summaryrefslogtreecommitdiff
path: root/doc/GLOSSARY.md
diff options
context:
space:
mode:
authorCharles Merriam <charles.merriam@gmail.com>2014-03-28 11:21:39 -0700
committerCharles Merriam <charles.merriam@gmail.com>2014-03-28 11:21:39 -0700
commit1f05abb52ad55270089a29ecc7185fca096a9b51 (patch)
treeb75a4d48065eb461e21f5b7aa1fcbb722492a638 /doc/GLOSSARY.md
parent71535a4c07ed1158d97ad73d296f01a619102fcc (diff)
downloadfork-ledger-1f05abb52ad55270089a29ecc7185fca096a9b51.tar.gz
fork-ledger-1f05abb52ad55270089a29ecc7185fca096a9b51.tar.bz2
fork-ledger-1f05abb52ad55270089a29ecc7185fca096a9b51.zip
Added Glossary
Wrote a first pass at a glossary, adding only accounting terms to start.
Diffstat (limited to 'doc/GLOSSARY.md')
-rw-r--r--doc/GLOSSARY.md14
1 files changed, 14 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/doc/GLOSSARY.md b/doc/GLOSSARY.md
new file mode 100644
index 00000000..3e9fbc68
--- /dev/null
+++ b/doc/GLOSSARY.md
@@ -0,0 +1,14 @@
+ACCOUNTING GLOSSARY
+---
+
+ Accounting and bookkeeping represent an entire field of human effort and has evolved its own specialized vocabulary. Accounting hopes to summarize and add understanding to where the money is going.
+
+**Account**: A category for grouping together amounts from similar transactions. Each account has a name, which is usually capitalized, and an account type. Accounts are often organized into a heirarchy when it helps understanding. For example, a coffee shop might have Coffee, Merchandise, and Equipment as accounts but arranged under an Inventory account because different decisions are made on the total inventory rather than just coffee. A heirarchy can be part of the account name in Ledger, e.g., "Assets:Inventory:Coffee". Note that the Ledger software usually creates the list of accounts on the fly: accounts are created when transactions use them.
+
+**Account Type**: Each account has a type of Asset, Liability, Equity, Income, or Expense. Assets represent something owned, e.g., Cash or Inventory. Liabilities represent sometime owed, e.g., a Loan or Mortgage. Equity, also called capital, is everything owned minus everything owed (Assets - Liabilities). It is the financial measure of how much you are ahead. Income is money earned somewhere, which puts you more ahead. Expenses is money spent somewhere, which puts you less ahead. The type of account determines if a debit represents an increase or decrease in an account. For example, Inventory is an asset so a transcation debiting Inventory would increase its value. Assets and Expenses increase with debits and decrease with credits; Liabilities, Equity, and Expenses increase with credits and decrease with debits.
+
+**Journal**: A record of all the financial transactions of a person or firm. This data of where money goes can be collated into reports. This used to be done with a physical book, called a ledger, where each account was on one page. Each debit or credit in the journal was transfered to the appropriate account page and the pages were totalled to produce reports. This process is now done with the Ledger software which creates reports from the journal. A journal is sometimes called a register.
+
+**Report**: A summary made from a journal of transactions. Each transaction affects accounts and those effects are collated and totaled. The two most common reports are the balance sheet, which shows what is owned and owed on a specific date, and the cash flow statement, which shows how money was earned and spent over a period. The cash flow statement is also called a profit and loss statement or an income statement.
+
+**Transaction**: Our financial lives are recorded as a series of transactions. Each transaction has a specific date, an equal total of debits and credits affecting accounts, and some sort of description. For example, "On January 1, pay $100 with check #243 from Checking to Utilities for my Verizon phone bill" is a transaction. A credit of $100 decreases my Checking asset, while a balancing debit of $100 increases my Utility expense. Transactions can be as complicated as humans can make finances.