Money Manager Ex User Manual
MMEX 0.9.8.0

• Frequently Asked Questions

Introduction

Money Manager Ex (MMEX) is a System that models the real financial world, to help us (the user) maintain our personal finances. The Money Manager EX Software, is Open Source, and free to use.

The primary goal of MMEX is to simplify the process of tracking financial information, in an easy to use program that can be used as regular as necessary, to help us keep track of where our money comes from and more importantly, where our money goes, in order to make better financial decisions for our future.

Think of Money Manager Ex as a computer checkbook which enables you to balance your accounts, organize, manage and generate reports for your finances.

It is also a great way to keep abreast of your financial worth.

The purpose of this manual is to give you (the user) some basic instructions for using MMEX. This instruction manual will evolve as the program evolves. So check the help system with each update and see what's new and how to better utilize MMEX.

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Working towards better Financial Health

Becoming organized financially requires some amount of discipline. Financial management can become complicated when there is no clear understanding of how much money we are getting, regarded as income as opposed to our expenses which is how much money we spend. Debt usually results when our cash flow is restricted because our expenses exceed our income. Then we need to borrow money to maintain our cash flow to enable us to purchase our necessary items.

The first step towards better Financial Health, is to maintain good financial records. It is only when we have a clear understanding of where our money goes, that we can make an informed decision of where to cut back on our expenses when our cash flow becomes tight. If we do need to borrow money, we can then better manage our debts as well.

Did you realize you spent $600 in buying DVD movies last year? How many times did you watch them? Do you think now that the $600 would have been better spent on the unexpected maintenance on the auto that came up yesterday? Of course there is no right or wrong answer to how you should spend your money. After all, it is you who earned that money and the right to spend it whichever way you see fit. But you can always make your money work harder for you.

Here's where personal finance software comes in. They help you slice/dice the financial data to give you better insight into what is going on. Always remember the software can only be as good as the data it has to process. Garbage In Garbage Out. But if you have started thinking of even using Personal finance software, you are well on your way to making every dollar count.

Read on how to work with Money Manager Ex.

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Money Manager Ex Concepts

Money Manager EX models the real world to help us maintain our personal finances.

Generally we receive money from someone for a service we provide, or a product that we sell. This is regarded as Income or as a Deposit to our system. When we purchase an item or use a service, the money that we spend is regarded as an expense or Withdrawal to our system. In MMEX, the people that give us money or receive our money are regarded as the Payees of the system.

As we hopefully do not spend all the money we receive, we would obviously need a place to keep our money. This is generally, some financial institution, or several institutions or in our pocket. MMEX tags these places as Accounts.

When we spend or receive money, we see this as a transaction, and the reason for our income or expense is our category. There will be times where we need to transfer money from one place to another, such as a withdrawal from an ATM, and this type of transaction is known as a transfer.

One other important thing to consider is the currency we use to perform the transactions.

With all of these things to keep track of, MMEX uses a database to store and connect all these entities together.

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Recommendations

The database that MMEX generates, known as the .mmb file, becomes an important file for you to maintain. Depending on circumstances, security features such as encryption can be employed, which is recognized as a .emb file. This is where we can attach a password to the database, and will require a password every time MMEX is opened.

When encrypting your database, Don't forget your password.

As with any computer system, the data we produce is important to us, and therefore need to safeguard against system malfunction. MMEX has a backup system where it can produce a dated copy when the database is opened, and can update the daily copy if the database is opened more than once every day, if necessary.

• Always backup your .mmb or .emb database file regularly.

• Always keep backup copies on other devices to protect against hardware failure.

• When upgrading to a new version of MMEX, make sure you backup your .mmb or .emb database file before doing so.

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Creating a New Database

When MMEX initially starts up, it will attempt to load the last database that was opened. If no database existed, the user is presented with the option to either open an existing database, or create a new one.

If you need to create a new database file, from the Menu, Select File->New Database.

This will prompt you to specify a new name for your .mmb database file, at the location you specify. Your new database file is now created and the New Database Wizard will be displayed to help you initialize the new database and assist in creating your first account.

The New Database Wizard will request you to set the Base Currency and a User Name.

