This is hledger.info, produced by makeinfo version 6.7 from stdin.


File: hledger.info,  Node: Top,  Next: COMMON TASKS,  Up: (dir)

hledger(1) hledger 1.20.99
**************************

hledger - a command-line accounting tool

   'hledger [-f FILE] COMMAND [OPTIONS] [ARGS]'
'hledger [-f FILE] ADDONCMD -- [OPTIONS] [ARGS]'
'hledger'

   hledger is a reliable, cross-platform set of programs for tracking
money, time, or any other commodity, using double-entry accounting and a
simple, editable file format.  hledger is inspired by and largely
compatible with ledger(1).

   This is hledger's command-line interface (there are also terminal and
web interfaces).  Its basic function is to read a plain text file
describing financial transactions (in accounting terms, a general
journal) and print useful reports on standard output, or export them as
CSV. hledger can also read some other file formats such as CSV files,
translating them to journal format.  Additionally, hledger lists other
hledger-* executables found in the user's $PATH and can invoke them as
subcommands.

   hledger reads data from one or more files in hledger journal,
timeclock, timedot, or CSV format specified with '-f', or
'$LEDGER_FILE', or '$HOME/.hledger.journal' (on windows, perhaps
'C:/Users/USER/.hledger.journal').  If using '$LEDGER_FILE', note this
must be a real environment variable, not a shell variable.  You can
specify standard input with '-f-'.

   Transactions are dated movements of money between two (or more) named
accounts, and are recorded with journal entries like this:

2015/10/16 bought food
 expenses:food          $10
 assets:cash

   For more about this format, see hledger_journal(5).

   Most users use a text editor to edit the journal, usually with an
editor mode such as ledger-mode for added convenience.  hledger's
interactive add command is another way to record new transactions.
hledger never changes existing transactions.

   To get started, you can either save some entries like the above in
'~/.hledger.journal', or run 'hledger add' and follow the prompts.  Then
try some commands like 'hledger print' or 'hledger balance'.  Run
'hledger' with no arguments for a list of commands.

* Menu:

* COMMON TASKS::
* Getting help::
* Constructing command lines::
* Starting a journal file::
* Setting opening balances::
* Recording transactions::
* Reconciling::
* Reporting::
* Migrating to a new file::
* OPTIONS::
* General options::
* Command options::
* Command arguments::
* Queries::
* Special characters in arguments and queries::
* Unicode characters::
* Input files::
* Strict mode::
* Output destination::
* Output format::
* Regular expressions::
* Smart dates::
* Report start & end date::
* Report intervals::
* Period expressions::
* Depth limiting::
* Pivoting::
* Valuation::
* COMMANDS::
* accounts::
* activity::
* add::
* aregister::
* balance::
* balancesheet::
* balancesheetequity::
* cashflow::
* check::
* close::
* codes::
* commodities::
* descriptions::
* diff::
* files::
* help::
* import::
* incomestatement::
* notes::
* payees::
* prices::
* print::
* print-unique::
* register::
* register-match::
* rewrite::
* roi::
* stats::
* tags::
* test::
* Add-on commands::
* ENVIRONMENT::
* FILES::
* LIMITATIONS::
* TROUBLESHOOTING::


File: hledger.info,  Node: COMMON TASKS,  Next: Getting help,  Prev: Top,  Up: Top

1 COMMON TASKS
**************

Here are some quick examples of how to do some basic tasks with hledger.
For more details, see the reference section below, the
hledger_journal(5) manual, or the more extensive docs at
https://hledger.org.


File: hledger.info,  Node: Getting help,  Next: Constructing command lines,  Prev: COMMON TASKS,  Up: Top

2 Getting help
**************

$ hledger                 # show available commands
$ hledger --help          # show common options
$ hledger CMD --help      # show common and command options, and command help
$ hledger help            # show available manuals/topics
$ hledger help hledger    # show hledger manual as info/man/text (auto-chosen)
$ hledger help journal --man  # show the journal manual as a man page
$ hledger help --help     # show more detailed help for the help command

   Find more docs, chat, mail list, reddit, issue tracker:
https://hledger.org#help-feedback


File: hledger.info,  Node: Constructing command lines,  Next: Starting a journal file,  Prev: Getting help,  Up: Top

3 Constructing command lines
****************************

hledger has an extensive and powerful command line interface.  We strive
to keep it simple and ergonomic, but you may run into one of the
confusing real world details described in OPTIONS, below.  If that
happens, here are some tips that may help:

   * command-specific options must go after the command (it's fine to
     put all options there) ('hledger CMD OPTS ARGS')
   * running add-on executables directly simplifies command line parsing
     ('hledger-ui OPTS ARGS')
   * enclose "problematic" args in single quotes
   * if needed, also add a backslash to hide regular expression
     metacharacters from the shell
   * to see how a misbehaving command is being parsed, add '--debug=2'.


File: hledger.info,  Node: Starting a journal file,  Next: Setting opening balances,  Prev: Constructing command lines,  Up: Top

4 Starting a journal file
*************************

hledger looks for your accounting data in a journal file,
'$HOME/.hledger.journal' by default:

$ hledger stats
The hledger journal file "/Users/simon/.hledger.journal" was not found.
Please create it first, eg with "hledger add" or a text editor.
Or, specify an existing journal file with -f or LEDGER_FILE.

   You can override this by setting the 'LEDGER_FILE' environment
variable.  It's a good practice to keep this important file under
version control, and to start a new file each year.  So you could do
something like this:

$ mkdir ~/finance
$ cd ~/finance
$ git init
Initialized empty Git repository in /Users/simon/finance/.git/
$ touch 2020.journal
$ echo "export LEDGER_FILE=$HOME/finance/2020.journal" >> ~/.bashrc
$ source ~/.bashrc
$ hledger stats
Main file                : /Users/simon/finance/2020.journal
Included files           : 
Transactions span        :  to  (0 days)
Last transaction         : none
Transactions             : 0 (0.0 per day)
Transactions last 30 days: 0 (0.0 per day)
Transactions last 7 days : 0 (0.0 per day)
Payees/descriptions      : 0
Accounts                 : 0 (depth 0)
Commodities              : 0 ()
Market prices            : 0 ()


File: hledger.info,  Node: Setting opening balances,  Next: Recording transactions,  Prev: Starting a journal file,  Up: Top

5 Setting opening balances
**************************

Pick a starting date for which you can look up the balances of some
real-world assets (bank accounts, wallet..)  and liabilities (credit
cards..).

   To avoid a lot of data entry, you may want to start with just one or
two accounts, like your checking account or cash wallet; and pick a
recent starting date, like today or the start of the week.  You can
always come back later and add more accounts and older transactions, eg
going back to january 1st.

   Add an opening balances transaction to the journal, declaring the
balances on this date.  Here are two ways to do it:

   * The first way: open the journal in any text editor and save an
     entry like this:

     2020-01-01 * opening balances
         assets:bank:checking                $1000   = $1000
         assets:bank:savings                 $2000   = $2000
         assets:cash                          $100   = $100
         liabilities:creditcard               $-50   = $-50
         equity:opening/closing balances

     These are start-of-day balances, ie whatever was in the account at
     the end of the previous day.

     The * after the date is an optional status flag.  Here it means
     "cleared & confirmed".

     The currency symbols are optional, but usually a good idea as
     you'll be dealing with multiple currencies sooner or later.

     The = amounts are optional balance assertions, providing extra
     error checking.

   * The second way: run 'hledger add' and follow the prompts to record
     a similar transaction:

     $ hledger add
     Adding transactions to journal file /Users/simon/finance/2020.journal
     Any command line arguments will be used as defaults.
     Use tab key to complete, readline keys to edit, enter to accept defaults.
     An optional (CODE) may follow transaction dates.
     An optional ; COMMENT may follow descriptions or amounts.
     If you make a mistake, enter < at any prompt to go one step backward.
     To end a transaction, enter . when prompted.
     To quit, enter . at a date prompt or press control-d or control-c.
     Date [2020-02-07]: 2020-01-01
     Description: * opening balances
     Account 1: assets:bank:checking
     Amount  1: $1000
     Account 2: assets:bank:savings
     Amount  2 [$-1000]: $2000
     Account 3: assets:cash
     Amount  3 [$-3000]: $100
     Account 4: liabilities:creditcard
     Amount  4 [$-3100]: $-50
     Account 5: equity:opening/closing balances
     Amount  5 [$-3050]: 
     Account 6 (or . or enter to finish this transaction): .
     2020-01-01 * opening balances
         assets:bank:checking                      $1000
         assets:bank:savings                       $2000
         assets:cash                                $100
         liabilities:creditcard                     $-50
         equity:opening/closing balances          $-3050
     
     Save this transaction to the journal ? [y]: 
     Saved.
     Starting the next transaction (. or ctrl-D/ctrl-C to quit)
     Date [2020-01-01]: .

   If you're using version control, this could be a good time to commit
the journal.  Eg:

$ git commit -m 'initial balances' 2020.journal


File: hledger.info,  Node: Recording transactions,  Next: Reconciling,  Prev: Setting opening balances,  Up: Top

6 Recording transactions
************************

As you spend or receive money, you can record these transactions using
one of the methods above (text editor, hledger add) or by using the
hledger-iadd or hledger-web add-ons, or by using the import command to
convert CSV data downloaded from your bank.

   Here are some simple transactions, see the hledger_journal(5) manual
and hledger.org for more ideas:

2020/1/10 * gift received
  assets:cash   $20
  income:gifts

2020.1.12 * farmers market
  expenses:food    $13
  assets:cash

2020-01-15 paycheck
  income:salary
  assets:bank:checking    $1000


File: hledger.info,  Node: Reconciling,  Next: Reporting,  Prev: Recording transactions,  Up: Top

7 Reconciling
*************

Periodically you should reconcile - compare your hledger-reported
balances against external sources of truth, like bank statements or your
bank's website - to be sure that your ledger accurately represents the
real-world balances (and, that the real-world institutions have not made
a mistake!).  This gets easy and fast with (1) practice and (2)
frequency.  If you do it daily, it can take 2-10 minutes.  If you let it
pile up, expect it to take longer as you hunt down errors and
discrepancies.

   A typical workflow:

  1. Reconcile cash.  Count what's in your wallet.  Compare with what
     hledger reports ('hledger bal cash').  If they are different, try
     to remember the missing transaction, or look for the error in the
     already-recorded transactions.  A register report can be helpful
     ('hledger reg cash').  If you can't find the error, add an
     adjustment transaction.  Eg if you have $105 after the above, and
     can't explain the missing $2, it could be:

     2020-01-16 * adjust cash
         assets:cash    $-2 = $105
         expenses:misc

  2. Reconcile checking.  Log in to your bank's website.  Compare
     today's (cleared) balance with hledger's cleared balance ('hledger
     bal checking -C').  If they are different, track down the error or
     record the missing transaction(s) or add an adjustment transaction,
     similar to the above.  Unlike the cash case, you can usually
     compare the transaction history and running balance from your bank
     with the one reported by 'hledger reg checking -C'.  This will be
     easier if you generally record transaction dates quite similar to
     your bank's clearing dates.

  3. Repeat for other asset/liability accounts.

   Tip: instead of the register command, use hledger-ui to see a
live-updating register while you edit the journal: 'hledger-ui --watch
--register checking -C'

   After reconciling, it could be a good time to mark the reconciled
transactions' status as "cleared and confirmed", if you want to track
that, by adding the '*' marker.  Eg in the paycheck transaction above,
insert '*' between '2020-01-15' and 'paycheck'

   If you're using version control, this can be another good time to
commit:

$ git commit -m 'txns' 2020.journal


File: hledger.info,  Node: Reporting,  Next: Migrating to a new file,  Prev: Reconciling,  Up: Top

8 Reporting
***********

Here are some basic reports.

   Show all transactions:

$ hledger print
2020-01-01 * opening balances
    assets:bank:checking                      $1000
    assets:bank:savings                       $2000
    assets:cash                                $100
    liabilities:creditcard                     $-50
    equity:opening/closing balances          $-3050

2020-01-10 * gift received
    assets:cash              $20
    income:gifts

2020-01-12 * farmers market
    expenses:food             $13
    assets:cash

2020-01-15 * paycheck
    income:salary
    assets:bank:checking           $1000

2020-01-16 * adjust cash
    assets:cash               $-2 = $105
    expenses:misc

   Show account names, and their hierarchy:

$ hledger accounts --tree
assets
  bank
    checking
    savings
  cash
equity
  opening/closing balances
expenses
  food
  misc
income
  gifts
  salary
liabilities
  creditcard

   Show all account totals:

$ hledger balance
               $4105  assets
               $4000    bank
               $2000      checking
               $2000      savings
                $105    cash
              $-3050  equity:opening/closing balances
                 $15  expenses
                 $13    food
                  $2    misc
              $-1020  income
                $-20    gifts
              $-1000    salary
                $-50  liabilities:creditcard
--------------------
                   0

   Show only asset and liability balances, as a flat list, limited to
depth 2:

$ hledger bal assets liabilities --flat -2
               $4000  assets:bank
                $105  assets:cash
                $-50  liabilities:creditcard
--------------------
               $4055

   Show the same thing without negative numbers, formatted as a simple
balance sheet:

$ hledger bs --flat -2
Balance Sheet 2020-01-16

                        || 2020-01-16 
========================++============
 Assets                 ||            
------------------------++------------
 assets:bank            ||      $4000 
 assets:cash            ||       $105 
------------------------++------------
                        ||      $4105 
========================++============
 Liabilities            ||            
------------------------++------------
 liabilities:creditcard ||        $50 
------------------------++------------
                        ||        $50 
========================++============
 Net:                   ||      $4055 

   The final total is your "net worth" on the end date.  (Or use 'bse'
for a full balance sheet with equity.)

   Show income and expense totals, formatted as an income statement:

hledger is 
Income Statement 2020-01-01-2020-01-16

               || 2020-01-01-2020-01-16 
===============++=======================
 Revenues      ||                       
---------------++-----------------------
 income:gifts  ||                   $20 
 income:salary ||                 $1000 
---------------++-----------------------
               ||                 $1020 
===============++=======================
 Expenses      ||                       
---------------++-----------------------
 expenses:food ||                   $13 
 expenses:misc ||                    $2 
---------------++-----------------------
               ||                   $15 
===============++=======================
 Net:          ||                 $1005 

   The final total is your net income during this period.

   Show transactions affecting your wallet, with running total:

$ hledger register cash
2020-01-01 opening balances     assets:cash                   $100          $100
2020-01-10 gift received        assets:cash                    $20          $120
2020-01-12 farmers market       assets:cash                   $-13          $107
2020-01-16 adjust cash          assets:cash                    $-2          $105

   Show weekly posting counts as a bar chart:

$ hledger activity -W
2019-12-30 *****
2020-01-06 ****
2020-01-13 ****


File: hledger.info,  Node: Migrating to a new file,  Next: OPTIONS,  Prev: Reporting,  Up: Top

9 Migrating to a new file
*************************

At the end of the year, you may want to continue your journal in a new
file, so that old transactions don't slow down or clutter your reports,
and to help ensure the integrity of your accounting history.  See the
close command.

   If using version control, don't forget to 'git add' the new file.


File: hledger.info,  Node: OPTIONS,  Next: General options,  Prev: Migrating to a new file,  Up: Top

10 OPTIONS
**********


File: hledger.info,  Node: General options,  Next: Command options,  Prev: OPTIONS,  Up: Top

11 General options
******************

To see general usage help, including general options which are supported
by most hledger commands, run 'hledger -h'.

