Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

MoneyDance 2003 Reviewed

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the free-money-programs-but-no-free-money dept.

TheMadPenguin writes "For those of you who may not have heard, MoneyDance 2003 was released on March 28th, 2003 for general public consumption. It is available for Linux, MacOS X, and also Windows. Geared toward current Intuit Quicken and Microsoft Money users, MoneyDance 2003 is packed full of features. It's reviewed at MadPenguin.org."

8 of 237 comments (clear)

  1. Moneydance by lostchicken · · Score: 5, Informative

    It's not free. See Here.
    However, GNUCash will run on all the platforms listed, and is free.

    --
    -twb
  2. Gnucash is just fine by Renegade+Lisp · · Score: 5, Insightful
    A user's comment on this review at madpenguin.org states the obvious: What about GnuCash? It turns out that GnuCash is very comparable to this product in terms of features, and for somebody who'd rather stick with free software, there should be no rational need to buy MoneyDance.

    I've been using GnuCash for my personal accounting for a year and a half now, and I must say that it's absolutely enough for all that I need (I'm a freelance consultant), and lots of interesting new features are on the horizon.

  3. conrad on gnucash by Renegade+Lisp · · Score: 5, Informative
    More interesting than the review itself, here is conrad's comment from madpenguin.org (I'm including it below because the server is already slashdotted):
    For those of you who would be prepared to pay money for Moneydance, can I recommend that you look at Gnucash and save your money. MadJudu waves his hand at Gnucash and dismisses it, and then goes on to praise MoneyDance for now doing what Gnucash has mostly been able to do for several years.

    The Gnucash interface mightn't have the "lean and mean" look that MadJudu favours, but it is fairly simple and after a small amount of aclimatization (it is very different from quicken), you will (in my opinion) find it far more useful.

    Gnucash does most of the other things MoneyDance does, plus a few extras. Gnucash can interface with HBCI (the German online computer banking standard). Gnucash doesn't have the budgeting features (yet), but does have simple Accounts Payable/Accounts Receivable functionality for people with slightly more complicated accounting requirements.

    Most of the complaints and comments MadJudu makes about MoneyDance also apply to Gnucash. In fact, I almost wondered if MadJudu was reviewing Gnucash at times.

    So, whats the biggest selling point for Gnucash over MoneyDance? Price! Why spend US$30, when the Gnucash developers charge you the princely sum of NOTHING in whatever currency you prefer. Same low price, always!

    The biggest disadvantage (for those so afflicted) is that Gnucash does not run on any Microsoft OS. Linux, MacOS-X, and FreeBSD are available. Probably others too.

    Get Gnucash from your favourite Linux distribution (its packaged by all major distributions), or visit http://www.gnucash.org/ for more details.

  4. MonkeyDance? by quebeck · · Score: 5, Funny

    Did anyone else read this as "MonkeyDance 2003" and think it was some Steve Ballmer rave event?

  5. Warning - by vasqzr · · Score: 5, Funny


    This site is NOTHING like Hampster Dance!!

  6. Re:MoneyDance is a good start... by Gen.+Fault · · Score: 5, Funny
    I'm just curious when MoneyDinner, MoneyMovie, and MoneyGoBackToMyPlace are scheduled for release!

    And soon after that (I hope) is MoneyShot!

  7. Real Coup for MoneyDance and users by MCRocker · · Score: 5, Informative

    This release is a real coup for MoneyDance's author, Sean Reilly. A while ago, he sold MoneyDance to Apgen. At first this worked out really well because they added a lot of resources to the project and development really took off.

    Unfortunately, when Apgen's fortunes started to fade with the end of the .com bubble, the MoneyDance staff was slowly laid off until even Sean was let go.

    Like many other zombie probjects, the MoneyDance web page was not taken down and Apgen was still selling it even though nobody was home. There was no support at all. The mailing list was a scary place then. It took months for people to figure out what was going on. Apgen didn't respond at all to help requests and the list turned to a big discussion on what the alternatives were.

    Somehow, Sean managed to get the rights to MoneyDance back just a few months ago and started working on the new version that he just released.

    Lots of good ideas have sunk in the last year or so of economic trouble in the software industry. Most will never resurface and have been lost forever. This is a real coup for Sean and the MoneyDance users that Sean was able to resurect this fine project and produce a new version in such a short time.

    The Apgen folks have been very quiet about the whole thing for obvious reasons, but I think they are an example to follow. They made a valiant effort to promote MoneyDance, but when it didn't work out they set MoneyDance free instead of locking it up and throwing away the key. For some strange reason, this isn't the norm.

    --
    Signatures are a waste of bandwi (buffering...)
  8. Re:Delete protection by BiAthlon · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Rather than keep me from doing something how about having a robust undo function.

    You just deleted a transaction. Oops, didn't mean to do that. Undo. Viola! Everything is back the way it was and no stupid "Are you really sure you want to do what you just said you wanted to do" prompts.