MMEX comes with a default set of currencies which you can use, to correspond to your countries currency settings. New accounts will then use this Base Currency setting as the default. This allows accounts from different countries to reflect the value in the base currency.

To help identify the purpose of the database, a User Name is requested. This is optional, as it is only used as a title on the Home Page, and in reports.

Both these settings can later be changed if required by selecting the menu: Tools ->Options

The database name will be displayed on the title bar which helps remind you which database file is open.
The new .mmb database file is not encrypted.

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Encrypting your database file.

The database can now be encrypted as follows: on the Menu, Select File->Save Database As

1. Select your location, and select your .mmb file or create a new name for your database.

2. Change the Save As Type: to Encrypted MMB Files (*.emb), then Save

3. Enter a password for your file – You will need the password when opening the database file.

Tips:

1. Remember to make backups of your .mmb or .emb database files.

2. Database file is not encrypted:
   That means anyone else having the proper know how, can actually open the file and read the contents. So make sure that if you are storing any sensitive financial information, it is properly guarded.

3. For encrypted database files: Remember your password.

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Creating New Accounts

When creating a new database file, you will automatically be requested to create a new account.

To manually create a new account, from the Menu, Select Accounts->New Account.

This will bring up the Add Account Wizard. The wizard will assist in collecting the important information of the Name and Type of Account. The Type of Account is not changeable, but the name can changed when editing account information.

Name of the Account: This is a required field. The recommendation is to name your accounts uniquely and in relation to real world accounts. Example: With CitiBank, we have a Savings account and a credit card Visa account. You could name your accounts as "CitiBank Savings" and “Citibank Visa”.

Type of Account: MMEX currently supports three types of accounts:

1. “Checking” Account: This is the most common type of account used for MMEX, and can handle most common account types, such as checking accounts, savings accounts, and credit card accounts. Also known as Bank Account, and supports three kinds of transactions. These are withdrawal, deposit and transfers.

2. “Term” Accounts: similar to Checking Accounts with the exception that they appear in their own section on the home page and can be shown or hidden for normal day usage. For a better explanation see the account setup example.
   
   These kinds of accounts cover specialized accounts such as Cash Term Accounts, Bank Mortgage accounts, Loan accounts, or investment accounts with regular income or expenditure that you need to keep track of. These accounts have their own balance section on the Home Page. These accounts also, supports three kinds of transactions.

3. "Investment" Account: The other type of account that MMEX supports is an "Investment" Account. This type of account allows you to track stock/bonds/mutual funds investments and possibly other investments you may own.

To properly setup accounts, you should have balance information for the accounts you want to add to MMEX. You can get this information from your most recent bank, investment and credit card statements. To track additional information about this account, optionally you can enter your account details such as Account Number, Held At, Website, Contact info and Access Info. You can enter additional notes about the account in the notes field.

Most accounts have some kind of balance in them, for example say in a credit card account, you have a current balance of $2304.67, you could put that value in the initial balance field. Going forward you only need to add transactions beyond that date when you had the balance.

The Account Status can be set to "Open" or "Closed". Closed accounts are just that. They are no longer active. Setting this status is just a way to de-clutter your view in your tree view navigation pane. Permanent settings are made by changing the View Options on the Menu, Tools->Options, you can hide the closed accounts. See Tips on Navigation Tree

Currency: This is initially set to the database Base Currency setting which was initially set when creating the database. You can set the currency that is associated with this account and can be different to the base currency. The exchange rate for the currency can be changed using the menu: Tools ->Organize Currency

Example: You live in the USA using US Dollars, and have an Italian bank account using the Euro. Most of your accounts are in USD. What is the real value of your Italian bank account? By changing the exchange rate for the Italian Euro, you can get the correct value of your accounts.

You also can mark accounts as a 'Favorite Account'. This again is used to change the accounts that are visible in the navigation bar. See Tips on Navigation Tree

Tips:

1. Use the toolbar icon for quick selection of the Add Account Wizard.

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Account Setup Example:

We have a savings account with $1250, a check account with $500, a MasterCard owing $250, a Visa Card owing $475, a home mortgage loan of $230,965 and an education fund to send the children to college in the future currently at $5000 earning interest.
We would set up the following accounts:

On the Home Page the balances would be $1025 for Bank accounts, and $-225,965 for Term Accounts

When a payment is made from your Savings Account to your MasterCard with a Transfer Transaction the balance on the home page remains the same. When a payment is made from your savings to your home mortgage, the balance on the home page will reflect the payment. Now you can determine the amount of money you have on a day to day basis. Regular payments can also be set up from your savings account to your mortgage account using Repeating Transactions.