   General help options:

'-h --help'

     show general usage (or after COMMAND, command usage)
'--version'

     show version
'--debug[=N]'

     show debug output (levels 1-9, default: 1)

   General input options:

'-f FILE --file=FILE'

     use a different input file.  For stdin, use - (default:
     '$LEDGER_FILE' or '$HOME/.hledger.journal')
'--rules-file=RULESFILE'

     Conversion rules file to use when reading CSV (default: FILE.rules)
'--separator=CHAR'

     Field separator to expect when reading CSV (default: ',')
'--alias=OLD=NEW'

     rename accounts named OLD to NEW
'--anon'

     anonymize accounts and payees
'--pivot FIELDNAME'

     use some other field or tag for the account name
'-I --ignore-assertions'

     disable balance assertion checks (note: does not disable balance
     assignments)
'-s --strict'

     do extra error checking (check that all posted accounts are
     declared)

   General reporting options:

'-b --begin=DATE'

     include postings/txns on or after this date
'-e --end=DATE'

     include postings/txns before this date
'-D --daily'

     multiperiod/multicolumn report by day
'-W --weekly'

     multiperiod/multicolumn report by week
'-M --monthly'

     multiperiod/multicolumn report by month
'-Q --quarterly'

     multiperiod/multicolumn report by quarter
'-Y --yearly'

     multiperiod/multicolumn report by year
'-p --period=PERIODEXP'

     set start date, end date, and/or reporting interval all at once
     using period expressions syntax
'--date2'

     match the secondary date instead (see command help for other
     effects)
'-U --unmarked'

     include only unmarked postings/txns (can combine with -P or -C)
'-P --pending'

     include only pending postings/txns
'-C --cleared'

     include only cleared postings/txns
'-R --real'

     include only non-virtual postings
'-NUM --depth=NUM'

     hide/aggregate accounts or postings more than NUM levels deep
'-E --empty'

     show items with zero amount, normally hidden (and vice-versa in
     hledger-ui/hledger-web)
'-B --cost'

     convert amounts to their cost/selling amount at transaction time
'-V --market'

     convert amounts to their market value in default valuation
     commodities
'-X --exchange=COMM'

     convert amounts to their market value in commodity COMM
'--value'

     convert amounts to cost or market value, more flexibly than
     -B/-V/-X
'--infer-value'

     with -V/-X/-value, also infer market prices from transactions
'--auto'

     apply automated posting rules to modify transactions.
'--forecast'

     generate future transactions from periodic transaction rules, for
     the next 6 months or till report end date.  In hledger-ui, also
     make ordinary future transactions visible.
'--color=WHEN (or --colour=WHEN)'

     Should color-supporting commands use ANSI color codes in text
     output.  'auto' (default): whenever stdout seems to be a
     color-supporting terminal.  'always' or 'yes': always, useful eg
     when piping output into 'less -R'. 'never' or 'no': never.  A
     NO_COLOR environment variable overrides this.

   When a reporting option appears more than once in the command line,
the last one takes precedence.

   Some reporting options can also be written as query arguments.


File: hledger.info,  Node: Command options,  Next: Command arguments,  Prev: General options,  Up: Top

12 Command options
******************

To see options for a particular command, including command-specific
options, run: 'hledger COMMAND -h'.

   Command-specific options must be written after the command name, eg:
'hledger print -x'.

   Additionally, if the command is an add-on, you may need to put its
options after a double-hyphen, eg: 'hledger ui -- --watch'.  Or, you can
run the add-on executable directly: 'hledger-ui --watch'.


File: hledger.info,  Node: Command arguments,  Next: Queries,  Prev: Command options,  Up: Top

13 Command arguments
********************

Most hledger commands accept arguments after the command name, which are
often a query, filtering the data in some way.

   You can save a set of command line options/arguments in a file, and
then reuse them by writing '@FILENAME' as a command line argument.  Eg:
'hledger bal @foo.args'.  (To prevent this, eg if you have an argument
that begins with a literal '@', precede it with '--', eg: 'hledger bal
-- @ARG').

   Inside the argument file, each line should contain just one option or
argument.  Avoid the use of spaces, except inside quotes (or you'll see
a confusing error).  Between a flag and its argument, use = (or
nothing).  Bad:

assets depth:2
-X USD

   Good:

assets
depth:2
-X=USD

   For special characters (see below), use one less level of quoting
than you would at the command prompt.  Bad:

-X"$"

   Good:

-X$

   See also: Save frequently used options.


File: hledger.info,  Node: Queries,  Next: Special characters in arguments and queries,  Prev: Command arguments,  Up: Top

14 Queries
**********

One of hledger's strengths is being able to quickly report on precise
subsets of your data.  Most commands accept an optional query
expression, written as arguments after the command name, to filter the
data by date, account name or other criteria.  The syntax is similar to
a web search: one or more space-separated search terms, quotes to
enclose whitespace, prefixes to match specific fields, a not: prefix to
negate the match.

   We do not yet support arbitrary boolean combinations of search terms;
instead most commands show transactions/postings/accounts which match
(or negatively match):

   * any of the description terms AND
   * any of the account terms AND
   * any of the status terms AND
   * all the other terms.

   The print command instead shows transactions which:

   * match any of the description terms AND
   * have any postings matching any of the positive account terms AND
   * have no postings matching any of the negative account terms AND
   * match all the other terms.

   The following kinds of search terms can be used.  Remember these can
also be prefixed with *'not:'*, eg to exclude a particular subaccount.

*'REGEX', 'acct:REGEX'*

     match account names by this regular expression.  (With no prefix,
     'acct:' is assumed.)  same as above

*'amt:N, amt:<N, amt:<=N, amt:>N, amt:>=N'*

     match postings with a single-commodity amount that is equal to,
     less than, or greater than N. (Multi-commodity amounts are not
     tested, and will always match.)  The comparison has two modes: if N
     is preceded by a + or - sign (or is 0), the two signed numbers are
     compared.  Otherwise, the absolute magnitudes are compared,
     ignoring sign.
*'code:REGEX'*

     match by transaction code (eg check number)
*'cur:REGEX'*

     match postings or transactions including any amounts whose
     currency/commodity symbol is fully matched by REGEX. (For a partial
     match, use '.*REGEX.*').  Note, to match characters which are
     regex-significant, like the dollar sign ('$'), you need to prepend
     '\'.  And when using the command line you need to add one more
     level of quoting to hide it from the shell, so eg do: 'hledger
     print cur:'\$'' or 'hledger print cur:\\$'.
*'desc:REGEX'*

     match transaction descriptions.
*'date:PERIODEXPR'*

     match dates within the specified period.  PERIODEXPR is a period
     expression (with no report interval).  Examples: 'date:2016',
     'date:thismonth', 'date:2000/2/1-2/15', 'date:lastweek-'.  If the
     '--date2' command line flag is present, this matches secondary
     dates instead.
*'date2:PERIODEXPR'*

     match secondary dates within the specified period.
*'depth:N'*

     match (or display, depending on command) accounts at or above this
     depth
*'note:REGEX'*

     match transaction notes (part of description right of '|', or whole
     description when there's no '|')
*'payee:REGEX'*

     match transaction payee/payer names (part of description left of
     '|', or whole description when there's no '|')
*'real:, real:0'*

     match real or virtual postings respectively
*'status:, status:!, status:*'*

     match unmarked, pending, or cleared transactions respectively
*'tag:REGEX[=REGEX]'*

     match by tag name, and optionally also by tag value.  Note a tag:
     query is considered to match a transaction if it matches any of the
     postings.  Also remember that postings inherit the tags of their
     parent transaction.

   The following special search term is used automatically in
hledger-web, only:

*'inacct:ACCTNAME'*

     tells hledger-web to show the transaction register for this
     account.  Can be filtered further with 'acct' etc.

   Some of these can also be expressed as command-line options (eg
'depth:2' is equivalent to '--depth 2').  Generally you can mix options
and query arguments, and the resulting query will be their intersection
(perhaps excluding the '-p/--period' option).


File: hledger.info,  Node: Special characters in arguments and queries,  Next: Unicode characters,  Prev: Queries,  Up: Top

15 Special characters in arguments and queries
**********************************************

In shell command lines, option and argument values which contain
"problematic" characters, ie spaces, and also characters significant to
your shell such as '<', '>', '(', ')', '|' and '$', should be escaped by
enclosing them in quotes or by writing backslashes before the
characters.  Eg:

   'hledger register -p 'last year' "accounts receivable
(receivable|payable)" amt:\>100'.

* Menu:

* More escaping::
* Even more escaping::
* Less escaping::


File: hledger.info,  Node: More escaping,  Next: Even more escaping,  Up: Special characters in arguments and queries

15.1 More escaping
==================

Characters significant both to the shell and in regular expressions may
need one extra level of escaping.  These include parentheses, the pipe
symbol and the dollar sign.  Eg, to match the dollar symbol, bash users
should do:

   'hledger balance cur:'\$''

   or:

   'hledger balance cur:\\$'


File: hledger.info,  Node: Even more escaping,  Next: Less escaping,  Prev: More escaping,  Up: Special characters in arguments and queries

15.2 Even more escaping
=======================

When hledger runs an add-on executable (eg you type 'hledger ui',
hledger runs 'hledger-ui'), it de-escapes command-line options and
arguments once, so you might need to _triple_-escape.  Eg in bash,
running the ui command and matching the dollar sign, it's:

   'hledger ui cur:'\\$''

   or:

   'hledger ui cur:\\\\$'

   If you asked why _four_ slashes above, this may help:

unescaped:        '$'
escaped:          '\$'
double-escaped:   '\\$'
triple-escaped:   '\\\\$'

   (The number of backslashes in fish shell is left as an exercise for
the reader.)

   You can always avoid the extra escaping for add-ons by running the
add-on directly:

   'hledger-ui cur:\\$'


File: hledger.info,  Node: Less escaping,  Prev: Even more escaping,  Up: Special characters in arguments and queries

15.3 Less escaping
==================

Inside an argument file, or in the search field of hledger-ui or
hledger-web, or at a GHCI prompt, you need one less level of escaping
than at the command line.  And backslashes may work better than quotes.
Eg:

   'ghci> :main balance cur:\$'


File: hledger.info,  Node: Unicode characters,  Next: Input files,  Prev: Special characters in arguments and queries,  Up: Top

16 Unicode characters
*********************

hledger is expected to handle non-ascii characters correctly:

   * they should be parsed correctly in input files and on the command
     line, by all hledger tools (add, iadd, hledger-web's
     search/add/edit forms, etc.)

   * they should be displayed correctly by all hledger tools, and
     on-screen alignment should be preserved.

   This requires a well-configured environment.  Here are some tips:

   * A system locale must be configured, and it must be one that can
     decode the characters being used.  In bash, you can set a locale
     like this: 'export LANG=en_US.UTF-8'.  There are some more details
     in Troubleshooting.  This step is essential - without it, hledger
     will quit on encountering a non-ascii character (as with all
     GHC-compiled programs).

   * your terminal software (eg Terminal.app, iTerm, CMD.exe, xterm..)
     must support unicode

   * the terminal must be using a font which includes the required
     unicode glyphs

   * the terminal should be configured to display wide characters as
     double width (for report alignment)

   * on Windows, for best results you should run hledger in the same
     kind of environment in which it was built.  Eg hledger built in the
     standard CMD.EXE environment (like the binaries on our download
     page) might show display problems when run in a cygwin or msys
     terminal, and vice versa.  (See eg #961).


File: hledger.info,  Node: Input files,  Next: Strict mode,  Prev: Unicode characters,  Up: Top

17 Input files
**************

hledger reads transactions from a data file (and the add command writes
to it).  By default this file is '$HOME/.hledger.journal' (or on
Windows, something like 'C:/Users/USER/.hledger.journal').  You can
override this with the '$LEDGER_FILE' environment variable:

$ setenv LEDGER_FILE ~/finance/2016.journal
$ hledger stats

   or with the '-f/--file' option:

$ hledger -f /some/file stats

   The file name '-' (hyphen) means standard input:

$ cat some.journal | hledger -f-

   Usually the data file is in hledger's journal format, but it can be
in any of the supported file formats, which currently are:

Reader:  Reads:                                   Used for file
                                                  extensions:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
'journal'hledger journal files and some Ledger    '.journal' '.j'
         journals, for transactions               '.hledger' '.ledger'
'timeclock'timeclock files, for precise time      '.timeclock'
         logging
'timedot'timedot files, for approximate time      '.timedot'
         logging
'csv'    comma/semicolon/tab/other-separated      '.csv' '.ssv' '.tsv'
         values, for data import

   hledger detects the format automatically based on the file extensions
shown above.  If it can't recognise the file extension, it assumes
'journal' format.  So for non-journal files, it's important to use a
recognised file extension, so as to either read successfully or to show
relevant error messages.

   When you can't ensure the right file extension, not to worry: you can
force a specific reader/format by prefixing the file path with the
format and a colon.  Eg to read a .dat file as csv:

$ hledger -f csv:/some/csv-file.dat stats
$ echo 'i 2009/13/1 08:00:00' | hledger print -ftimeclock:-

   You can specify multiple '-f' options, to read multiple files as one
big journal.  There are some limitations with this:

   * directives in one file will not affect the other files
   * balance assertions will not see any account balances from previous
     files

   If you need either of those things, you can

   * use a single parent file which includes the others
   * or concatenate the files into one before reading, eg: 'cat
     a.journal b.journal | hledger -f- CMD'.


File: hledger.info,  Node: Strict mode,  Next: Output destination,  Prev: Input files,  Up: Top

18 Strict mode
**************

hledger checks input files for valid data.  By default, the most
important errors are detected, while still accepting easy journal files
without a lot of declarations:

   * Are the input files parseable, with valid syntax ?
   * Are all transactions balanced ?
   * Do all balance assertions pass ?

   With the '-s'/'--strict' flag, additional checks are performed:

   * Are all accounts posted to, declared with an 'account' directive ?
     (Account error checking)
   * Are all commodities declared with a 'commodity' directive ?
     (Commodity error checking)

   See also: https://hledger.org/checking-for-errors.html

   _experimental._


File: hledger.info,  Node: Output destination,  Next: Output format,  Prev: Strict mode,  Up: Top

19 Output destination
*********************

hledger commands send their output to the terminal by default.  You can
of course redirect this, eg into a file, using standard shell syntax:

$ hledger print > foo.txt

   Some commands (print, register, stats, the balance commands) also
provide the '-o/--output-file' option, which does the same thing without
needing the shell.  Eg:

$ hledger print -o foo.txt
$ hledger print -o -        # write to stdout (the default)


File: hledger.info,  Node: Output format,  Next: Regular expressions,  Prev: Output destination,  Up: Top

20 Output format
****************

Some commands (print, register, the balance commands) offer a choice of
output format.  In addition to the usual plain text format ('txt'),
there are CSV ('csv'), HTML ('html'), JSON ('json') and SQL ('sql').
This is controlled by the '-O/--output-format' option:

$ hledger print -O csv

   or, by a file extension specified with '-o/--output-file':

$ hledger balancesheet -o foo.html   # write HTML to foo.html

   The '-O' option can be used to override the file extension if needed:

$ hledger balancesheet -o foo.txt -O html   # write HTML to foo.txt

   Some notes about JSON output:

   * This feature is marked experimental, and not yet much used; you
     should expect our JSON to evolve.  Real-world feedback is welcome.

   * Our JSON is rather large and verbose, as it is quite a faithful
     representation of hledger's internal data types.  To understand the
     JSON, read the Haskell type definitions, which are mostly in
     https://github.com/simonmichael/hledger/blob/master/hledger-lib/Hledger/Data/Types.hs.

   * hledger represents quantities as Decimal values storing up to 255
     significant digits, eg for repeating decimals.  Such numbers can
     arise in practice (from automatically-calculated transaction
     prices), and would break most JSON consumers.  So in JSON, we show
     quantities as simple Numbers with at most 10 decimal places.  We
     don't limit the number of integer digits, but that part is under
     your control.  We hope this approach will not cause problems in
     practice; if you find otherwise, please let us know.  (Cf #1195)

   Notes about SQL output:

   * SQL output is also marked experimental, and much like JSON could
     use real-world feedback.

