite entry format.
Wrong names or punctuation marks can only be removed by deleting the
database and starting from the beginning using the reset menu option.
Once you have created your account it is time to start filling in the details of your income and expenses.
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Select Account
When you click on the Create Account button a selection box will
open with your account listed in it, if you double click on your
account using the left mouse button the account window will open.
Any additional accounts that are created can be opened in this box by a
left mouse button click on 'Open Account' in the main Puppy Money
window and then double clicking on the account name with the left mouse button.
The Account window
When the account window opens you will be presented with a message, the
details of the selected account and a set of menu buttons.
The File menu contains:
Close
Remove
Backup
Restore
The Update Account menu contains:
Add Income Details
Add Expense Details
Add Loans Details
Add Loans Payments
Add Insurance Details
Add Insurance Payments
The View menu contains:
View Details ___
Monthly Summary
Main Costs
Loans Details
Loans Payments
Insurance Details
Insurance Payments
Income Details
Balance Sheet
Find Details ___
Find by Date
Find by Heading
The Help menu contains:
Puppy Help
About
Add Income Details
When you click on the OK
button to create your account the 'Enter Income Details' window will open with fields to enter
details of your income. There are two sections here, one for your main
income and one for any additional income that you might have.
This window can be accessed in any account by clicking on 'Update Account / Add Income Details'
The fields are simple enough:
Date: for the date on which you received the payment.
Source: For the source of the payment e.g. your place of employment etc.
Amount: For the amount of the payment.
The same applies to the 'Other' income section.
For instructions on how to fill in the fields refer the previous section on 'Entering Details' .
You can fill in each section on its own and save the details separately, as before
you must put an entry in each of the three fields, failure to do so
will result in an error message.
When you click on the Save .... button the following message will appear,
If you have finished click Cancel if not click OK.
Clicking OK will clear the fields and allow you to enter fresh data.
To close the window at any time click on File/Close.
Add Expense Details
To enter expense details click on 'Update Account' and from the
dropdown menu click on 'Add expense Details', this will open the Expense entry window.
There are preset fields in this window covering most areas of cost and
a Misc field for any expense not included in this window.
This window
does not require you to fill in all the fields but the date must be
entered. When you have finished entering data click Save Expenses to save the details or File/Close to exit without saving.
Add Loans Details
The next section deals with loans, click on 'Update Account / Loans Details' to open the loans details window.
The 'Loan Details' window contains fields for four categories of loans,
Personal, Credit Card, Car and House. The fields are as follows:
Provider: This is who you have borrowed the money from e.g. Bank, Credit Company etc.
Date: The date that the loan was obtained.
Amount: The total amount that was borrowed.
Duration: The time over which the loan must be repaid.
Interest: The amount of interest that must be paid on the loan.
Charges: Any charges that must be added to the loan.
Each loan can be saved separately so that if you only have one loan but
acquire another one at a later date you can save the details at that
time but you can only use each section once. If you attempt to reuse a
loan section you will receive a warning message informing you
that the section has been closed, you can of course use a different
unused section but when they have all been used you will have to go
back to using pencil & paper.
Of course if you have more loans than are catered for here you obviously need a bigger financial program.
The first three fields must be filled in, failure to do so will result
in an error message and nothing will be saved. If you do not need to
fill in the last three fields just enter zeros otherwise you will
receive an error message informing you that the fields are blank.
When you have finished filling in the details of the loan/loans click the Save button below the relevant loan.
Click File/Close to close the window at any time.
Loan Payments
To record the payments you make on any loan click on 'Update
Account / Add Loan Payments' to open the "Enter Loan Payment Details'
window.
This window contains fields to record the date and amount of loan
payments for different loans plus an Edit menu that contains a Grab and
Paste section, there is also a link to this Help file in the Help menu.
Enter the date and amount and click on the save button relating to the
type of loan. If you leave either field blank you will receive an error
message.
Click on the File/Close button to close the window at any time and you will receive this message.
Insurance Details
Click on Add Insurance Details to add details of
insurance that you may have. As in the loans section these are
predefined areas and can only be used once so if you have a lot of
different policies you probably need a bigger program to accommodate
them.
This section is the same as the rest, you must fill in each field,
failure to do so will result in an error message. The same applies to
the date format
Insurance Payments
When you have filled in a section of the details you can add payments by clicking on Add Insurance Payments.
Here again if you fail to enter data in both fields you will receive messages reminding you to do so.
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Clicking
on the 'View Details' menu selection will open a cascading menu containing the following
submenus:
View Details
Monthly Summary
Main Costs
Loans
Details
Loans Payments
Insurance Details
Insurance Payments
Income
Balance Sheet
Find Details
Find by Date
Find by Heading
Monthly Summary
This
selection displays the 'Main entries' information in a spreadsheet format . The data is arranged as a
summary of the monthly totals for each field with a complete monthly
total in the green section on the left hand side.
Each field is also totaled at the bottom which results in a yearly total of each field in the green section.
Finally the sum of the totals is displayed in the bottom left hand
corner. This total is only for the main entries, the loans details are
displayed separately.
This display helps you keep a check on monthly expenses for your
main costs.Click the X in the top left hand corner to close the window.
Main Costs
Main Costs displays the above
information in a scrolling format and shows the cost of each item with
a total for each column at the bottom. There is no total for all the
items and no monthy totals, this information is displayed in the
'Monthly Summary' window.