Tip on using the Navigation Tree and Home page:

As more accounts are created the Navigation Tree and Home page can become very large.
This views can be temporarily changed to show or hide the appropriate section:

Using a mouse Right-Click on:

• Bank Accounts in the Navigation tree, will allow all accounts or only favorite accounts to be shown, temporarily changing the permanent settings, as well as other useful options.

• Any account name under Bank or Term accounts, to bring up other useful options.

To make the change permanent, change the options using the menu: Tools ->Options -->View Options

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Editing Account Information

Once you have created an account, you can edit any of the account information fields in the following ways:

1. Using menu Accounts –> Edit Account
   The list of account will be displayed where the required account is selected.

2. Selecting the account name in the navigation pane
   Right click to bring up the pop-up menu and select "Edit Account"

This will bring up the account information dialog where the required fields can be changed.

• Edit the account details

• Use the "OK" button to save the account information.

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Creating New Transactions

Once you have created a new account, select the required account from the navigation tree. This account is then displayed in the main window where a new transaction can be created by: one can start entering transactions.

• Using the New button at the bottom of the screen,

• From the Navigation Tree, Select the required account.

• account you want to enter transactions into. This opens the register of transactions associated with this account. To create a new transaction, click the "New" button to open up the New/Edit Transaction dialog. Enter the details associated with this transaction. Start by selecting the type of transaction from "Withdrawal", "Deposit" or "Transfer". Then select the Payee, Category, the transaction date, number, any notes and then the transaction amount. Press "OK" button to save the transaction.
  
  Here are some notes on the fields associated with the transaction dialog.

Transaction Types:

• Withdrawal: is one where one makes a payment and is an expense.

• Deposit: is one where money is received and is an income.

• Transfer: is one where a withdrawal is made from one account and is deposited into another account.
  This type of transaction is not included in Income/Expense calculations.
  
  Transfer transactions activates the Advanced button. Used for advanced situations when we require the amount withdrawn from the “From” account, to be different to the amount as a deposit in the “To” account, or vice-versa.
  (That is why it is advanced.) When the Advanced (To account) is different to the amount (From Account) a note “is active!” is displayed next to the “Advanced” button.

Payee: This is a person or an organization to whom the money goes or comes from.

• Clicking the payee button opens up the payee dialog. You can select the payee from that dialog or create a new payee.

Category: Category selects the kind of expense/income for the transaction.

• Clicking the category button opens up the category dialog. You can select the category from the dialog or create a new category.

Transaction Number: is a field to enter any kind of number associated with the transaction like check number.
Transaction Status: Select from "Unreconciled", "Reconciled", "Void", "Flag for Followup" status options. This marks the transaction into various states.

• Unreconciled: When you enter a transaction, it initially is in the state of "Unreconciled". Which means the transaction has not been reconciled with your bank/credit card company's balance.

• Reconciled: Once the transaction is checked and verified with a credit card company's balance information, it can be marked as reconciled.

• Void: If you entered a transaction that later became invalid or you canceled the transaction, instead of deleting the transaction you can also mark it as void so you have a record of the transaction.

• Flag For Followup: This status marks transactions as needing more action. For example, you receive a balance statement from the financial institution and you notice that the transaction amount is different between what you recorded and what is in the statement. You can mark it as flag for follow up so that you can followup with the financial institution.

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Editing and Updating Transactions

Editing existing transactions can be achieved in a number of ways:

• select the transaction and then click the edit button.

• double-click the selected transaction.

• press enter on the selection.

Any of these actions will open the transaction dialog box containing the details of the selected transaction. Make the changes and click OK to save the changes.

The “Advanced” button

• Activates when a transfer transaction is used.

• A note “is active!” is displayed to indicate Advanced activity.