   * SQL output is expected to work with sqlite, MySQL and PostgreSQL

   * SQL output is structured with the expectations that statements will
     be executed in the empty database.  If you already have tables
     created via SQL output of hledger, you would probably want to
     either clear tables of existing data (via 'delete' or 'truncate'
     SQL statements) or drop tables completely as otherwise your
     postings will be duped.


File: hledger.info,  Node: Regular expressions,  Next: Smart dates,  Prev: Output format,  Up: Top

21 Regular expressions
**********************

hledger uses regular expressions in a number of places:

   * query terms, on the command line and in the hledger-web search
     form: 'REGEX', 'desc:REGEX', 'cur:REGEX', 'tag:...=REGEX'
   * CSV rules conditional blocks: 'if REGEX ...'
   * account alias directives and options: 'alias /REGEX/ =
     REPLACEMENT', '--alias /REGEX/=REPLACEMENT'

   hledger's regular expressions come from the regex-tdfa library.  If
they're not doing what you expect, it's important to know exactly what
they support:

  1. they are case insensitive
  2. they are infix matching (they do not need to match the entire thing
     being matched)
  3. they are POSIX ERE (extended regular expressions)
  4. they also support GNU word boundaries ('\b', '\B', '\<', '\>')
  5. they do not support backreferences; if you write '\1', it will
     match the digit '1'.  Except when doing text replacement, eg in
     account aliases, where backreferences can be used in the
     replacement string to reference capturing groups in the search
     regexp.
  6. they do not support mode modifiers ('(?s)'), character classes
     ('\w', '\d'), or anything else not mentioned above.

   Some things to note:

   * In the 'alias' directive and '--alias' option, regular expressions
     must be enclosed in forward slashes ('/REGEX/').  Elsewhere in
     hledger, these are not required.

   * In queries, to match a regular expression metacharacter like '$' as
     a literal character, prepend a backslash.  Eg to search for amounts
     with the dollar sign in hledger-web, write 'cur:\$'.

   * On the command line, some metacharacters like '$' have a special
     meaning to the shell and so must be escaped at least once more.
     See Special characters.


File: hledger.info,  Node: Smart dates,  Next: Report start & end date,  Prev: Regular expressions,  Up: Top

22 Smart dates
**************

hledger's user interfaces accept a flexible "smart date" syntax (unlike
dates in the journal file).  Smart dates allow some english words, can
be relative to today's date, and can have less-significant date parts
omitted (defaulting to 1).

   Examples:

'2004/10/1',              exact date, several separators allowed.  Year
'2004-01-01',             is 4+ digits, month is 1-12, day is 1-31
'2004.9.1'
'2004'                    start of year
'2004/10'                 start of month
'10/1'                    month and day in current year
'21'                      day in current month
'october, oct'            start of month in current year
'yesterday, today,        -1, 0, 1 days from today
tomorrow'
'last/this/next           -1, 0, 1 periods from the current period
day/week/month/quarter/year'
'20181201'                8 digit YYYYMMDD with valid year month and
                          day
'201812'                  6 digit YYYYMM with valid year and month

   Counterexamples - malformed digit sequences might give surprising
results:

'201813'     6 digits with an invalid month is parsed as start of
             6-digit year
'20181301'   8 digits with an invalid month is parsed as start of
             8-digit year
'20181232'   8 digits with an invalid day gives an error
'201801012'  9+ digits beginning with a valid YYYYMMDD gives an error


File: hledger.info,  Node: Report start & end date,  Next: Report intervals,  Prev: Smart dates,  Up: Top

23 Report start & end date
**************************

Most hledger reports show the full span of time represented by the
journal data, by default.  So, the effective report start and end dates
will be the earliest and latest transaction or posting dates found in
the journal.

   Often you will want to see a shorter time span, such as the current
month.  You can specify a start and/or end date using '-b/--begin',
'-e/--end', '-p/--period' or a 'date:' query (described below).  All of
these accept the smart date syntax.

   Some notes:

   * As in Ledger, end dates are exclusive, so you need to write the
     date _after_ the last day you want to include.
   * As noted in reporting options: among start/end dates specified with
     _options_, the last (i.e.  right-most) option takes precedence.
   * The effective report start and end dates are the intersection of
     the start/end dates from options and that from 'date:' queries.
     That is, 'date:2019-01 date:2019 -p'2000 to 2030'' yields January
     2019, the smallest common time span.

   Examples:

'-b           begin on St. Patrick's day 2016
2016/3/17'
'-e 12/1'     end at the start of december 1st of the current year
              (11/30 will be the last date included)
'-b           all transactions on or after the 1st of the current month
thismonth'
'-p           all transactions in the current month
thismonth'
'date:2016/3/17..'the above written as queries instead ('..' can also be
              replaced with '-')
'date:..12/1'
'date:thismonth..'
'date:thismonth'


File: hledger.info,  Node: Report intervals,  Next: Period expressions,  Prev: Report start & end date,  Up: Top

24 Report intervals
*******************

A report interval can be specified so that commands like register,
balance and activity will divide their reports into multiple subperiods.
The basic intervals can be selected with one of '-D/--daily',
'-W/--weekly', '-M/--monthly', '-Q/--quarterly', or '-Y/--yearly'.  More
complex intervals may be specified with a period expression.  Report
intervals can not be specified with a query.


File: hledger.info,  Node: Period expressions,  Next: Depth limiting,  Prev: Report intervals,  Up: Top

25 Period expressions
*********************

The '-p/--period' option accepts period expressions, a shorthand way of
expressing a start date, end date, and/or report interval all at once.

   Here's a basic period expression specifying the first quarter of
2009.  Note, hledger always treats start dates as inclusive and end
dates as exclusive:

   '-p "from 2009/1/1 to 2009/4/1"'

   Keywords like "from" and "to" are optional, and so are the spaces, as
long as you don't run two dates together.  "to" can also be written as
".."  or "-".  These are equivalent to the above:

'-p "2009/1/1 2009/4/1"'
'-p2009/1/1to2009/4/1'
'-p2009/1/1..2009/4/1'

   Dates are smart dates, so if the current year is 2009, the above can
also be written as:

'-p "1/1 4/1"'
'-p "january-apr"'
'-p "this year to 4/1"'

   If you specify only one date, the missing start or end date will be
the earliest or latest transaction in your journal:

'-p "from 2009/1/1"'   everything after january 1, 2009
'-p "from 2009/1"'     the same
'-p "from 2009"'       the same
'-p "to 2009"'         everything before january 1, 2009

   A single date with no "from" or "to" defines both the start and end
date like so:

'-p "2009"'       the year 2009; equivalent to “2009/1/1 to 2010/1/1”
'-p "2009/1"'     the month of jan; equivalent to “2009/1/1 to 2009/2/1”
'-p "2009/1/1"'   just that day; equivalent to “2009/1/1 to 2009/1/2”

   Or you can specify a single quarter like so:

'-p "2009Q1"'   first quarter of 2009, equivalent to “2009/1/1 to 2009/4/1”
'-p "q4"'       fourth quarter of the current year

   The argument of '-p' can also begin with, or be, a report interval
expression.  The basic report intervals are 'daily', 'weekly',
'monthly', 'quarterly', or 'yearly', which have the same effect as the
'-D','-W','-M','-Q', or '-Y' flags.  Between report interval and
start/end dates (if any), the word 'in' is optional.  Examples:

'-p "weekly from 2009/1/1 to 2009/4/1"'
'-p "monthly in 2008"'
'-p "quarterly"'

   Note that 'weekly', 'monthly', 'quarterly' and 'yearly' intervals
will always start on the first day on week, month, quarter or year
accordingly, and will end on the last day of same period, even if
associated period expression specifies different explicit start and end
date.

   For example:

'-p "weekly from           starts on 2008/12/29, closest preceding
2009/1/1 to 2009/4/1"'     Monday
'-p "monthly in            starts on 2018/11/01
2008/11/25"'
'-p "quarterly from        starts on 2009/04/01, ends on 2009/06/30,
2009-05-05 to              which are first and last days of Q2 2009
2009-06-01"'
'-p "yearly from           starts on 2009/01/01, first day of 2009
2009-12-29"'

   The following more complex report intervals are also supported:
'biweekly', 'fortnightly', 'bimonthly', 'every
day|week|month|quarter|year', 'every N
days|weeks|months|quarters|years'.

   All of these will start on the first day of the requested period and
end on the last one, as described above.

   Examples:

'-p "bimonthly from        periods will have boundaries on 2008/01/01,
2008"'                     2008/03/01, ...
'-p "every 2 weeks"'       starts on closest preceding Monday
'-p "every 5 month from    periods will have boundaries on 2009/03/01,
2009/03"'                  2009/08/01, ...

   If you want intervals that start on arbitrary day of your choosing
and span a week, month or year, you need to use any of the following:

   'every Nth day of week', 'every WEEKDAYNAME' (eg
'mon|tue|wed|thu|fri|sat|sun'), 'every Nth day [of month]', 'every Nth
WEEKDAYNAME [of month]', 'every MM/DD [of year]', 'every Nth MMM [of
year]', 'every MMM Nth [of year]'.

   Examples:

'-p "every 2nd day of    periods will go from Tue to Tue
week"'
'-p "every Tue"'         same
'-p "every 15th day"'    period boundaries will be on 15th of each
                         month
'-p "every 2nd           period boundaries will be on second Monday of
Monday"'                 each month
'-p "every 11/05"'       yearly periods with boundaries on 5th of Nov
'-p "every 5th Nov"'     same
'-p "every Nov 5th"'     same

   Show historical balances at end of 15th each month (N is exclusive
end date):

   'hledger balance -H -p "every 16th day"'

   Group postings from start of wednesday to end of next tuesday (N is
start date and exclusive end date):

   'hledger register checking -p "every 3rd day of week"'


File: hledger.info,  Node: Depth limiting,  Next: Pivoting,  Prev: Period expressions,  Up: Top

26 Depth limiting
*****************

With the '--depth N' option (short form: '-N'), commands like account,
balance and register will show only the uppermost accounts in the
account tree, down to level N. Use this when you want a summary with
less detail.  This flag has the same effect as a 'depth:' query argument
(so '-2', '--depth=2' or 'depth:2' are equivalent).


File: hledger.info,  Node: Pivoting,  Next: Valuation,  Prev: Depth limiting,  Up: Top

27 Pivoting
***********

Normally hledger sums amounts, and organizes them in a hierarchy, based
on account name.  The '--pivot FIELD' option causes it to sum and
organize hierarchy based on the value of some other field instead.
FIELD can be: 'code', 'description', 'payee', 'note', or the full name
(case insensitive) of any tag.  As with account names, values containing
'colon:separated:parts' will be displayed hierarchically in reports.

   '--pivot' is a general option affecting all reports; you can think of
hledger transforming the journal before any other processing, replacing
every posting's account name with the value of the specified field on
that posting, inheriting it from the transaction or using a blank value
if it's not present.

   An example:

2016/02/16 Member Fee Payment
    assets:bank account                    2 EUR
    income:member fees                    -2 EUR  ; member: John Doe

   Normal balance report showing account names:

$ hledger balance
               2 EUR  assets:bank account
              -2 EUR  income:member fees
--------------------
                   0

   Pivoted balance report, using member: tag values instead:

$ hledger balance --pivot member
               2 EUR
              -2 EUR  John Doe
--------------------
                   0

   One way to show only amounts with a member: value (using a query,
described below):

$ hledger balance --pivot member tag:member=.
              -2 EUR  John Doe
--------------------
              -2 EUR

   Another way (the acct: query matches against the pivoted "account
name"):

$ hledger balance --pivot member acct:.
              -2 EUR  John Doe
--------------------
              -2 EUR


File: hledger.info,  Node: Valuation,  Next: COMMANDS,  Prev: Pivoting,  Up: Top

28 Valuation
************

Instead of reporting amounts in their original commodity, hledger can
convert them to cost/sale amount (using the conversion rate recorded in
the transaction), or to market value (using some market price on a
certain date).  This is controlled by the '--value=TYPE[,COMMODITY]'
option, but we also provide the simpler '-B'/'-V'/'-X' flags, and
usually one of those is all you need.

* Menu:

* -B Cost::
* -V Value::
* -X Value in specified commodity::
* Valuation date::
* Market prices::
* --infer-value market prices from transactions::
* Valuation commodity::
* Simple valuation examples::
* --value Flexible valuation::
* More valuation examples::
* Effect of valuation on reports::


File: hledger.info,  Node: -B Cost,  Next: -V Value,  Up: Valuation

28.1 -B: Cost
=============

The '-B/--cost' flag converts amounts to their cost or sale amount at
transaction time, if they have a transaction price specified.


File: hledger.info,  Node: -V Value,  Next: -X Value in specified commodity,  Prev: -B Cost,  Up: Valuation

28.2 -V: Value
==============

The '-V/--market' flag converts amounts to market value in their default
_valuation commodity_, using the market prices in effect on the
_valuation date(s)_, if any.  More on these in a minute.


File: hledger.info,  Node: -X Value in specified commodity,  Next: Valuation date,  Prev: -V Value,  Up: Valuation

28.3 -X: Value in specified commodity
=====================================

The '-X/--exchange=COMM' option is like '-V', except you tell it which
currency you want to convert to, and it tries to convert everything to
that.


File: hledger.info,  Node: Valuation date,  Next: Market prices,  Prev: -X Value in specified commodity,  Up: Valuation

28.4 Valuation date
===================

Since market prices can change from day to day, market value reports
have a valuation date (or more than one), which determines which market
prices will be used.

   For single period reports, if an explicit report end date is
specified, that will be used as the valuation date; otherwise the
valuation date is "today".

   For multiperiod reports, each column/period is valued on the last day
of the period, by default.


File: hledger.info,  Node: Market prices,  Next: --infer-value market prices from transactions,  Prev: Valuation date,  Up: Valuation

28.5 Market prices
==================

_(experimental)_

   To convert a commodity A to its market value in another commodity B,
hledger looks for a suitable market price (exchange rate) as follows, in
this order of preference :

  1. A _declared market price_ or _inferred market price_: A's latest
     market price in B on or before the valuation date as declared by a
     P directive, or (with the '--infer-value' flag) inferred from
     transaction prices.

  2. A _reverse market price_: the inverse of a declared or inferred
     market price from B to A.

  3. A _a forward chain of market prices_: a synthetic price formed by
     combining the shortest chain of "forward" (only 1 above) market
     prices, leading from A to B.

  4. A _any chain of market prices_: a chain of any market prices,
     including both forward and reverse prices (1 and 2 above), leading
     from A to B.

   Amounts for which no applicable market price can be found, are not
converted.


File: hledger.info,  Node: --infer-value market prices from transactions,  Next: Valuation commodity,  Prev: Market prices,  Up: Valuation

28.6 -infer-value: market prices from transactions
==================================================

_(experimental)_

   Normally, market value in hledger is fully controlled by, and
requires, P directives in your journal.  Since adding and updating those
can be a chore, and since transactions usually take place at close to
market value, why not use the recorded transaction prices as additional
market prices (as Ledger does) ?  We could produce value reports without
needing P directives at all.

   Adding the '--infer-value' flag to '-V', '-X' or '--value' enables
this.  So for example, 'hledger bs -V --infer-value' will get market
prices both from P directives and from transactions.

   There is a downside: value reports can sometimes be affected in
confusing/undesired ways by your journal entries.  If this happens to
you, read all of this Valuation section carefully, and try adding
'--debug' or '--debug=2' to troubleshoot.

   '--infer-value' can infer market prices from:

   * multicommodity transactions with explicit prices ('@'/'@@')

   * multicommodity transactions with implicit prices (no '@', two
     commodities, unbalanced).  (With these, the order of postings
     matters.  'hledger print -x' can be useful for troubleshooting.)

   * but not, currently, from "more correct" multicommodity transactions
     (no '@', multiple commodities, balanced).