There is a 'Save' button in the top left hand corner which can be used
to create a file containing the data in these fields, this file can be
opened in a spreadsheet and thus printed out.
This window helps you find the cost and entry date of each item in the main expenses section. Click the X in the top left hand corner to close the window.
Loans Details
The Loan Account Details window contains four buttons, one for each loan.
Clicking on a button will open a scrollable display showing the details
for the selected loan.displaying the information for each loan that you
have regarding the
following:
Provider
Date
Amount
Duration
Interest
Charges
Click on the Ok button to close the window.
Loans Payments
This is another scrolling window that
displays the payments and date for each loan that you have.
At the bottom of each loan Amount column is a Total field which shows
the total of the payments already made to show how much has been already paid
off each loan.
Click OK to close the window.
Income
The details of your income, main and
any other, are displayed in this scrolling window with the date , the
source of the income and the amount. The totals are shown at the bottom
of the window.
Click Ok to close the window.
Balance Sheet
The final selection in this
section displays the starting and finishing dates , the total income
and expenses and the starting and finishing balances of the account.
If the account shows that the income exceeds the expenditure the figure
will be displayed in black, if expenditure exceeds income the figure
will be displayed in red.
There is a 'Save' button in the bottom left hand corner that allows you to save the data for printing.
Note: See the section on printing for further details.
Click Close to close the window.
Find Details
The 'Find Details' menu contains the following sections:
Find by date
When you click on the Find by date submenu a window opens containing the following:
An 'Enter Date' field
A set of selection buttons
A search button
A Reset button
Enter Date: To search for
an item in the main expenses table enter the date when the data was
saved, click on the item you are searching for then click on Search.
The results of your search will be displayed in the lower area of the window.
If you enter an invalid date i.e., one
for which there is no amount saved, the Amount field will be blank.
If you do not enter a date you will
receive an Error message telling you to close the window and try again.
If you enter a date with the wrong format you will receive an error message.
Click on 'Close' to close the window.
Find by Heading
Clicking on the Find by Heading menu cause the following display to appear:
Click on the item you wish to find then click on 'Search' this will produce a dropdown scrollable display:
If you wish to search again simply click on the Reset button.
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Printing from Puppy Money
is not possible at the moment but there is a workaround that will give
you hard copies of some of your data.
To print a copy of the main expenses table simply click on the 'Save'
button and then open up Gnumeric. Click on 'Open' either from the Open
icon or 'File/Open', click on the file select button ( it probably says
Spreadsheets ) then open /root/my-documents and locate the file that
has your account name and ends in SVA i.e. if the account name is john
look for johnSVA then click on Open at the bottom. This will display
the data
in a spreadsheet.
You will have to highlight the amounts and click on the 'Align left justify 'icon in the upper section of the window.
Save the file and print it out. If you do not have a working printer in
Puppy save the file as an MS Excel document, this allows you to open the
document in Excel and print it from there.
The same applies to the balance sheet simply click on ' Save ' then
locate the file with the account name ending in SVB in my-documents and follow the same
procedure as above.
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Because sqlite creates each database as a single file to do a backup is
a simple matter of making a copy of that file. In Puppy Money a feature called Backup and Restore has been implemented.
When you wish to do a backup of your account simply click on 'File/Backup' in your account:
select where you wish to backup your data by left clicking on the appropiate button.
If you select 'Save to your computer' the data will be saved on your hard drive and you will receive a message:
click to close the message.
When you select 'Save to floppy disk' you will receive a message:
use a new floppy disk if possible to avoid errors, label the disk insert it and click OK.
Wait until you receive the message:
you may now remove the floppy disk, do not attempt to remove the disk while writing is in progress as indicated by the floppy light being on.
Removing the floppy disk before being told to do so may result in an incomplete backup and corruption of data.
Restoring from Backups
To restore from your backups click on File/Restore this will open the
Restore window with the options to restore from your computer or a
floppy disk.
If you have saved you backup to your computer click the 'Restore from
your computer' button to restore your data. When the data is
sucessfully restored you will receive a message.
If you try to restore without previously saving you will receive a message similar to the one below.
To restore from a floppy click on the 'Restore from floppy disk' button which will display this message:
of course the name will not be the same (unless your account name is
bill) but will be the name of the account that you have open.
When the data is restored you will receive a message.
If there are any problems you will receive error messages and the data will not be restored.
One of the first things most people like to do with a new program is
explore it but in Puppy Money this can lead to a rash of error messages
as the database must have tables in it before they can be read.
These tables are only created when the account is created so you must
first create an account and populate the tables with entries.
If you have entered the wrong amount in any of the fields you can
rectify this by putting a minus entry in the same section i.e.
If you have entered an extra $20 in the expenses section just enter -20 in the same field.
If you wish to start over again because the entries are wrong or
you have mixed things up simply click on File in the main window and
click on 'Remove', This will remove the database and allow you to start
from the beginning, you will receive a message telling you to click Yes
to proceed or No to exit.
If you receive any other error messages not covered in this help section just click Ok, close Puppy Money and start over again.
If you have problems read the Help file first then either PM me, Ian, on the forum or email me at [ ian@puppylinux.org ].
Because Puppy Money is designed to be installed and run in Puppy I can
give no guarantee that it will run in any other Linux distro.
Puppy Money was written in Chubby Puppy 1.0.4 and tested in Puppy 1.0.7
but I give no guarantee that it will run on your Puppy setup or that it
will not destroy your installation. If you have any doubts back up your
data before attempting to install and use Puppy Money.
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