• This is displayed next to the Advanced button when the Advanced “To account” is different to the amount field, (From Account)

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Reconciling and Balancing Transactions

Transactions that are entered into MMEX are considered unreconciled. This means that they have not been verified with the statement from the financial institution. Once the statement comes or by viewing an online bank statement a transaction can be considered reconciled if the details of the transaction match that from the financial institution. Then the transaction can be marked as reconciled. By marking these transactions you can keep track whether the transactions you are entering match the actual transactions. In MMEX, reconciled and unreconciled transactions are shown by different icons.

Tip:To mark a transaction as reconciled, just select the transaction and hit the 'r' or 'R' key. To mark a transaction as unreconciled, just select the transaction and hit the 'u' or 'U' key.

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Flagging transactions for followup

Some transactions might have some issues that you want to follow up on. Mark these as with status of flag for followup. This is indicated in MMEX with a different icon.

Tip:

• To mark a transaction as requiring followup, just select the transaction and hit the 'f or 'F' key.

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Working with Currencies

As MMEX can be used in many countries, MMEX need to consider the currency for the country of use. When creating a new database, the Base Currency is set up as the currency for the country of the user. If the user's currency settings is not listed in the default currencies, the user can create their own currency Listing.

MMEX also allows us to work in more than one currency if required. When this is done, a summary of the currencies being used is also displayed on the Home Summary Page.

You can manage Currencies by using the menu item: Tools -> Organize Currency.

To Add a new Currency:

• Use the Add button in the Currency Dialog

• Provide a suitable name for your new currency.
  Note: This name is not changeable, but the currency can be deleted if not being used.

• Adjust the currency values in the Currency Manager.
  The Currency Manager is also available when editing a currency.

• Use the Update button to save the changes before closing.
  Note: All changes will be lost if the Update button is not used before Closing.

When more than one currency is being used, the Conversion to Base Rate needs to be set, to allow the value of the currency to properly reflect the value at the base rare. To allow for the automatic update of currencies, the Currency Symbol needs to be set for the particular currency being used.

To use the menu item: Tools –> Online Update Currency Rate, the following must occur:

• Activate the option from the Tools –> Options... Others page.

• Set the Currency Symbol for all currencies requiring update.

• Set the base currency value 1

Tips:

1. Use the toolbar icon for quick selection of the Organize Currencies dialog

2. Use the up/down keys to navigate the currency selection.

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Working with Categories

Categories indicate the reason an expenditure is made or an income is received.

Example: If we want to record the repairs for our car, we would set a category of: Car and a subcategory of maintenance.

You can manage Categories by using the menu item: Tools -> Organize Categories.
Once the category dialog opens, you can add new categories and subcategories.

To Add a new Category:

• Select Categories at the root of the tree (At the top),

• type the new category name into the text box

• Use the the Add button.

The new category will appear at the bottom, and will be resorted when the dialog box is re-opened.

To Add a new Subcategory:

• Select the category that you wish the subcategory to belong to

• type the new subcategory name into the text box

• use the the Add button.

You can also change the names by selecting the category/subcategory in the list , modify the name in the text box, then use the Edit button. Use a similar action to delete the category/subcategory in the list.

Note: You cannot delete categories which are being used by any transactions.

Ensure that no transactions use this category/subcategory, combination. This can be done by:

• Editing the transaction and changing the category/subcategory.

• Deleting the transaction using this category/subcategory.

• using the menu item: Tools –> Relocation of... Categories, where you can move all categories of a particular name to an alternate category/subcategory combination.

This would then make the category free so it can then be deleted.

Tips:

1. Use the toolbar icon for quick selection of the Organize Categories dialog

2. Use the up/down keys to navigate the tree selection.

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Working with Payees

Payees are the people or institutions that give us money, or
the people or institutions who we pay, for our goods and services.

You can manage Payees by using the menu item: Tools –> Organize Payees.

Once the payee dialog opens you can add new payees, edit or delete existing payees.

To Add a new Payee:

• Enter the name of the payee in the Filter Payees box

• Use the Add button

You can also select the payee in the list, then use the Edit or Delete button to perform the required action.

Note: You cannot delete payees which are being used by any transactions.

To delete a payee, ensure that no transactions use this payee. This can be done by:

• Editing the transaction and changing the payee.

• Deleting the transaction using this payee.

• By using the menu item: Tools –> Relocation of... Payees, where you can move all payees of a particular name to an alternate name.