File: hledger.info,  Node: Valuation commodity,  Next: Simple valuation examples,  Prev: --infer-value market prices from transactions,  Up: Valuation

28.7 Valuation commodity
========================

_(experimental)_

   *When you specify a valuation commodity ('-X COMM' or '--value
TYPE,COMM'):*
hledger will convert all amounts to COMM, wherever it can find a
suitable market price (including by reversing or chaining prices).

   *When you leave the valuation commodity unspecified ('-V' or '--value
TYPE'):*
For each commodity A, hledger picks a default valuation commodity as
follows, in this order of preference:

  1. The price commodity from the latest P-declared market price for A
     on or before valuation date.

  2. The price commodity from the latest P-declared market price for A
     on any date.  (Allows conversion to proceed when there are inferred
     prices before the valuation date.)

  3. If there are no P directives at all (any commodity or date) and the
     '--infer-value' flag is used: the price commodity from the latest
     transaction-inferred price for A on or before valuation date.

   This means:

   * If you have P directives, they determine which commodities '-V'
     will convert, and to what.

   * If you have no P directives, and use the '--infer-value' flag,
     transaction prices determine it.

   Amounts for which no valuation commodity can be found are not
converted.


File: hledger.info,  Node: Simple valuation examples,  Next: --value Flexible valuation,  Prev: Valuation commodity,  Up: Valuation

28.8 Simple valuation examples
==============================

Here are some quick examples of '-V':

; one euro is worth this many dollars from nov 1
P 2016/11/01 € $1.10

; purchase some euros on nov 3
2016/11/3
    assets:euros        €100
    assets:checking

; the euro is worth fewer dollars by dec 21
P 2016/12/21 € $1.03

   How many euros do I have ?

$ hledger -f t.j bal -N euros
                €100  assets:euros

   What are they worth at end of nov 3 ?

$ hledger -f t.j bal -N euros -V -e 2016/11/4
             $110.00  assets:euros

   What are they worth after 2016/12/21 ?  (no report end date
specified, defaults to today)

$ hledger -f t.j bal -N euros -V
             $103.00  assets:euros


File: hledger.info,  Node: --value Flexible valuation,  Next: More valuation examples,  Prev: Simple valuation examples,  Up: Valuation

28.9 -value: Flexible valuation
===============================

'-B', '-V' and '-X' are special cases of the more general '--value'
option:

 --value=TYPE[,COMM]  TYPE is cost, then, end, now or YYYY-MM-DD.
                      COMM is an optional commodity symbol.
                      Shows amounts converted to:
                      - cost commodity using transaction prices (then optionally to COMM using market prices at period end(s))
                      - default valuation commodity (or COMM) using market prices at posting dates
                      - default valuation commodity (or COMM) using market prices at period end(s)
                      - default valuation commodity (or COMM) using current market prices
                      - default valuation commodity (or COMM) using market prices at some date

   The TYPE part selects cost or value and valuation date:

'--value=cost'

     Convert amounts to cost, using the prices recorded in transactions.
'--value=then'

     Convert amounts to their value in the default valuation commodity,
     using market prices on each posting's date.  This is currently
     supported only by the print and register commands.
'--value=end'

     Convert amounts to their value in the default valuation commodity,
     using market prices on the last day of the report period (or if
     unspecified, the journal's end date); or in multiperiod reports,
     market prices on the last day of each subperiod.
'--value=now'

     Convert amounts to their value in the default valuation commodity
     using current market prices (as of when report is generated).
'--value=YYYY-MM-DD'

     Convert amounts to their value in the default valuation commodity
     using market prices on this date.

   To select a different valuation commodity, add the optional ',COMM'
part: a comma, then the target commodity's symbol.  Eg:
*'--value=now,EUR'*.  hledger will do its best to convert amounts to
this commodity, deducing market prices as described above.


File: hledger.info,  Node: More valuation examples,  Next: Effect of valuation on reports,  Prev: --value Flexible valuation,  Up: Valuation

28.10 More valuation examples
=============================

Here are some examples showing the effect of '--value', as seen with
'print':

P 2000-01-01 A  1 B
P 2000-02-01 A  2 B
P 2000-03-01 A  3 B
P 2000-04-01 A  4 B

2000-01-01
  (a)      1 A @ 5 B

2000-02-01
  (a)      1 A @ 6 B

2000-03-01
  (a)      1 A @ 7 B

   Show the cost of each posting:

$ hledger -f- print --value=cost
2000-01-01
    (a)             5 B

2000-02-01
    (a)             6 B

2000-03-01
    (a)             7 B

   Show the value as of the last day of the report period (2000-02-29):

$ hledger -f- print --value=end date:2000/01-2000/03
2000-01-01
    (a)             2 B

2000-02-01
    (a)             2 B

   With no report period specified, that shows the value as of the last
day of the journal (2000-03-01):

$ hledger -f- print --value=end
2000-01-01
    (a)             3 B

2000-02-01
    (a)             3 B

2000-03-01
    (a)             3 B

   Show the current value (the 2000-04-01 price is still in effect
today):

$ hledger -f- print --value=now
2000-01-01
    (a)             4 B

2000-02-01
    (a)             4 B

2000-03-01
    (a)             4 B

   Show the value on 2000/01/15:

$ hledger -f- print --value=2000-01-15
2000-01-01
    (a)             1 B

2000-02-01
    (a)             1 B

2000-03-01
    (a)             1 B

   You may need to explicitly set a commodity's display style, when
reverse prices are used.  Eg this output might be surprising:

P 2000-01-01 A 2B

2000-01-01
  a  1B
  b

$ hledger print -x -X A
2000-01-01
    a               0
    b               0

   Explanation: because there's no amount or commodity directive
specifying a display style for A, 0.5A gets the default style, which
shows no decimal digits.  Because the displayed amount looks like zero,
the commodity symbol and minus sign are not displayed either.  Adding a
commodity directive sets a more useful display style for A:

P 2000-01-01 A 2B
commodity 0.00A

2000-01-01
  a  1B
  b

$ hledger print -X A
2000-01-01
    a           0.50A
    b          -0.50A


File: hledger.info,  Node: Effect of valuation on reports,  Prev: More valuation examples,  Up: Valuation

28.11 Effect of valuation on reports
====================================

Here is a reference for how valuation is supposed to affect each part of
hledger's reports (and a glossary).  (It's wide, you'll have to scroll
sideways.)  It may be useful when troubleshooting.  If you find
problems, please report them, ideally with a reproducible example.
Related: #329, #1083.

Report      '-B',          '-V', '-X'     '--value=then''--value=end' '--value=DATE',
type        '--value=cost'                                            '--value=now'
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
*print*
posting     cost           value at       value at     value at       value
amounts                    report end     posting      report or      at
                           or today       date         journal end    DATE/today
balance     unchanged      unchanged      unchanged    unchanged      unchanged
assertions/assignments
*register*
starting    cost           value at day   not          value at day   value
balance                    before         supported    before         at
(-H)                       report or                   report or      DATE/today
                           journal                     journal
                           start                       start
posting     cost           value at       value at     value at       value
amounts                    report end     posting      report or      at
                           or today       date         journal end    DATE/today
summary     summarised     value at       sum of       value at       value
posting     cost           period ends    postings     period ends    at
amounts                                   in                          DATE/today
with                                      interval,
report                                    valued at
interval                                  interval
                                          start
running     sum/average    sum/average    sum/average  sum/average    sum/average
total/averageof displayed  of displayed   of           of displayed   of
            values         values         displayed    values         displayed
                                          values                      values
*balance
(bs, bse,
cf, is)*
balance     sums of        value at       not          value at       value
changes     costs          report end     supported    report or      at
                           or today of                 journal end    DATE/today
                           sums of                     of sums of     of sums
                           postings                    postings       of
                                                                      postings
budget      like balance   like balance   not          like           like
amounts     changes        changes        supported    balances       balance
(-budget)                                                             changes
grand       sum of         sum of         not          sum of         sum of
total       displayed      displayed      supported    displayed      displayed
            values         values                      values         values
*balance
(bs, bse,
cf, is)
with
report
interval*
starting    sums of        value at       not          value at       sums of
balances    costs of       report start   supported    report start   postings
(-H)        postings       of sums of                  of sums of     before
            before         all postings                all postings   report
            report start   before                      before         start
                           report start                report start
balance     sums of        same as        not          balance        value
changes     costs of       -value=end     supported    change in      at
(bal, is,   postings in                                each period,   DATE/today
bs          period                                     valued at      of sums
-change,                                               period ends    of
cf                                                                    postings
-change)
end         sums of        same as        not          period end     value
balances    costs of       -value=end     supported    balances,      at
(bal -H,    postings                                   valued at      DATE/today
is -H,      from before                                period ends    of sums
bs, cf)     report start                                              of
            to period                                                 postings
            end
budget      like balance   like balance   not          like           like
amounts     changes/end    changes/end    supported    balances       balance
(-budget)   balances       balances                                   changes/end
                                                                      balances
row         sums,          sums,          not          sums,          sums,
totals,     averages of    averages of    supported    averages of    averages
row         displayed      displayed                   displayed      of
averages    values         values                      values         displayed
(-T, -A)                                                              values
column      sums of        sums of        not          sums of        sums of
totals      displayed      displayed      supported    displayed      displayed
            values         values                      values         values
grand       sum, average   sum, average   not          sum, average   sum,
total,      of column      of column      supported    of column      average
grand       totals         totals                      totals         of
average                                                               column
                                                                      totals

   '--cumulative' is omitted to save space, it works like '-H' but with
a zero starting balance.

   *Glossary:*

_cost_

     calculated using price(s) recorded in the transaction(s).
_value_

     market value using available market price declarations, or the
     unchanged amount if no conversion rate can be found.
_report start_

     the first day of the report period specified with -b or -p or
     date:, otherwise today.
_report or journal start_

     the first day of the report period specified with -b or -p or
     date:, otherwise the earliest transaction date in the journal,
     otherwise today.
_report end_

     the last day of the report period specified with -e or -p or date:,
     otherwise today.
_report or journal end_

     the last day of the report period specified with -e or -p or date:,
     otherwise the latest transaction date in the journal, otherwise
     today.
_report interval_

     a flag (-D/-W/-M/-Q/-Y) or period expression that activates the
     report's multi-period mode (whether showing one or many
     subperiods).


File: hledger.info,  Node: COMMANDS,  Next: accounts,  Prev: Valuation,  Up: Top

29 COMMANDS
***********

hledger provides a number of subcommands; 'hledger' with no arguments
shows a list.

   If you install additional 'hledger-*' packages, or if you put
programs or scripts named 'hledger-NAME' in your PATH, these will also
be listed as subcommands.

   Run a subcommand by writing its name as first argument (eg 'hledger
incomestatement').  You can also write one of the standard short aliases
displayed in parentheses in the command list ('hledger b'), or any any
unambiguous prefix of a command name ('hledger inc').

   Here are all the builtin commands in alphabetical order.  See also
'hledger' for a more organised command list, and 'hledger CMD -h' for
detailed command help.


File: hledger.info,  Node: accounts,  Next: activity,  Prev: COMMANDS,  Up: Top

30 accounts
***********

accounts, a
Show account names.

   This command lists account names, either declared with account
directives (-declared), posted to (-used), or both (the default).  With
query arguments, only matched account names and account names referenced
by matched postings are shown.  It shows a flat list by default.  With
'--tree', it uses indentation to show the account hierarchy.  In flat
mode you can add '--drop N' to omit the first few account name
components.  Account names can be depth-clipped with 'depth:N' or
'--depth N' or '-N'.

   Examples:

$ hledger accounts
assets:bank:checking
assets:bank:saving
assets:cash
expenses:food
expenses:supplies
income:gifts
income:salary
liabilities:debts


File: hledger.info,  Node: activity,  Next: add,  Prev: accounts,  Up: Top

31 activity
***********

activity
Show an ascii barchart of posting counts per interval.

   The activity command displays an ascii histogram showing transaction
counts by day, week, month or other reporting interval (by day is the
default).  With query arguments, it counts only matched transactions.

   Examples:

$ hledger activity --quarterly
2008-01-01 **
2008-04-01 *******
2008-07-01 
2008-10-01 **


File: hledger.info,  Node: add,  Next: aregister,  Prev: activity,  Up: Top

32 add
******

add
Prompt for transactions and add them to the journal.  Any arguments will
be used as default inputs for the first N prompts.

   Many hledger users edit their journals directly with a text editor,
or generate them from CSV. For more interactive data entry, there is the
'add' command, which prompts interactively on the console for new
transactions, and appends them to the journal file (if there are
multiple '-f FILE' options, the first file is used.)  Existing
transactions are not changed.  This is the only hledger command that
writes to the journal file.

   To use it, just run 'hledger add' and follow the prompts.  You can
add as many transactions as you like; when you are finished, enter '.'
or press control-d or control-c to exit.

   Features:

   * add tries to provide useful defaults, using the most similar (by
     description) recent transaction (filtered by the query, if any) as
     a template.
   * You can also set the initial defaults with command line arguments.
   * Readline-style edit keys can be used during data entry.
   * The tab key will auto-complete whenever possible - accounts,
     descriptions, dates ('yesterday', 'today', 'tomorrow').  If the
     input area is empty, it will insert the default value.
   * If the journal defines a default commodity, it will be added to any
     bare numbers entered.
   * A parenthesised transaction code may be entered following a date.
   * Comments and tags may be entered following a description or amount.
   * If you make a mistake, enter '<' at any prompt to go one step
     backward.
   * Input prompts are displayed in a different colour when the terminal
     supports it.

   Example (see the tutorial for a detailed explanation):

$ hledger add
Adding transactions to journal file /src/hledger/examples/sample.journal
Any command line arguments will be used as defaults.
Use tab key to complete, readline keys to edit, enter to accept defaults.
An optional (CODE) may follow transaction dates.
An optional ; COMMENT may follow descriptions or amounts.
If you make a mistake, enter < at any prompt to go one step backward.
To end a transaction, enter . when prompted.
To quit, enter . at a date prompt or press control-d or control-c.
Date [2015/05/22]: 
Description: supermarket
Account 1: expenses:food
Amount  1: $10
Account 2: assets:checking
Amount  2 [$-10.0]: 
Account 3 (or . or enter to finish this transaction): .
2015/05/22 supermarket
    expenses:food             $10
    assets:checking        $-10.0

Save this transaction to the journal ? [y]: 
Saved.
Starting the next transaction (. or ctrl-D/ctrl-C to quit)
Date [2015/05/22]: <CTRL-D> $

   On Microsoft Windows, the add command makes sure that no part of the
file path ends with a period, as that would cause problems (#1056).


File: hledger.info,  Node: aregister,  Next: balance,  Prev: add,  Up: Top

33 aregister
************

aregister, areg
Show transactions affecting a particular account, and the account's
running balance.

   'aregister' shows the transactions affecting a particular account
(and its subaccounts), from the point of view of that account.  Each
line shows:

   * the transaction's (or posting's, see below) date
   * the names of the other account(s) involved
   * the net change to this account's balance
   * the account's historical running balance (including balance from
     transactions before the report start date).

   With 'aregister', each line represents a whole transaction - as in
hledger-ui, hledger-web, and your bank statement.  By contrast, the
'register' command shows individual postings, across all accounts.  You
might prefer 'aregister' for reconciling with real-world asset/liability
accounts, and 'register' for reviewing detailed revenues/expenses.

   An account must be specified as the first argument, which should be
the full account name or an account pattern (regular expression).
aregister will show transactions in this account (the first one matched)
and any of its subaccounts.

   Any additional arguments form a query which will filter the
transactions shown.

   Transactions making a net change of zero are not shown by default;
add the '-E/--empty' flag to show them.

