On 3/23/2019 6:04 PM, aeg via gnucash-user wrote:
Thank you to those who have tried to educate me on the use of the word "split"
in GnuCash, but whilst I believe that I understand how it is being used, the reason for
using such an ambiguous term remains puzzling when better alternatives exist.
Is the objection then just to the term "split" being used when going
from the simplified method of entry (usable for the vast majority of
transactions where only two accounts are involved) to the more general
"journal view" form of entry that can be used for any transaction?
You are right in the sense that nothing is being "split". The developers
could have used something more descriptive like "enter in journal view".
Do you understand that gnucash would allow you to enter even simple
(just two accounts affected) transactions in this more complicated way?
Instead of entering the second account in the space provided hit the
"split" button (the "change to journal view" button) and enter the
second account on its own line. In other words, the "simple" (unsplit)
method of entry is simply a work flow shortcut making entering the vast
majority of transactions much faster/easier.
To those of us who learned bookkeeping in the "old days", first entering
transactions in the journal, what is happening with "split" is obvious.
We are entering transactions the "old fashioned way" and with the hit of
the <enter> key at the end doing the "post".
Those of us who know the computer language c and unix know that strange
(hard to read shortened spellings) were used by the engineers at Bell
Labs who preferred shorter (less key strokes) even if they had to be
memorized. Thus "mount" and "umount" (had to remember, no first "n"). I
heard that this is because none of them could touch type. But also how
engineer minds work, in the long run, less time spent learning that
"umount" was spelled that way than all the times afterwards hitting that
extra "n".
Just think of "enter in journal view" as being spelled "split".
Michael D Novack
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