This would then make the payee free so it can then be deleted.

Tips:

1. Use the toolbar icon for quick selection of the Organize Payees dialog

2. Use the up/down keys to navigate the payee selection.

3. Use the % as a wild-card to match many characters in the filter.

4. Use _ to match a single character in the filter.

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Importing From CSV Files

MMEX can import from a wide variety of formats. One of them is a fixed format CSV file. This file format exactly matches the CSV format that MMEX can export. So it can be useful to move data from one .mmb database file to another .mmb database file. To easily see the format of the CSV file, you can try exporting an account to a CSV file and then analyzing the format created.

The general format is as follows:
Date - Date of the transaction (Displayed in the format specified in Options->DateFormat)
Payee - To whom the transaction was made. In the case of a transfer transaction, this indicates the name of the account from which the transfer was made or to the account the transfer was made.
Transaction Type - This can either be "Withdrawal" or "Deposit"
Amount - The transaction amount as a positive value
Category - The category of the transaction
SubCategory - The subcategory of the transaction if any (otherwise blank)
Number - Transaction Number
Notes - Transaction Notes

Note that the transactions from a CSV file can only be imported into a single MMEX account.

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Importing From QIF Files

Quicken Interchange Format (QIF) is an open specification for reading and writing financial data to media (i.e. files). A QIF file typically has the following structure:

!Type:type identifier string
[single character line code]Literal String Data
...
^
[single character line code]Literal String Data
...
^

Each record ends with a ^ (caret).
See example QIF transaction

!Type:Bank Header
D6/ 1/94 Date
T-1,000.00 Amount
N1005 number
PBank Of Mortgage Payee
^ End of transaction

QIF is older than Open Financial Exchange (OFX). The inability to reconcile imported transactions against the current account information is one of the primary shortcomings of QIF. It is commonly supported by financial institutions to supply down-loadable information to account holders.

MMEX can import transactions from specific types of QIF formats into an account.

The types are the following: (You can find the type of QIF by opening in a text editor)
!Type:Bank Bank account transactions
!Type:Cash Cash account transactions
!Type:CCard Credit card account transactions

Important Note (1): The date format option has to match that of the date format in the QIF file, otherwise, date parsing by MMEX will fail and will result in transactions having incorrect dates.

Important Note (2): After importing from QIF, all transactions will have a "Follow Flag" as it its status. You can mark all transactions with this flag using the bulk status setting commands using the right click menu in the account view.

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Importing From MM.NET CSV Files

MMEX can also import from CSV files that are exported from the Money Manager.NET program. This is to primarily help users of that program migrate to using MMEX.

The general format is as follows:
Date - Date of the transaction (Displayed in the format specified in Options->DateFormat)
Payee - To whom the transaction was made. In the case of a transfer transaction, this indicates the name of the account from which the transfer was made or to the account the transfer was made.
Amount - The transaction amount. If it is positive, it is considered a deposit, if it is negative, it is a withdrawal.
Number - Transaction Number
Status - Transaction status
Category - The category of the transaction. This is actually a compound string of the type "Category:SubCategory"
Notes - Transaction Notes

Note that the transactions from a CSV file can only be imported into a single MMEX account.

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Importing From Universal CSV Format

To alleviate the problem of users having to pre-format their bank transaction CSV files into the fixed format MMEX requires, MMEX also allows users to import CSV files where the order of fields is completely freeform. To use this importer, select the account you want to import into and then select the order of fields in the CSV file by picking and choosing from the list of possible fields. MMEX will now import the CSV file using the format information specified by the user. MMEX can import from a wide variety of formats. One of them is a fixed format CSV file. This file format exactly matches the CSV format that MMEX can export. So it can be useful to move data from one .mmb database file to another .mmb database file. To easily see the format of the CSV file, you can try exporting an account to a CSV file and then analyzing the format created.