* Menu:

* aregister and custom posting dates::
* Output format::


File: hledger.info,  Node: aregister and custom posting dates,  Next: ,  Up: aregister

33.1 aregister and custom posting dates
=======================================

Transactions whose date is outside the report period can still be shown,
if they have a posting to this account dated inside the report period.
(And in this case it's the posting date that is shown.)  This ensures
that 'aregister' can show an accurate historical running balance,
matching the one shown by 'register -H' with the same arguments.

   To filter strictly by transaction date instead, add the '--txn-dates'
flag.  If you use this flag and some of your postings have custom dates,
it's probably best to assume the running balance is wrong.

33.2 Output format
==================

This command also supports the output destination and output format
options The output formats supported are 'txt', 'csv', and 'json'.

   Examples:

   Show all transactions and historical running balance in the first
account whose name contains "checking":

$ hledger areg checking

   Show transactions and historical running balance in all asset
accounts during july:

$ hledger areg assets date:jul


File: hledger.info,  Node: balance,  Next: balancesheet,  Prev: aregister,  Up: Top

34 balance
**********

balance, bal, b
Show accounts and their balances.

   The balance command is hledger's most versatile command.  Note,
despite the name, it is not always used for showing real-world account
balances; the more accounting-aware balancesheet and incomestatement may
be more convenient for that.

   By default, it displays all accounts, and each account's change in
balance during the entire period of the journal.  Balance changes are
calculated by adding up the postings in each account.  You can limit the
postings matched, by a query, to see fewer accounts, changes over a
different time period, changes from only cleared transactions, etc.

   If you include an account's complete history of postings in the
report, the balance change is equivalent to the account's current ending
balance.  For a real-world account, typically you won't have all
transactions in the journal; instead you'll have all transactions after
a certain date, and an "opening balances" transaction setting the
correct starting balance on that date.  Then the balance command will
show real-world account balances.  In some cases the -H/-historical flag
is used to ensure this (more below).

   The balance command can produce several styles of report:

* Menu:

* Classic balance report::
* Customising the classic balance report::
* Colour support::
* Flat mode::
* Depth limited balance reports::
* Percentages::
* Sorting by amount::
* Multicolumn balance report::
* Budget report::
* Output format::


File: hledger.info,  Node: Classic balance report,  Next: Customising the classic balance report,  Up: balance

34.1 Classic balance report
===========================

This is the original balance report, as found in Ledger.  It usually
looks like this:

$ hledger balance
                 $-1  assets
                  $1    bank:saving
                 $-2    cash
                  $2  expenses
                  $1    food
                  $1    supplies
                 $-2  income
                 $-1    gifts
                 $-1    salary
                  $1  liabilities:debts
--------------------
                   0

   By default, accounts are displayed hierarchically, with subaccounts
indented below their parent, with accounts at each level of the tree
sorted by declaration order if declared, then by account name.

   "Boring" accounts, which contain a single interesting subaccount and
no balance of their own, are elided into the following line for more
compact output.  (Eg above, the "liabilities" account.)  Use
'--no-elide' to prevent this.

   Account balances are "inclusive" - they include the balances of any
subaccounts.

   Accounts which have zero balance (and no non-zero subaccounts) are
omitted.  Use '-E/--empty' to show them.

   A final total is displayed by default; use '-N/--no-total' to
suppress it, eg:

$ hledger balance -p 2008/6 expenses --no-total
                  $2  expenses
                  $1    food
                  $1    supplies


File: hledger.info,  Node: Customising the classic balance report,  Next: Colour support,  Prev: Classic balance report,  Up: balance

34.2 Customising the classic balance report
===========================================

You can customise the layout of classic balance reports with '--format
FMT':

$ hledger balance --format "%20(account) %12(total)"
              assets          $-1
         bank:saving           $1
                cash          $-2
            expenses           $2
                food           $1
            supplies           $1
              income          $-2
               gifts          $-1
              salary          $-1
   liabilities:debts           $1
---------------------------------
                                0

   The FMT format string (plus a newline) specifies the formatting
applied to each account/balance pair.  It may contain any suitable text,
with data fields interpolated like so:

   '%[MIN][.MAX](FIELDNAME)'

   * MIN pads with spaces to at least this width (optional)

   * MAX truncates at this width (optional)

   * FIELDNAME must be enclosed in parentheses, and can be one of:

        * 'depth_spacer' - a number of spaces equal to the account's
          depth, or if MIN is specified, MIN * depth spaces.
        * 'account' - the account's name
        * 'total' - the account's balance/posted total, right justified

   Also, FMT can begin with an optional prefix to control how
multi-commodity amounts are rendered:

   * '%_' - render on multiple lines, bottom-aligned (the default)
   * '%^' - render on multiple lines, top-aligned
   * '%,' - render on one line, comma-separated

   There are some quirks.  Eg in one-line mode, '%(depth_spacer)' has no
effect, instead '%(account)' has indentation built in.  Experimentation
may be needed to get pleasing results.

   Some example formats:

   * '%(total)' - the account's total
   * '%-20.20(account)' - the account's name, left justified, padded to
     20 characters and clipped at 20 characters
   * '%,%-50(account) %25(total)' - account name padded to 50
     characters, total padded to 20 characters, with multiple
     commodities rendered on one line
   * '%20(total) %2(depth_spacer)%-(account)' - the default format for
     the single-column balance report


File: hledger.info,  Node: Colour support,  Next: Flat mode,  Prev: Customising the classic balance report,  Up: balance

34.3 Colour support
===================

In terminal output, when colour is enabled, the balance command shows
negative amounts in red.


File: hledger.info,  Node: Flat mode,  Next: Depth limited balance reports,  Prev: Colour support,  Up: balance

34.4 Flat mode
==============

To see a flat list instead of the default hierarchical display, use
'--flat'.  In this mode, accounts (unless depth-clipped) show their full
names and "exclusive" balance, excluding any subaccount balances.  In
this mode, you can also use '--drop N' to omit the first few account
name components.

$ hledger balance -p 2008/6 expenses -N --flat --drop 1
                  $1  food
                  $1  supplies


File: hledger.info,  Node: Depth limited balance reports,  Next: Percentages,  Prev: Flat mode,  Up: balance

34.5 Depth limited balance reports
==================================

With '--depth N' or 'depth:N' or just '-N', balance reports show
accounts only to the specified numeric depth.  This is very useful to
summarise a complex set of accounts and get an overview.

$ hledger balance -N -1
                 $-1  assets
                  $2  expenses
                 $-2  income
                  $1  liabilities

   Flat-mode balance reports, which normally show exclusive balances,
show inclusive balances at the depth limit.


File: hledger.info,  Node: Percentages,  Next: Sorting by amount,  Prev: Depth limited balance reports,  Up: balance

34.6 Percentages
================

With '-%' or '--percent', balance reports show each account's value
expressed as a percentage of the column's total.  This is useful to get
an overview of the relative sizes of account balances.  For example to
obtain an overview of expenses:

$ hledger balance expenses -%
             100.0 %  expenses
              50.0 %    food
              50.0 %    supplies
--------------------
             100.0 %

   Note that '--tree' does not have an effect on '-%'.  The percentages
are always relative to the total sum of each column, they are never
relative to the parent account.

   Since the percentages are relative to the columns sum, it is usually
not useful to calculate percentages if the signs of the amounts are
mixed.  Although the results are technically correct, they are most
likely useless.  Especially in a balance report that sums up to zero (eg
'hledger balance -B') all percentage values will be zero.

   This flag does not work if the report contains any mixed commodity
accounts.  If there are mixed commodity accounts in the report be sure
to use '-V' or '-B' to coerce the report into using a single commodity.


File: hledger.info,  Node: Sorting by amount,  Next: Multicolumn balance report,  Prev: Percentages,  Up: balance

34.7 Sorting by amount
======================

With '-S'/'--sort-amount', accounts with the largest (most positive)
balances are shown first.  For example, 'hledger bal expenses -MAS'
shows your biggest averaged monthly expenses first.

   Revenues and liability balances are typically negative, however, so
'-S' shows these in reverse order.  To work around this, you can add
'--invert' to flip the signs.  Or, use one of the sign-flipping reports
like 'balancesheet' or 'incomestatement', which also support '-S'.  Eg:
'hledger is -MAS'.


File: hledger.info,  Node: Multicolumn balance report,  Next: Budget report,  Prev: Sorting by amount,  Up: balance

34.8 Multicolumn balance report
===============================

Multicolumn or tabular balance reports are a very useful hledger
feature, and usually the preferred style.  They share many of the above
features, but they show the report as a table, with columns representing
time periods.  This mode is activated by providing a reporting interval.

   There are three types of multicolumn balance report, showing
different information:

  1. By default: each column shows the sum of postings in that period,
     ie the account's change of balance in that period.  This is useful
     eg for a monthly income statement:

     $ hledger balance --quarterly income expenses -E
     Balance changes in 2008:
     
                        ||  2008q1  2008q2  2008q3  2008q4 
     ===================++=================================
      expenses:food     ||       0      $1       0       0 
      expenses:supplies ||       0      $1       0       0 
      income:gifts      ||       0     $-1       0       0 
      income:salary     ||     $-1       0       0       0 
     -------------------++---------------------------------
                        ||     $-1      $1       0       0 

  2. With '--cumulative': each column shows the ending balance for that
     period, accumulating the changes across periods, starting from 0 at
     the report start date:

     $ hledger balance --quarterly income expenses -E --cumulative
     Ending balances (cumulative) in 2008:
     
                        ||  2008/03/31  2008/06/30  2008/09/30  2008/12/31 
     ===================++=================================================
      expenses:food     ||           0          $1          $1          $1 
      expenses:supplies ||           0          $1          $1          $1 
      income:gifts      ||           0         $-1         $-1         $-1 
      income:salary     ||         $-1         $-1         $-1         $-1 
     -------------------++-------------------------------------------------
                        ||         $-1           0           0           0 

  3. With '--historical/-H': each column shows the actual historical
     ending balance for that period, accumulating the changes across
     periods, starting from the actual balance at the report start date.
     This is useful eg for a multi-period balance sheet, and when you
     are showing only the data after a certain start date:

     $ hledger balance ^assets ^liabilities --quarterly --historical --begin 2008/4/1
     Ending balances (historical) in 2008/04/01-2008/12/31:
     
                           ||  2008/06/30  2008/09/30  2008/12/31 
     ======================++=====================================
      assets:bank:checking ||          $1          $1           0 
      assets:bank:saving   ||          $1          $1          $1 
      assets:cash          ||         $-2         $-2         $-2 
      liabilities:debts    ||           0           0          $1 
     ----------------------++-------------------------------------
                           ||           0           0           0 

   Note that '--cumulative' or '--historical/-H' disable
'--row-total/-T', since summing end balances generally does not make
sense.

   Multicolumn balance reports display accounts in flat mode by default;
to see the hierarchy, use '--tree'.

   With a reporting interval (like '--quarterly' above), the report
start/end dates will be adjusted if necessary so that they encompass the
displayed report periods.  This is so that the first and last periods
will be "full" and comparable to the others.

   The '-E/--empty' flag does two things in multicolumn balance reports:
first, the report will show all columns within the specified report
period (without -E, leading and trailing columns with all zeroes are not
shown).  Second, all accounts which existed at the report start date
will be considered, not just the ones with activity during the report
period (use -E to include low-activity accounts which would otherwise
would be omitted).

   The '-T/--row-total' flag adds an additional column showing the total
for each row.

   The '-A/--average' flag adds a column showing the average value in
each row.

   Here's an example of all three:

$ hledger balance -Q income expenses --tree -ETA
Balance changes in 2008:

            ||  2008q1  2008q2  2008q3  2008q4    Total  Average 
============++===================================================
 expenses   ||       0      $2       0       0       $2       $1 
   food     ||       0      $1       0       0       $1        0 
   supplies ||       0      $1       0       0       $1        0 
 income     ||     $-1     $-1       0       0      $-2      $-1 
   gifts    ||       0     $-1       0       0      $-1        0 
   salary   ||     $-1       0       0       0      $-1        0 
------------++---------------------------------------------------
            ||     $-1      $1       0       0        0        0 

(Average is rounded to the dollar here since all journal amounts are)

   The '--transpose' flag can be used to exchange the rows and columns
of a multicolumn report.

   When showing multicommodity amounts, multicolumn balance reports will
elide any amounts which have more than two commodities, since otherwise
columns could get very wide.  The '--no-elide' flag disables this.
Hiding totals with the '-N/--no-total' flag can also help reduce the
width of multicommodity reports.

   When the report is still too wide, a good workaround is to pipe it
into 'less -RS' (-R for colour, -S to chop long lines).  Eg: 'hledger
bal -D --color=yes | less -RS'.


File: hledger.info,  Node: Budget report,  Next: ,  Prev: Multicolumn balance report,  Up: balance

34.9 Budget report
==================

With '--budget', extra columns are displayed showing budget goals for
each account and period, if any.  Budget goals are defined by periodic
transactions.  This is very useful for comparing planned and actual
income, expenses, time usage, etc.  -budget is most often combined with
a report interval.

   For example, you can take average monthly expenses in the common
expense categories to construct a minimal monthly budget:

;; Budget
~ monthly
  income  $2000
  expenses:food    $400
  expenses:bus     $50
  expenses:movies  $30
  assets:bank:checking

;; Two months worth of expenses
2017-11-01
  income  $1950
  expenses:food    $396
  expenses:bus     $49
  expenses:movies  $30
  expenses:supplies  $20
  assets:bank:checking

2017-12-01
  income  $2100
  expenses:food    $412
  expenses:bus     $53
  expenses:gifts   $100
  assets:bank:checking

   You can now see a monthly budget report:

$ hledger balance -M --budget
Budget performance in 2017/11/01-2017/12/31:

                      ||                      Nov                       Dec 
======================++====================================================
 assets               || $-2445 [  99% of $-2480]  $-2665 [ 107% of $-2480] 
 assets:bank          || $-2445 [  99% of $-2480]  $-2665 [ 107% of $-2480] 
 assets:bank:checking || $-2445 [  99% of $-2480]  $-2665 [ 107% of $-2480] 
 expenses             ||   $495 [ 103% of   $480]    $565 [ 118% of   $480] 
 expenses:bus         ||    $49 [  98% of    $50]     $53 [ 106% of    $50] 
 expenses:food        ||   $396 [  99% of   $400]    $412 [ 103% of   $400] 
 expenses:movies      ||    $30 [ 100% of    $30]       0 [   0% of    $30] 
 income               ||  $1950 [  98% of  $2000]   $2100 [ 105% of  $2000] 
----------------------++----------------------------------------------------
                      ||      0 [              0]       0 [              0] 

   This is different from a normal balance report in several ways:

   * Only accounts with budget goals during the report period are shown,
     by default.

   * In each column, in square brackets after the actual amount, budget
     goal amounts are shown, and the actual/goal percentage.  (Note:
     budget goals should be in the same commodity as the actual amount.)

   * All parent accounts are always shown, even in flat mode.  Eg
     assets, assets:bank, and expenses above.

   * Amounts always include all subaccounts, budgeted or unbudgeted,
     even in flat mode.

   This means that the numbers displayed will not always add up!  Eg
above, the 'expenses' actual amount includes the gifts and supplies
transactions, but the 'expenses:gifts' and 'expenses:supplies' accounts
are not shown, as they have no budget amounts declared.

