Please forgive me if this is too non-specific and generalized, I'm sure
someone else who's made the MSmoney –> GnuCash migration can lend
assistance (there are threads from the past on this subject, so it has
been done) but I'll offer some general considerations and ideas.
#1 Can MSmoney export a chart of accounts?
If so, do that and then import to GnuCash. Else, manually recreate your
accounts in GnuCash with MSmoney open side-by-side. Get your existing
accounts straight as a first step.
#2 Can MSmoney export CSV of all, or better, individual accounts? If so,
export a singular account, probably an asset (which will of course,
contain splits linked to many others, likely expenses) and import it to
GnuCash. If due to the size of your MSmoney history, there is no such
thing as 'small' account, then pick one and export at least one month or
so of transactions for practice.
Import that to GnuCash to learn the import process.
You'll likely do this a few times to refine your learning. Keep the Help
& Tutorial open for reference while doing so. Take your time. Don't rush
or try to import too much.
#3 If you've gotten this far, then iterate, if not, ask for more help.
Import more periods of the same account, and/or, import more accounts.
Eventually, you'll end up with everything in GnuCash.
I'd start with all Asset accounts, then move to fill in gaps with any
transactions that only involve non-asset accounts.
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The reason for this piecemeal approach is that there is no 'all-in-one'
conversion between the two apps.
By breaking up the import, you get to tell GnuCash how to import data
and 'teach' the importer along the way so that it will guess what you
want to do as you go through the subsequent periods and accounts. (a
piece by piece approach with iterative 'learning/correction/teaching'
results in less work overall vs. an all-at-once attempt. It keeps
guessing as you go and gets better at guessing as you teach/correct it.)
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At any particular point, if you get stuck, ask back here for help.
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As others have mentioned, establish a date cutoff. Once you've imported
your current Chart of Accounts from MSmoney, then enter all new
transactions past that date directly into GnuCash only.
Then you get to take your time importing your historical data.
If you want, you can create 'opening balances' based off your current
accounts as of the 'cutoff dates' and then later remove those entries
when you successfully import your historical data. (which means at that
point your 'opening' entries in GnuCash would be considered
'duplicates', superfluous, and eligible for deletion, or at least
reversal if you're a stickler for non-editing.)
Regards,
Adrien
On 10/15/22 5:15 AM, Trevor Richards via gnucash-user wrote:
I've been using MSmoney for my personal financial management for about 20 years. When
it went 'sunset' I started looking around and found GNUcash. I signed up & I've
been following you all here ever since. I made some tentative attempts to convert over
but it has always been a disaster. I have personal bank accounts and investments with
about multiple banks & institutions around the world (NZ, UK, Jersey, Malaysia,
Australia, Singapore). I think you can imagine what my MSmoney records look like. It
does not seem feasible to me to attempt a full on file transfer. I've tried a few times
in the past but I just create a mess that I have no time to solve.
I was wondering if there was a better strategy for a 'slow' migration. Any
thoughts on this?
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