The CSV field options are as follows:
Date - Date of the transaction (In the format specified in Options->DateFormat)
Payee - To whom the transaction was made. In the case of a transfer transaction, this indicates the name of the account from which the transfer was made or to the account the transfer was made.
Amount (+/-) - The transaction amount. If it is a positive value it is a deposit, negative value is a withdrawal.
Category - The category of the transaction
SubCategory - The subcategory of the transaction
Notes - Transaction Notes
Number - Transaction Number
Withdrawal - An +ive amount that is considered as a withdrawal. (Do not use if specifying Amount (+/-))
Deposit - An +ive amount that is considered as a deposit. (Do not use if specifying Amount (+/-))
Don't Care - Ignore this field

Note that the transactions from a CSV file can only be imported into a single MMEX account.

Important Note (1): The date format option has to match that of the date format in the QIF file, otherwise, date parsing by MMEX will fail and will result in transactions having incorrect dates.

Important Note (2): After importing from QIF, all transactions will have a "Follow Flag" as it its status. You can mark all transactions with this flag using the bulk status setting commands using the right click menu in the account view.

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Tips for creating CSV Files

• When creating your CSV file be sure that you remove the commas from your deposits and withdrawals. This can be done easily through a program such as Excel or OpenOffice Calc.

• Or you can change the delimiter to be used by MMEX by choosing Tools –> Options and changing the "Import/Export Settings" in the "General" option settings.

• You do not need to include balance values in your CSV File.

• Note that the transactions from a CSV file can only be imported into a single MMEX account.

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Exporting to CSV Files

MMEX can export to a fixed format CSV file. This file format exactly matches the CSV format that MMEX can import. So it can be useful to move data from one .mmb database file to another .mmb database file. To easily see the format of the CSV file, you can try exporting an account to a CSV file and then analyzing the format created.

The general format is as follows:
Date - Date of the transaction (Displayed in the format specified in Options->DateFormat)
Payee - To whom the transaction was made. In the case of a transfer transaction, this indicates the name of the account from which the transfer was made or to the account the transfer was made.
Transaction Type - This can either be "Withdrawal" or "Deposit"
Amount - The transaction amount as a positive value
Category - The category of the transaction
SubCategory - The subcategory of the transaction if any (otherwise blank)
Notes - Transaction Notes

Note that the transactions from an account can be exported to a single CSV file.

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Exporting to QIF Files

MMEX can export an account to a file of the format: QIF.

This format can also be used by MMEX to reload into an account.

Caution: Although Transfer transactions will be reloaded into a single account, they will not function correctly.

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Repeating Transactions

When we have transactions that occur at regular intervals, such as paying our bills, MMEX allows us to set these future transactions as Repeating Transactions. These transactions:

• Will be displayed as reminders on the Home Page 14 Days before a transaction is due.

• Can be set up to activate automatically on the due date.

• Can be set up to activate – allowing the user to adjust any values on the due date.

Access is by selecting Repeating Transactions from the navigation tree.

• To create new transactions, use the New button.

• Specify the starting account.

• Similar to creating new accounts except that we need to associate the transactions with an account. This is because this transaction needs to know the target account.

• set the Next Occurrence date to some future date

• select the Repeats as “daily”, “weekly” etc.

• Times Repeated:
  - enter a number for the number of times this will occur.
  - No number means indefinitely.

These transaction will be displayed as: Upcoming Transactions on the home page within 15 days of the due.

Note:

1. When we enter the transaction, we can change the amount, payee, category, status and date if required.

2. Entering a transaction before it is due, will gray out the transaction in the associated account until the day it becomes active.

3. To use the Cash Flow Reports we need to set up repeating transactions.

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Assets

MMEX allows you to track fixed assets like cars, houses, land and others. Each asset can have its value appreciate by a certain rate per year, depreciate by a certain rate per year, or not change in value. The total assets are added to your total financial worth.

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Transaction Filter

MMEX allows you to search for transactions that meet certain criteria. This can be done using the transaction filter option. The resulting list of transactions can be printed or saved as a HTML file.

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Budgeting

MMEX allows you to setup a budget for a year and compare how you did versus your budget. To setup a budget click on the 'Budgeting' tree node and add a budget year. Once the year has been added, select the year and edit the amounts for each category. This becomes the budget for the year.

Using the reports under 'Budgeting' it is possible to compare how you spent the money versus your actual budget.

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Reports

MMEX allows a variety of reports.
All the reports can also be printed if required using the menu: File->Print... -->Current View

Select the appropriate report under the Reports node in the navigation tree. Some reports require some user input, some do not. Once you view a report, you can print the report using the print options in the menu.