   This can be confusing.  When you need to make things clearer, use the
'-E/--empty' flag, which will reveal all accounts including unbudgeted
ones, giving the full picture.  Eg:

$ hledger balance -M --budget --empty
Budget performance in 2017/11/01-2017/12/31:

                      ||                      Nov                       Dec 
======================++====================================================
 assets               || $-2445 [  99% of $-2480]  $-2665 [ 107% of $-2480] 
 assets:bank          || $-2445 [  99% of $-2480]  $-2665 [ 107% of $-2480] 
 assets:bank:checking || $-2445 [  99% of $-2480]  $-2665 [ 107% of $-2480] 
 expenses             ||   $495 [ 103% of   $480]    $565 [ 118% of   $480] 
 expenses:bus         ||    $49 [  98% of    $50]     $53 [ 106% of    $50] 
 expenses:food        ||   $396 [  99% of   $400]    $412 [ 103% of   $400] 
 expenses:gifts       ||      0                      $100                   
 expenses:movies      ||    $30 [ 100% of    $30]       0 [   0% of    $30] 
 expenses:supplies    ||    $20                         0                   
 income               ||  $1950 [  98% of  $2000]   $2100 [ 105% of  $2000] 
----------------------++----------------------------------------------------
                      ||      0 [              0]       0 [              0] 

   You can roll over unspent budgets to next period with '--cumulative':

$ hledger balance -M --budget --cumulative
Budget performance in 2017/11/01-2017/12/31:

                      ||                      Nov                       Dec 
======================++====================================================
 assets               || $-2445 [  99% of $-2480]  $-5110 [ 103% of $-4960] 
 assets:bank          || $-2445 [  99% of $-2480]  $-5110 [ 103% of $-4960] 
 assets:bank:checking || $-2445 [  99% of $-2480]  $-5110 [ 103% of $-4960] 
 expenses             ||   $495 [ 103% of   $480]   $1060 [ 110% of   $960] 
 expenses:bus         ||    $49 [  98% of    $50]    $102 [ 102% of   $100] 
 expenses:food        ||   $396 [  99% of   $400]    $808 [ 101% of   $800] 
 expenses:movies      ||    $30 [ 100% of    $30]     $30 [  50% of    $60] 
 income               ||  $1950 [  98% of  $2000]   $4050 [ 101% of  $4000] 
----------------------++----------------------------------------------------
                      ||      0 [              0]       0 [              0] 

   For more examples and notes, see Budgeting.

* Menu:

* Budget report start date::
* Nested budgets::


File: hledger.info,  Node: Budget report start date,  Next: Nested budgets,  Up: Budget report

34.9.1 Budget report start date
-------------------------------

This might be a bug, but for now: when making budget reports, it's a
good idea to explicitly set the report's start date to the first day of
a reporting period, because a periodic rule like '~ monthly' generates
its transactions on the 1st of each month, and if your journal has no
regular transactions on the 1st, the default report start date could
exclude that budget goal, which can be a little surprising.  Eg here the
default report period is just the day of 2020-01-15:

~ monthly in 2020
  (expenses:food)  $500

2020-01-15
  expenses:food    $400
  assets:checking

$ hledger bal expenses --budget
Budget performance in 2020-01-15:

              || 2020-01-15 
==============++============
 <unbudgeted> ||       $400 
--------------++------------
              ||       $400 

   To avoid this, specify the budget report's period, or at least the
start date, with '-b'/'-e'/'-p'/'date:', to ensure it includes the
budget goal transactions (periodic transactions) that you want.  Eg,
adding '-b 2020/1/1' to the above:

$ hledger bal expenses --budget -b 2020/1/1
Budget performance in 2020-01-01..2020-01-15:

               || 2020-01-01..2020-01-15 
===============++========================
 expenses:food ||     $400 [80% of $500] 
---------------++------------------------
               ||     $400 [80% of $500] 


File: hledger.info,  Node: Nested budgets,  Prev: Budget report start date,  Up: Budget report

34.9.2 Nested budgets
---------------------

You can add budgets to any account in your account hierarchy.  If you
have budgets on both parent account and some of its children, then
budget(s) of the child account(s) would be added to the budget of their
parent, much like account balances behave.

   In the most simple case this means that once you add a budget to any
account, all its parents would have budget as well.

   To illustrate this, consider the following budget:

~ monthly from 2019/01
    expenses:personal             $1,000.00
    expenses:personal:electronics    $100.00
    liabilities

   With this, monthly budget for electronics is defined to be $100 and
budget for personal expenses is an additional $1000, which implicitly
means that budget for both 'expenses:personal' and 'expenses' is $1100.

   Transactions in 'expenses:personal:electronics' will be counted both
towards its $100 budget and $1100 of 'expenses:personal' , and
transactions in any other subaccount of 'expenses:personal' would be
counted towards only towards the budget of 'expenses:personal'.

   For example, let's consider these transactions:

~ monthly from 2019/01
    expenses:personal             $1,000.00
    expenses:personal:electronics    $100.00
    liabilities

2019/01/01 Google home hub
    expenses:personal:electronics          $90.00
    liabilities                           $-90.00

2019/01/02 Phone screen protector
    expenses:personal:electronics:upgrades          $10.00
    liabilities

2019/01/02 Weekly train ticket
    expenses:personal:train tickets       $153.00
    liabilities

2019/01/03 Flowers
    expenses:personal          $30.00
    liabilities

   As you can see, we have transactions in
'expenses:personal:electronics:upgrades' and 'expenses:personal:train
tickets', and since both of these accounts are without explicitly
defined budget, these transactions would be counted towards budgets of
'expenses:personal:electronics' and 'expenses:personal' accordingly:

$ hledger balance --budget -M
Budget performance in 2019/01:

                               ||                           Jan 
===============================++===============================
 expenses                      ||  $283.00 [  26% of  $1100.00] 
 expenses:personal             ||  $283.00 [  26% of  $1100.00] 
 expenses:personal:electronics ||  $100.00 [ 100% of   $100.00] 
 liabilities                   || $-283.00 [  26% of $-1100.00] 
-------------------------------++-------------------------------
                               ||        0 [                 0] 

   And with '--empty', we can get a better picture of budget allocation
and consumption:

$ hledger balance --budget -M --empty
Budget performance in 2019/01:

                                        ||                           Jan 
========================================++===============================
 expenses                               ||  $283.00 [  26% of  $1100.00] 
 expenses:personal                      ||  $283.00 [  26% of  $1100.00] 
 expenses:personal:electronics          ||  $100.00 [ 100% of   $100.00] 
 expenses:personal:electronics:upgrades ||   $10.00                      
 expenses:personal:train tickets        ||  $153.00                      
 liabilities                            || $-283.00 [  26% of $-1100.00] 
----------------------------------------++-------------------------------
                                        ||        0 [                 0] 

34.10 Output format
===================

This command also supports the output destination and output format
options The output formats supported are (in most modes): 'txt', 'csv',
'html', and 'json'.


File: hledger.info,  Node: balancesheet,  Next: balancesheetequity,  Prev: balance,  Up: Top

35 balancesheet
***************

balancesheet, bs
This command displays a balance sheet, showing historical ending
balances of asset and liability accounts.  (To see equity as well, use
the balancesheetequity command.)  Amounts are shown with normal positive
sign, as in conventional financial statements.

   The asset and liability accounts shown are those accounts declared
with the 'Asset' or 'Cash' or 'Liability' type, or otherwise all
accounts under a top-level 'asset' or 'liability' account (case
insensitive, plurals allowed).

   Example:

$ hledger balancesheet
Balance Sheet

Assets:
                 $-1  assets
                  $1    bank:saving
                 $-2    cash
--------------------
                 $-1

Liabilities:
                  $1  liabilities:debts
--------------------
                  $1

Total:
--------------------
                   0

   With a reporting interval, multiple columns will be shown, one for
each report period.  As with multicolumn balance reports, you can alter
the report mode with '--change'/'--cumulative'/'--historical'.  Normally
balancesheet shows historical ending balances, which is what you need
for a balance sheet; note this means it ignores report begin dates (and
'-T/--row-total', since summing end balances generally does not make
sense).  Instead of absolute values percentages can be displayed with
'-%'.

   This command also supports the output destination and output format
options The output formats supported are 'txt', 'csv', 'html', and
(experimental) 'json'.


File: hledger.info,  Node: balancesheetequity,  Next: cashflow,  Prev: balancesheet,  Up: Top

36 balancesheetequity
*********************

balancesheetequity, bse
This command displays a balance sheet, showing historical ending
balances of asset, liability and equity accounts.  Amounts are shown
with normal positive sign, as in conventional financial statements.

   The asset, liability and equity accounts shown are those accounts
declared with the 'Asset', 'Cash', 'Liability' or 'Equity' type, or
otherwise all accounts under a top-level 'asset', 'liability' or
'equity' account (case insensitive, plurals allowed).

   Example:

$ hledger balancesheetequity
Balance Sheet With Equity

Assets:
                 $-2  assets
                  $1    bank:saving
                 $-3    cash
--------------------
                 $-2

Liabilities:
                  $1  liabilities:debts
--------------------
                  $1

Equity:
          $1  equity:owner
--------------------
          $1

Total:
--------------------
                   0

   This command also supports the output destination and output format
options The output formats supported are 'txt', 'csv', 'html', and
(experimental) 'json'.


File: hledger.info,  Node: cashflow,  Next: check,  Prev: balancesheetequity,  Up: Top

37 cashflow
***********

cashflow, cf
This command displays a cashflow statement, showing the inflows and
outflows affecting "cash" (ie, liquid) assets.  Amounts are shown with
normal positive sign, as in conventional financial statements.

   The "cash" accounts shown are those accounts declared with the 'Cash'
type, or otherwise all accounts under a top-level 'asset' account (case
insensitive, plural allowed) which do not have 'fixed', 'investment',
'receivable' or 'A/R' in their name.

   Example:

$ hledger cashflow
Cashflow Statement

Cash flows:
                 $-1  assets
                  $1    bank:saving
                 $-2    cash
--------------------
                 $-1

Total:
--------------------
                 $-1

   With a reporting interval, multiple columns will be shown, one for
each report period.  Normally cashflow shows changes in assets per
period, though as with multicolumn balance reports you can alter the
report mode with '--change'/'--cumulative'/'--historical'.  Instead of
absolute values percentages can be displayed with '-%'.

   This command also supports the output destination and output format
options The output formats supported are 'txt', 'csv', 'html', and
(experimental) 'json'.


File: hledger.info,  Node: check,  Next: close,  Prev: cashflow,  Up: Top

38 check
********

check
Check for various kinds of errors in your data.  _experimental_

   hledger provides a number of built-in error checks to help prevent
problems in your data.  Some of these are run automatically; or, you can
use this 'check' command to run them on demand, with no output and a
zero exit code if all is well.  Some examples:

hledger check      # basic checks
hledger check -s   # basic + strict checks
hledger check ordereddates uniqueleafnames  # basic + specified checks

   Here are the checks currently available:

* Menu:

* Basic checks::
* Strict checks::
* Other checks::
* Add-on checks::


File: hledger.info,  Node: Basic checks,  Next: Strict checks,  Up: check

38.1 Basic checks
=================

These are always run by this command and other commands:

   * *parseable* - data files are well-formed and can be successfully
     parsed

   * *autobalanced* - all transactions are balanced, inferring missing
     amounts where necessary, and possibly converting commodities using
     transaction prices or automatically-inferred transaction prices

   * *assertions* - all balance assertions in the journal are passing.
     (This check can be disabled with '-I'/'--ignore-assertions'.)


File: hledger.info,  Node: Strict checks,  Next: Other checks,  Prev: Basic checks,  Up: check

38.2 Strict checks
==================

These are always run by this and other commands when '-s'/'--strict' is
used (strict mode):

   * *accounts* - all account names used by transactions have been
     declared

   * *commodities* - all commodity symbols used have been declared


File: hledger.info,  Node: Other checks,  Next: Add-on checks,  Prev: Strict checks,  Up: check

38.3 Other checks
=================

These checks can be run by specifying their names as arguments to the
check command:

   * *ordereddates* - transactions are ordered by date (similar to the
     old 'check-dates' command)

   * *uniqueleafnames* - all account leaf names are unique (similar to
     the old 'check-dupes' command)


File: hledger.info,  Node: Add-on checks,  Prev: Other checks,  Up: check

38.4 Add-on checks
==================

Some checks are not yet integrated with this command, but are available
as add-on commands in
https://github.com/simonmichael/hledger/tree/master/bin:

   * *hledger-check-tagfiles* - all tag values containing / (a forward
     slash) exist as file paths

   * *hledger-check-fancyassertions* - more complex balance assertions
     are passing

   You could make your own similar scripts to perform custom checks;
Cookbook -> Scripting may be helpful.


File: hledger.info,  Node: close,  Next: codes,  Prev: check,  Up: Top

39 close
********

close, equity
Prints a "closing balances" transaction and an "opening balances"
transaction that bring account balances to and from zero, respectively.
These can be added to your journal file(s), eg to bring asset/liability
balances forward into a new journal file, or to close out
revenues/expenses to retained earnings at the end of a period.

   You can print just one of these transactions by using the '--close'
or '--open' flag.  You can customise their descriptions with the
'--close-desc' and '--open-desc' options.

   One amountless posting to "equity:opening/closing balances" is added
to balance the transactions, by default.  You can customise this account
name with '--close-acct' and '--open-acct'; if you specify only one of
these, it will be used for both.

   With '--x/--explicit', the equity posting's amount will be shown.
And if it involves multiple commodities, a posting for each commodity
will be shown, as with the print command.

   With '--interleaved', the equity postings are shown next to the
postings they balance, which makes troubleshooting easier.

   By default, transaction prices in the journal are ignored when
generating the closing/opening transactions.  With '--show-costs', this
cost information is preserved ('balance -B' reports will be unchanged
after the transition).  Separate postings are generated for each cost in
each commodity.  Note this can generate very large journal entries, if
you have many foreign currency or investment transactions.

* Menu:

* close usage::


File: hledger.info,  Node: close usage,  Up: close

39.1 close usage
================

If you split your journal files by time (eg yearly), you will typically
run this command at the end of the year, and save the closing
transaction as last entry of the old file, and the opening transaction
as the first entry of the new file.  This makes the files self
contained, so that correct balances are reported no matter which of them
are loaded.  Ie, if you load just one file, the balances are initialised
correctly; or if you load several files, the redundant closing/opening
transactions cancel each other out.  (They will show up in print or
register reports; you can exclude them with a query like
'not:desc:'(opening|closing) balances''.)

   If you're running a business, you might also use this command to
"close the books" at the end of an accounting period, transferring
income statement account balances to retained earnings.  (You may want
to change the equity account name to something like "equity:retained
earnings".)

   By default, the closing transaction is dated yesterday, the balances
are calculated as of end of yesterday, and the opening transaction is
dated today.  To close on some other date, use: 'hledger close -e
OPENINGDATE'.  Eg, to close/open on the 2018/2019 boundary, use '-e
2019'.  You can also use -p or 'date:PERIOD' (any starting date is
ignored).

   Both transactions will include balance assertions for the
closed/reopened accounts.  You probably shouldn't use status or realness
filters (like -C or -R or 'status:') with this command, or the generated
balance assertions will depend on these flags.  Likewise, if you run
this command with -auto, the balance assertions will probably always
require -auto.

   Examples:

   Carrying asset/liability balances into a new file for 2019:

$ hledger close -f 2018.journal -e 2019 assets liabilities --open
    # (copy/paste the output to the start of your 2019 journal file)
$ hledger close -f 2018.journal -e 2019 assets liabilities --close
    # (copy/paste the output to the end of your 2018 journal file)

   Now:

$ hledger bs -f 2019.journal                   # one file - balances are correct
$ hledger bs -f 2018.journal -f 2019.journal   # two files - balances still correct
$ hledger bs -f 2018.journal not:desc:closing  # to see year-end balances, must exclude closing txn

   Transactions spanning the closing date can complicate matters,
breaking balance assertions:

2018/12/30 a purchase made in 2018, clearing the following year
    expenses:food          5
    assets:bank:checking  -5  ; [2019/1/2]

   Here's one way to resolve that:

; in 2018.journal:
2018/12/30 a purchase made in 2018, clearing the following year
    expenses:food          5
    liabilities:pending

; in 2019.journal:
2019/1/2 clearance of last year's pending transactions
    liabilities:pending    5 = 0
    assets:checking


File: hledger.info,  Node: codes,  Next: commodities,  Prev: close,  Up: Top

40 codes
********

codes
List the codes seen in transactions, in the order parsed.

