Re: New Tutorial & Cash Accounts

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In Reply to: Re: New Tutorial & Cash Accounts posted by Tom on January 26, 2000 at 01:43:59:

: : : Hi Mark, Thanks for posting the new tutorial/introduction
: : : to Fund Manager. I know that for lots of us visual examples
: : : are a *much* more effective means of learning something new than
: : : trying to digest dry text. It's a welcome addition.

: : : I'd like to suggest an addition to the tutorial (ver 1.01 ?)for
: : : you to consider. I was surprised to see the minimal discussion
: : : of a cash account. This is, by far, the area of configuring FM
: : : that gave me the most trouble. Those of us that actually use
: : : "real world" Cash Accounts in FM that mirror our brokerage accounts
: : : *need* to know that when "setting up" the portfolio you *must*
: : : enter the cash account info *first*. I'm sure that anyone who
: : : spent an entire evening entering all of their portfolio data,
: : : and doing the cash account last (because it was the "least
: : : important" entry), only to find that it didn't work and had to
: : : be all done over would agree with me. My feeling is that when
: : : setting up a new portfolio that this is the *first* decision to
: : : be made: "Are you going to use a "real" cash account?" If so,
: : : you need to start with that.

: : : The other area that I think would be really helpful would be a
: : : discussion of the terminology in the EDIT ALL DATA field relating
: : : to cash accounts. I found that entering the data for the actual
: : : investments to be relatively intuitive. But, because you're using
: : : the same forms for the cash account as for your investments even
: : : though a (+) in one is a (-) in the other, I find that entering data
: : : for the cash account to be very confusing.

: : : regards,
: : : Tom

: : Hi Tom,

: : Thanks for the feedback on the tutorial, glad you found that useful.
: : Regarding cash accounts, you only need to set up the cash account first
: : if you want all your historical transactions to have corresponding entries
: : in the cash account. Some people may also prefer to just start the cash
: : account off with a certain balance on a day.

: : Which type of cash account entries are confusing, is it entering a new
: : transaction in the cash account, or viewing the corresponding entry
: : for some other transaction?

: : Thanks,
: : Mark
: : --

: Hi Mark,

: You Said:

: "you only need to set up the cash account first if you want all your
: historical transactions to have corresponding entries in the cash account"

: Sure, I imagine that lots of people *just* track their stocks/funds
: and and don't try to make their FM portfolio an "accurate-to-the-penny"
: copy of their brokerage act. *But* for those of that take advantage
: of this ability of FM to do just that it's a frustrating experience
: to learn by trial & error just how this needs to be configured
: "correctly". *One* paragraph in the beginning of the tutorial (*and*
: the "online" help file) would fix this. I can tell you that the first week
: that I tried FM and had to completely configure FM *twice* (because I didn't
: know that you have to *start* w/ the cash act) that I was *not* a happy camper.
: Your name was taken in vain more than once. I would *not* have paid anybody
: for this software at that point. Now, of course, you'd have to pry it out
: of my cold, dead fingers! ;-)

: and also:
: "Which type of cash account entries are confusing?"

: Entrys to the cash account that don't have a corresponding investment
: transaction entry. For example an account transaction fee. The
: "newbie" perspective on entering this info is: OK, FM is asking me
: a "natural language" question: How much was the Account Fee? My
: answer is $xx.xx (which is a positive #) The unthinking assumption
: is: The underlying software will subtract this from the account
: balance. But FM wants *me* to do the "transposing" (+ to -) This
: is not intuitive. Same story w/ withdrawals (redemptions) from the
: cash act.

: my $.02

: Tom

:
: : Mark Beiley
: :
: : Fund Manager for Windows 3.1x/95/98/NT
: :
: :

Hi Tom,

I can understand your point on the cash account, and definitely on
the account fee recording style, that has confused more than one person...
I will beef up the emphasis a little bit on the cash account concept in
the tutorial. I don't want to make too big of a point of this, as I think
it could cloud more important concepts I'm trying to get across. I can
only go by the feedback I get, but so far I've only heard from one persone (you)
on misunderstanding the cash account operation.

Thanks again for the feedback, I really do appreciate it.

Thanks,
Mark
--
Mark Beiley

Fund Manager for Windows 3.1x/95/98/NT

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