Financial Year Reports: (Required by various countries)

These are reports that generally do not start at the beginning of the calendar year, and appear as other branches of the main reports. These reports cover:

1. Previous Financial Year

2. Current Financial Year periods.

3. By default the start date of a financial year is 1^st July of the year.

The start date can be changed by the user to start on any day of any month, within a 12 month period by using the menu Tools ->Options then selecting the Others panel.

Transaction Report:

1. This allows the user to generate specific reports with specific selection criteria information.

2. Also known as a Transaction Filter.

Cash flow Reports

To work properly the Repeating Transactions need to be set up for the various accounts. The report will then use the Repeating Transactions for the various accounts, to reflect forward 10 years on a monthly basis and predict the amount of money that may be available each future month based on future commitments.

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Printing

MMEX supports printing of all reports that can be viewed.

The print options are available under the menu, File->Print... Current View

Recommendations:

• Use the page setup option to reformat the page if necessary

• Use the print preview option to check the layout of the report before printing.

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MMEX Options

You can modify some run time behavior of MMEX by changing the options in the Options Dialog.

Access from the menu with Tools->Options

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Frequently Asked Questions

1. How can I contribute?

2. What's the reason for the EX in the name of the software?

3. Is the .mmb file format proprietary? And is my data safe?

4. Can MMEX run from a USB Key?

5. How do I know MMEX is not trying to steal my sensitive financial information?

6. How do I print account statements using MMEX?

How can I contribute?

You can contribute by

• Reporting bugs

• Translating to your language

• Helping spread the word

• If you are a C++ expert, by helping extend MMEX developing code.

• If you are really very happy because you saved a lot of money by using MMEX, you can donate to the MMEX project.

What's the reason for the EX in the name of the software?

Originally I developed a personal finance software called Money Manager. It was written in .NET and more of a learning exercise than serious software development. It grew far beyond the original design. The software was frozen and work began on a new version which had a similar user interface and features, but written in C++. 

Usually Microsoft names their second version of their improved software APIs with an Ex extension as in doSomething() and doSomethingEx(). So I just followed the model and tacked on a 'Ex' to the end.

Is the .mmb format proprietary? And, Is my data safe?

Can MMEX run from a USB Key?

Yes.

MMEX is a portable application which means ability to run without installation, for example, from USB flash drive. If MMEX finds mmexini.db3 in its folder, it assumes portable mode. Copy mmex's files to USB Key and copy yours mmexini.db3 to mmex's folder on that drive.

To make MMEX portable:

1. On Windows (assume F:\ is USB flash drive)
   Copy "C:\Program Files\MoneyManagerEx" to F:\
   Copy "%APPDATA%\MoneyManagerEx\mmexini.db3" to F:\MoneyManagerEx
   Copy your database file to any folder on F:\
   
   
   

2. On Unix (assume /media/disk is mounted USB flash drive)
   Compile mmex from sources as usually,
   and make install prefix=/media/disk
   cp ~/.mmex/mmexini.db3 /media/disk/mmex/share/mmex
   
   or if you want to copy mmex which has already installed in /usr
   cp /usr/bin/mmex /media/disk/mmex/bin
   cp /usr/share/mmex /media/disk/mmex/share
   cp /usr/share/doc/mmex /media/disk/mmex/share/doc
   cp ~/.mmex/mmexini.db3 /media/disk/mmex/share/mmex
   
   
   

How do I know MMEX is not trying to steal my sensitive financial information?

Generally, with any closed source program, you have to depend upon the vendor's word regarding safety of the data. But with MMEX being open source, you can verify this claim yourself. Even if you are not a C++ expert, you can rest assured that anyone can access the source code at any time and verify the legitimacy of MMEX's intentions. MMEX does not connect to the internet unless you explicitly asked it do so (like checking for an update etc).

How do I print account statements using MMEX?

To print a statement with transactions from any arbitrary set of criteria, use the Transaction Filter to select the transactions you want and then do a print from the menu. File ->Print... ->Current View

The Transaction Filter is accessed from Reports --> Transaction Reports on the Navigation Tree, or
from the Quick Navigation buttons in the top left hand corner of MMEX.

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