   This command prints the value of each transaction's code field, in
the order transactions were parsed.  The transaction code is an optional
value written in parentheses between the date and description, often
used to store a cheque number, order number or similar.

   Transactions aren't required to have a code, and missing or empty
codes will not be shown by default.  With the '-E'/'--empty' flag, they
will be printed as blank lines.

   You can add a query to select a subset of transactions.

   Examples:

1/1 (123)
 (a)  1

1/1 ()
 (a)  1

1/1
 (a)  1

1/1 (126)
 (a)  1

$ hledger codes
123
124
126

$ hledger codes -E
123
124


126


File: hledger.info,  Node: commodities,  Next: descriptions,  Prev: codes,  Up: Top

41 commodities
**************

commodities
List all commodity/currency symbols used or declared in the journal.


File: hledger.info,  Node: descriptions,  Next: diff,  Prev: commodities,  Up: Top

42 descriptions
***************

descriptions
List the unique descriptions that appear in transactions.

   This command lists the unique descriptions that appear in
transactions, in alphabetic order.  You can add a query to select a
subset of transactions.

   Example:

$ hledger descriptions
Store Name
Gas Station | Petrol
Person A


File: hledger.info,  Node: diff,  Next: files,  Prev: descriptions,  Up: Top

43 diff
*******

diff
Compares a particular account's transactions in two input files.  It
shows any transactions to this account which are in one file but not in
the other.

   More precisely, for each posting affecting this account in either
file, it looks for a corresponding posting in the other file which posts
the same amount to the same account (ignoring date, description, etc.)
Since postings not transactions are compared, this also works when
multiple bank transactions have been combined into a single journal
entry.

   This is useful eg if you have downloaded an account's transactions
from your bank (eg as CSV data).  When hledger and your bank disagree
about the account balance, you can compare the bank data with your
journal to find out the cause.

   Examples:

$ hledger diff -f $LEDGER_FILE -f bank.csv assets:bank:giro 
These transactions are in the first file only:

2014/01/01 Opening Balances
    assets:bank:giro              EUR ...
    ...
    equity:opening balances       EUR -...

These transactions are in the second file only:


File: hledger.info,  Node: files,  Next: help,  Prev: diff,  Up: Top

44 files
********

files
List all files included in the journal.  With a REGEX argument, only
file names matching the regular expression (case sensitive) are shown.


File: hledger.info,  Node: help,  Next: import,  Prev: files,  Up: Top

45 help
*******

help
Show any of the hledger manuals.

   The 'help' command displays any of the main hledger manuals, in one
of several ways.  Run it with no argument to list the manuals, or
provide a full or partial manual name to select one.

   hledger manuals are available in several formats.  hledger help will
use the first of these display methods that it finds: info, man, $PAGER,
less, stdout (or when non-interactive, just stdout).  You can force a
particular viewer with the '--info', '--man', '--pager', '--cat' flags.

   Examples:

$ hledger help
Please choose a manual by typing "hledger help MANUAL" (a substring is ok).
Manuals: hledger hledger-ui hledger-web journal csv timeclock timedot

$ hledger help h --man

hledger(1)                    hledger User Manuals                    hledger(1)

NAME
       hledger - a command-line accounting tool

SYNOPSIS
       hledger [-f FILE] COMMAND [OPTIONS] [ARGS]
       hledger [-f FILE] ADDONCMD -- [OPTIONS] [ARGS]
       hledger

DESCRIPTION
       hledger  is  a  cross-platform  program  for tracking money, time, or any
...


File: hledger.info,  Node: import,  Next: incomestatement,  Prev: help,  Up: Top

46 import
*********

import
Read new transactions added to each FILE since last run, and add them to
the main journal file.  Or with -dry-run, just print the transactions
that would be added.  Or with -catchup, just mark all of the FILEs'
transactions as imported, without actually importing any.

   The input files are specified as arguments - no need to write -f
before each one.  So eg to add new transactions from all CSV files to
the main journal, it's just: 'hledger import *.csv'

   New transactions are detected in the same way as print -new: by
assuming transactions are always added to the input files in increasing
date order, and by saving '.latest.FILE' state files.

   The -dry-run output is in journal format, so you can filter it, eg to
see only uncategorised transactions:

$ hledger import --dry ... | hledger -f- print unknown --ignore-assertions

* Menu:

* Importing balance assignments::
* Commodity display styles::


File: hledger.info,  Node: Importing balance assignments,  Next: Commodity display styles,  Up: import

46.1 Importing balance assignments
==================================

Entries added by import will have their posting amounts made explicit
(like 'hledger print -x').  This means that any balance assignments in
imported files must be evaluated; but, imported files don't get to see
the main file's account balances.  As a result, importing entries with
balance assignments (eg from an institution that provides only balances
and not posting amounts) will probably generate incorrect posting
amounts.  To avoid this problem, use print instead of import:

$ hledger print IMPORTFILE [--new] >> $LEDGER_FILE

   (If you think import should leave amounts implicit like print does,
please test it and send a pull request.)


File: hledger.info,  Node: Commodity display styles,  Prev: Importing balance assignments,  Up: import

46.2 Commodity display styles
=============================

Imported amounts will be formatted according to the canonical commodity
styles (declared or inferred) in the main journal file.


File: hledger.info,  Node: incomestatement,  Next: notes,  Prev: import,  Up: Top

47 incomestatement
******************

incomestatement, is

   This command displays an income statement, showing revenues and
expenses during one or more periods.  Amounts are shown with normal
positive sign, as in conventional financial statements.

   The revenue and expense accounts shown are those accounts declared
with the 'Revenue' or 'Expense' type, or otherwise all accounts under a
top-level 'revenue' or 'income' or 'expense' account (case insensitive,
plurals allowed).

   Example:

$ hledger incomestatement
Income Statement

Revenues:
                 $-2  income
                 $-1    gifts
                 $-1    salary
--------------------
                 $-2

Expenses:
                  $2  expenses
                  $1    food
                  $1    supplies
--------------------
                  $2

Total:
--------------------
                   0

   With a reporting interval, multiple columns will be shown, one for
each report period.  Normally incomestatement shows revenues/expenses
per period, though as with multicolumn balance reports you can alter the
report mode with '--change'/'--cumulative'/'--historical'.  Instead of
absolute values percentages can be displayed with '-%'.

   This command also supports the output destination and output format
options The output formats supported are 'txt', 'csv', 'html', and
(experimental) 'json'.


File: hledger.info,  Node: notes,  Next: payees,  Prev: incomestatement,  Up: Top

48 notes
********

notes
List the unique notes that appear in transactions.

   This command lists the unique notes that appear in transactions, in
alphabetic order.  You can add a query to select a subset of
transactions.  The note is the part of the transaction description after
a | character (or if there is no |, the whole description).

   Example:

$ hledger notes
Petrol
Snacks


File: hledger.info,  Node: payees,  Next: prices,  Prev: notes,  Up: Top

49 payees
*********

payees
List the unique payee/payer names that appear in transactions.

   This command lists the unique payee/payer names that appear in
transactions, in alphabetic order.  You can add a query to select a
subset of transactions.  The payee/payer is the part of the transaction
description before a | character (or if there is no |, the whole
description).

   Example:

$ hledger payees
Store Name
Gas Station
Person A


File: hledger.info,  Node: prices,  Next: print,  Prev: payees,  Up: Top

50 prices
*********

prices
Print market price directives from the journal.  With -costs, also print
synthetic market prices based on transaction prices.  With
-inverted-costs, also print inverse prices based on transaction prices.
Prices (and postings providing prices) can be filtered by a query.
Price amounts are always displayed with their full precision.


File: hledger.info,  Node: print,  Next: print-unique,  Prev: prices,  Up: Top

51 print
********

print, txns, p
Show transaction journal entries, sorted by date.

   The print command displays full journal entries (transactions) from
the journal file in date order, tidily formatted.  With -date2,
transactions are sorted by secondary date instead.

   print's output is always a valid hledger journal.
It preserves all transaction information, but it does not preserve
directives or inter-transaction comments

$ hledger print
2008/01/01 income
    assets:bank:checking            $1
    income:salary                  $-1

2008/06/01 gift
    assets:bank:checking            $1
    income:gifts                   $-1

2008/06/02 save
    assets:bank:saving              $1
    assets:bank:checking           $-1

2008/06/03 * eat & shop
    expenses:food                $1
    expenses:supplies            $1
    assets:cash                 $-2

2008/12/31 * pay off
    liabilities:debts               $1
    assets:bank:checking           $-1

   Normally, the journal entry's explicit or implicit amount style is
preserved.  For example, when an amount is omitted in the journal, it
will not appear in the output.  Similarly, when a transaction price is
implied but not written, it will not appear in the output.  You can use
the '-x'/'--explicit' flag to make all amounts and transaction prices
explicit, which can be useful for troubleshooting or for making your
journal more readable and robust against data entry errors.  '-x' is
also implied by using any of '-B','-V','-X','--value'.

   Note, '-x'/'--explicit' will cause postings with a multi-commodity
amount (these can arise when a multi-commodity transaction has an
implicit amount) to be split into multiple single-commodity postings,
keeping the output parseable.

   With '-B'/'--cost', amounts with transaction prices are converted to
cost using that price.  This can be used for troubleshooting.

   With '-m'/'--match' and a STR argument, print will show at most one
transaction: the one one whose description is most similar to STR, and
is most recent.  STR should contain at least two characters.  If there
is no similar-enough match, no transaction will be shown.

   With '--new', for each FILE being read, hledger reads (and writes) a
special state file ('.latest.FILE' in the same directory), containing
the latest transaction date(s) that were seen last time FILE was read.
When this file is found, only transactions with newer dates (and new
transactions on the latest date) are printed.  This is useful for
ignoring already-seen entries in import data, such as downloaded CSV
files.  Eg:

$ hledger -f bank1.csv print --new
(shows transactions added since last print --new on this file)

   This assumes that transactions added to FILE always have same or
increasing dates, and that transactions on the same day do not get
reordered.  See also the import command.

   This command also supports the output destination and output format
options The output formats supported are 'txt', 'csv', and
(experimental) 'json' and 'sql'.

   Here's an example of print's CSV output:

$ hledger print -Ocsv
"txnidx","date","date2","status","code","description","comment","account","amount","commodity","credit","debit","posting-status","posting-comment"
"1","2008/01/01","","","","income","","assets:bank:checking","1","$","","1","",""
"1","2008/01/01","","","","income","","income:salary","-1","$","1","","",""
"2","2008/06/01","","","","gift","","assets:bank:checking","1","$","","1","",""
"2","2008/06/01","","","","gift","","income:gifts","-1","$","1","","",""
"3","2008/06/02","","","","save","","assets:bank:saving","1","$","","1","",""
"3","2008/06/02","","","","save","","assets:bank:checking","-1","$","1","","",""
"4","2008/06/03","","*","","eat & shop","","expenses:food","1","$","","1","",""
"4","2008/06/03","","*","","eat & shop","","expenses:supplies","1","$","","1","",""
"4","2008/06/03","","*","","eat & shop","","assets:cash","-2","$","2","","",""
"5","2008/12/31","","*","","pay off","","liabilities:debts","1","$","","1","",""
"5","2008/12/31","","*","","pay off","","assets:bank:checking","-1","$","1","","",""

   * There is one CSV record per posting, with the parent transaction's
     fields repeated.
   * The "txnidx" (transaction index) field shows which postings belong
     to the same transaction.  (This number might change if transactions
     are reordered within the file, files are parsed/included in a
     different order, etc.)
   * The amount is separated into "commodity" (the symbol) and "amount"
     (numeric quantity) fields.
   * The numeric amount is repeated in either the "credit" or "debit"
     column, for convenience.  (Those names are not accurate in the
     accounting sense; it just puts negative amounts under credit and
     zero or greater amounts under debit.)


File: hledger.info,  Node: print-unique,  Next: register,  Prev: print,  Up: Top

52 print-unique
***************

print-unique
Print transactions which do not reuse an already-seen description.

   Example:

$ cat unique.journal
1/1 test
 (acct:one)  1
2/2 test
 (acct:two)  2
$ LEDGER_FILE=unique.journal hledger print-unique
(-f option not supported)
2015/01/01 test
    (acct:one)             1


File: hledger.info,  Node: register,  Next: register-match,  Prev: print-unique,  Up: Top

53 register
***********

register, reg, r
Show postings and their running total.

   The register command displays matched postings, across all accounts,
in date order, with their running total or running historical balance.
(See also the 'aregister' command, which shows matched transactions in a
specific account.)

   register normally shows line per posting, but note that
multi-commodity amounts will occupy multiple lines (one line per
commodity).

   It is typically used with a query selecting a particular account, to
see that account's activity:

$ hledger register checking
2008/01/01 income               assets:bank:checking            $1           $1
2008/06/01 gift                 assets:bank:checking            $1           $2
2008/06/02 save                 assets:bank:checking           $-1           $1
2008/12/31 pay off              assets:bank:checking           $-1            0

   With -date2, it shows and sorts by secondary date instead.

   The '--historical'/'-H' flag adds the balance from any undisplayed
prior postings to the running total.  This is useful when you want to
see only recent activity, with a historically accurate running balance:

$ hledger register checking -b 2008/6 --historical
2008/06/01 gift                 assets:bank:checking            $1           $2
2008/06/02 save                 assets:bank:checking           $-1           $1
2008/12/31 pay off              assets:bank:checking           $-1            0

   The '--depth' option limits the amount of sub-account detail
displayed.

   The '--average'/'-A' flag shows the running average posting amount
instead of the running total (so, the final number displayed is the
average for the whole report period).  This flag implies '--empty' (see
below).  It is affected by '--historical'.  It works best when showing
just one account and one commodity.

   The '--related'/'-r' flag shows the _other_ postings in the
transactions of the postings which would normally be shown.

   The '--invert' flag negates all amounts.  For example, it can be used
on an income account where amounts are normally displayed as negative
numbers.  It's also useful to show postings on the checking account
together with the related account:

$ hledger register --related --invert assets:checking

   With a reporting interval, register shows summary postings, one per
interval, aggregating the postings to each account:

$ hledger register --monthly income
2008/01                 income:salary                          $-1          $-1
2008/06                 income:gifts                           $-1          $-2

   Periods with no activity, and summary postings with a zero amount,
are not shown by default; use the '--empty'/'-E' flag to see them:

$ hledger register --monthly income -E
2008/01                 income:salary                          $-1          $-1
2008/02                                                          0          $-1
2008/03                                                          0          $-1
2008/04                                                          0          $-1
2008/05                                                          0          $-1
2008/06                 income:gifts                           $-1          $-2
2008/07                                                          0          $-2
2008/08                                                          0          $-2
2008/09                                                          0          $-2
2008/10                                                          0          $-2
2008/11                                                          0          $-2
2008/12                                                          0          $-2

   Often, you'll want to see just one line per interval.  The '--depth'
option helps with this, causing subaccounts to be aggregated:

$ hledger register --monthly assets --depth 1h
2008/01                 assets                                  $1           $1
2008/06                 assets                                 $-1            0
2008/12                 assets                                 $-1          $-1

   Note when using report intervals, if you specify start/end dates
these will be adjusted outward if necessary to contain a whole number of
intervals.  This ensures that the first and last intervals are full
length and comparable to the others in the report.

* Menu:

* Custom register output::


File: hledger.info,  Node: Custom register output,  Up: register

53.1 Custom register output
===========================

register uses the full terminal width by default, except on windows.
You can override this by setting the 'COLUMNS' environment variable (not
a bash shell variable) or by using the '--width'/'-w' option.

   The description and account columns normally share the space equally
(about half of (width - 40) each).  You can adjust this by adding a
description width as part of -width's argument, comma-separated:
'--width W,D' .  Here's a diagram (won't display correctly in -help):

<--------------------------------- width (W) ---------------------------------->
date (10)  description (D)       account (W-41-D)     amount (12)   balance (12)
DDDDDDDDDD dddddddddddddddddddd  aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa  AAAAAAAAAAAA  AAAAAAAAAAAA

   and some examples:

$ hledger reg                     # use terminal width (or 80 on windows)
$ hledger reg -w 100              # use width 100
$ COLUMNS=100 hledger reg         # set with one-time environment variable
$ export COLUMNS=100; hledger reg # set till session end (or window resize)
$ hledger reg -w 100,40           # set overall width 100, description width 40
$ hledger reg -w $COLUMNS,40      # use terminal width, & description width 40

   This command also supports the output destination and output format
options The output formats supported are 'txt', 'csv', and
(experimental) 'json'.


File: hledger.info,  Node: register-match,  Next: rewrite,  Prev: register,  Up: Top

54 register-match
*****************

register-match
Print the one posting whose transaction description is closest to DESC,
in the style of the register command.  If there are multiple equally
good matches, it shows the most recent.  Query options (options, not
arguments) can be used to restrict the search space.  Helps
ledger-autosync detect already-seen transactions when importing.


File: hledger.info,  Node: rewrite,  Next: roi,  Prev: register-match,  Up: Top

55 rewrite
**********

rewrite
Print all transactions, rewriting the postings of matched transactions.
For now the only rewrite available is adding new postings, like print
-auto.

   This is a start at a generic rewriter of transaction entries.  It
reads the default journal and prints the transactions, like print, but
adds one or more specified postings to any transactions matching QUERY.
The posting amounts can be fixed, or a multiplier of the existing
transaction's first posting amount.

   Examples:

$ hledger-rewrite.hs ^income --add-posting '(liabilities:tax)  *.33  ; income tax' --add-posting '(reserve:gifts)  $100'
$ hledger-rewrite.hs expenses:gifts --add-posting '(reserve:gifts)  *-1"'
$ hledger-rewrite.hs -f rewrites.hledger

   rewrites.hledger may consist of entries like:

= ^income amt:<0 date:2017
  (liabilities:tax)  *0.33  ; tax on income
  (reserve:grocery)  *0.25  ; reserve 25% for grocery
  (reserve:)  *0.25  ; reserve 25% for grocery

   Note the single quotes to protect the dollar sign from bash, and the
two spaces between account and amount.

   More:

$ hledger rewrite -- [QUERY]        --add-posting "ACCT  AMTEXPR" ...
$ hledger rewrite -- ^income        --add-posting '(liabilities:tax)  *.33'
$ hledger rewrite -- expenses:gifts --add-posting '(budget:gifts)  *-1"'
$ hledger rewrite -- ^income        --add-posting '(budget:foreign currency)  *0.25 JPY; diversify'

   Argument for '--add-posting' option is a usual posting of transaction
with an exception for amount specification.  More precisely, you can use
''*'' (star symbol) before the amount to indicate that that this is a
factor for an amount of original matched posting.  If the amount
includes a commodity name, the new posting amount will be in the new
commodity; otherwise, it will be in the matched posting amount's
commodity.

* Menu:

* Re-write rules in a file::


File: hledger.info,  Node: Re-write rules in a file,  Up: rewrite

55.1 Re-write rules in a file
=============================

During the run this tool will execute so called "Automated Transactions"
found in any journal it process.  I.e instead of specifying this
operations in command line you can put them in a journal file.

$ rewrite-rules.journal

   Make contents look like this:

= ^income
    (liabilities:tax)  *.33

= expenses:gifts
    budget:gifts  *-1
    assets:budget  *1

   Note that ''='' (equality symbol) that is used instead of date in
transactions you usually write.  It indicates the query by which you
want to match the posting to add new ones.

$ hledger rewrite -- -f input.journal -f rewrite-rules.journal > rewritten-tidy-output.journal

   This is something similar to the commands pipeline:

$ hledger rewrite -- -f input.journal '^income' --add-posting '(liabilities:tax)  *.33' \
  | hledger rewrite -- -f - expenses:gifts      --add-posting 'budget:gifts  *-1'       \
                                                --add-posting 'assets:budget  *1'       \
  > rewritten-tidy-output.journal

   It is important to understand that relative order of such entries in
journal is important.  You can re-use result of previously added
postings.

* Menu:

* Diff output format::
* rewrite vs print --auto::


File: hledger.info,  Node: Diff output format,  Next: rewrite vs print --auto,  Up: Re-write rules in a file

55.1.1 Diff output format
-------------------------

To use this tool for batch modification of your journal files you may
find useful output in form of unified diff.

$ hledger rewrite -- --diff -f examples/sample.journal '^income' --add-posting '(liabilities:tax)  *.33'

   Output might look like:

--- /tmp/examples/sample.journal
+++ /tmp/examples/sample.journal
@@ -18,3 +18,4 @@
 2008/01/01 income
-    assets:bank:checking  $1
+    assets:bank:checking            $1
     income:salary
+    (liabilities:tax)                0
@@ -22,3 +23,4 @@
 2008/06/01 gift
-    assets:bank:checking  $1
+    assets:bank:checking            $1
     income:gifts
+    (liabilities:tax)                0

   If you'll pass this through 'patch' tool you'll get transactions
containing the posting that matches your query be updated.  Note that
multiple files might be update according to list of input files
specified via '--file' options and 'include' directives inside of these
files.

   Be careful.  Whole transaction being re-formatted in a style of
output from 'hledger print'.

   See also:

   https://github.com/simonmichael/hledger/issues/99


File: hledger.info,  Node: rewrite vs print --auto,  Prev: Diff output format,  Up: Re-write rules in a file

55.1.2 rewrite vs. print -auto
------------------------------

This command predates print -auto, and currently does much the same
thing, but with these differences:

   * with multiple files, rewrite lets rules in any file affect all
     other files.  print -auto uses standard directive scoping; rules
     affect only child files.

   * rewrite's query limits which transactions can be rewritten; all are
     printed.  print -auto's query limits which transactions are
     printed.

   * rewrite applies rules specified on command line or in the journal.
     print -auto applies rules specified in the journal.


File: hledger.info,  Node: roi,  Next: stats,  Prev: rewrite,  Up: Top

56 roi
******

roi
Shows the time-weighted (TWR) and money-weighted (IRR) rate of return on
your investments.

   This command assumes that you have account(s) that hold nothing but
your investments and whenever you record current appraisal/valuation of
these investments you offset unrealized profit and loss into account(s)
that, again, hold nothing but unrealized profit and loss.

   Any transactions affecting balance of investment account(s) and not
originating from unrealized profit and loss account(s) are assumed to be
your investments or withdrawals.

   At a minimum, you need to supply a query (which could be just an
account name) to select your investments with '--inv', and another query
to identify your profit and loss transactions with '--pnl'.

   This command will compute and display the internalized rate of return
(IRR) and time-weighted rate of return (TWR) for your investments for
the time period requested.  Both rates of return are annualized before
display, regardless of the length of reporting interval.

   Note, in some cases this report can fail, for these reasons:

   * Error (NotBracketed): No solution for Internal Rate of Return
     (IRR). Possible causes: IRR is huge (>1000000%), balance of
     investment becomes negative at some point in time.
   * Error (SearchFailed): Failed to find solution for Internal Rate of
     Return (IRR). Either search does not converge to a solution, or
     converges too slowly.

   Examples:

   * Using roi to report unrealised gains:
     https://github.com/simonmichael/hledger/blob/master/examples/roi-unrealised.ledger

   More background:

   "ROI" stands for "return on investment".  Traditionally this was
computed as a difference between current value of investment and its
initial value, expressed in percentage of the initial value.

   However, this approach is only practical in simple cases, where
investments receives no in-flows or out-flows of money, and where rate
of growth is fixed over time.  For more complex scenarios you need
different ways to compute rate of return, and this command implements
two of them: IRR and TWR.

   Internal rate of return, or "IRR" (also called "money-weighted rate
of return") takes into account effects of in-flows and out-flows.
Naively, if you are withdrawing from your investment, your future gains
would be smaller (in absolute numbers), and will be a smaller percentage
of your initial investment, and if you are adding to your investment,
you will receive bigger absolute gains (but probably at the same rate of
return).  IRR is a way to compute rate of return for each period between
in-flow or out-flow of money, and then combine them in a way that gives
you an annual rate of return that investment is expected to generate.

   As mentioned before, in-flows and out-flows would be any cash that
you personally put in or withdraw, and for the "roi" command, these are
transactions that involve account(s) matching '--inv' argument and NOT
involve account(s) matching '--pnl' argument.

   Presumably, you will also record changes in the value of your
investment, and balance them against "profit and loss" (or "unrealized
gains") account.  Note that in order for IRR to compute the precise
effect of your in-flows and out-flows on the rate of return, you will
need to record the value of your investement on or close to the days
when in- or out-flows occur.

   Implementation of IRR in hledger should match the 'XIRR' formula in
Excel.

   Second way to compute rate of return that 'roi' command implements is
called "time-weighted rate of return" or "TWR". Like IRR, it will also
break the history of your investment into periods between in-flows and
out-flows to compute rate of return per each period and then a compound
rate of return.  However, internal workings of TWR are quite different.

   In technical terms, IRR uses the same approach as computation of net
present value, and tries to find a discount rate that makes net present
value of all the cash flows of your investment to add up to zero.  This
could be hard to wrap your head around, especially if you haven't done
discounted cash flow analysis before.

   TWR represents your investment as an imaginary "unit fund" where
in-flows/ out-flows lead to buying or selling "units" of your investment
and changes in its value change the value of "investment unit".  Change
in "unit price" over the reporting period gives you rate of return of
your investment.

   References: * Explanation of rate of return * Explanation of IRR *
Explanation of TWR * Examples of computing IRR and TWR and discussion of
the limitations of both metrics

   More examples:

   Lets say that we found an investment in Snake Oil that is proising to
give us 10% annually:

2019-01-01 Investing in Snake Oil
  assets:cash  -$100
  investment:snake oil

2019-12-24 Recording the growth of Snake Oil
  investment:snake oil   = $110
  equity:unrealized gains

   For now, basic computation of the rate of return, as well as IRR and
TWR, gives us the expected 10%:

$ hledger roi -Y --inv investment --pnl "unrealized"
+---++------------+------------++---------------+----------+-------------+-----++--------+--------+
|   ||      Begin |        End || Value (begin) | Cashflow | Value (end) | PnL ||    IRR |    TWR |
+===++============+============++===============+==========+=============+=====++========+========+
| 1 || 2019-01-01 | 2019-12-31 ||             0 |      100 |         110 |  10 || 10.00% | 10.00% |
+---++------------+------------++---------------+----------+-------------+-----++--------+--------+

   However, lets say that shorty after investing in the Snake Oil we
started to have second thoughs, so we prompty withdrew $90, leaving only
$10 in.  Before Christmas, though, we started to get the "fear of
mission out", so we put the $90 back in.  So for most of the year, our
investment was just $10 dollars, and it gave us just $1 in growth:

2019-01-01 Investing in Snake Oil
  assets:cash  -$100
  investment:snake oil

2019-01-02 Buyers remorse
  assets:cash  $90
  investment:snake oil
       
2019-12-30 Fear of missing out
  assets:cash  -$90
  investment:snake oil

2019-12-31 Recording the growth of Snake Oil
  investment:snake oil   = $101
  equity:unrealized gains

   Now IRR and TWR are drastically different:

$ hledger roi -Y --inv investment --pnl "unrealized"
+---++------------+------------++---------------+----------+-------------+-----++-------+-------+
|   ||      Begin |        End || Value (begin) | Cashflow | Value (end) | PnL ||   IRR |   TWR |
+===++============+============++===============+==========+=============+=====++=======+=======+
| 1 || 2019-01-01 | 2019-12-31 ||             0 |      100 |         101 |   1 || 9.32% | 1.00% |
+---++------------+------------++---------------+----------+-------------+-----++-------+-------+

   Here, IRR tells us that we made close to 10% on the $10 dollars that
we had in the account most of the time.  And TWR is ...  just 1%?  Why?

   Based on the transactions in our journal, TWR "think" that we are
buying back $90 worst of Snake Oil at the same price that it had at the
beginning of they year, and then after that our $100 investment gets $1
increase in value, or 1% of $100.  Let's take a closer look at what is
happening here by asking for quarterly reports instead of annual:

$ hledger roi -Q --inv investment --pnl "unrealized"
+---++------------+------------++---------------+----------+-------------+-----++--------+-------+
|   ||      Begin |        End || Value (begin) | Cashflow | Value (end) | PnL ||    IRR |   TWR |
+===++============+============++===============+==========+=============+=====++========+=======+
| 1 || 2019-01-01 | 2019-03-31 ||             0 |       10 |          10 |   0 ||  0.00% | 0.00% |
| 2 || 2019-04-01 | 2019-06-30 ||            10 |        0 |          10 |   0 ||  0.00% | 0.00% |
| 3 || 2019-07-01 | 2019-09-30 ||            10 |        0 |          10 |   0 ||  0.00% | 0.00% |
| 4 || 2019-10-01 | 2019-12-31 ||            10 |       90 |         101 |   1 || 37.80% | 4.03% |
+---++------------+------------++---------------+----------+-------------+-----++--------+-------+

   Now both IRR and TWR are thrown off by the fact that all of the
growth for our investment happens in Q4 2019.  This happes because IRR
computation is still yielding 9.32% and TWR is still 1%, but this time
these are rates for three month period instead of twelve, so in order to
get an annual rate they should be multiplied by four!

   Let's try to keep a better record of how Snake Oil grew in value:

2019-01-01 Investing in Snake Oil
  assets:cash  -$100
  investment:snake oil

2019-01-02 Buyers remorse
  assets:cash  $90
  investment:snake oil

2019-02-28 Recording the growth of Snake Oil
  investment:snake oil  
  equity:unrealized gains  -$0.25

2019-06-30 Recording the growth of Snake Oil
  investment:snake oil  
  equity:unrealized gains  -$0.25

2019-09-30 Recording the growth of Snake Oil
  investment:snake oil  
  equity:unrealized gains  -$0.25

2019-12-30 Fear of missing out
  assets:cash  -$90
  investment:snake oil

2019-12-31 Recording the growth of Snake Oil
  investment:snake oil
  equity:unrealized gains  -$0.25

   Would our quartery report look better now?  Almost:

$ hledger roi -Q --inv investment --pnl "unrealized"
+---++------------+------------++---------------+----------+-------------+------++--------+--------+
|   ||      Begin |        End || Value (begin) | Cashflow | Value (end) |  PnL ||    IRR |    TWR |
+===++============+============++===============+==========+=============+======++========+========+
| 1 || 2019-01-01 | 2019-03-31 ||             0 |       10 |       10.25 | 0.25 ||  9.53% | 10.53% |
| 2 || 2019-04-01 | 2019-06-30 ||         10.25 |        0 |       10.50 | 0.25 || 10.15% | 10.15% |
| 3 || 2019-07-01 | 2019-09-30 ||         10.50 |        0 |       10.75 | 0.25 ||  9.79% |  9.78% |
| 4 || 2019-10-01 | 2019-12-31 ||         10.75 |       90 |      101.00 | 0.25 ||  8.05% |  1.00% |
+---++------------+------------++---------------+----------+-------------+------++--------+--------+

   Something is still wrong with TWR computation for Q4, and if you have
been paying attention you know what it is already: big $90 buy-back is
recorded prior to the only transaction that captures the change of value
of Snake Oil that happened in this time period.  Lets combine
transactions from 30th and 31st of Dec into one:

2019-12-30 Fear of missing out and growth of Snake Oil
  assets:cash  -$90
  investment:snake oil
  equity:unrealized gains  -$0.25

   Now growth of investment properly affects its price at the time of
buy-back:

$ hledger roi -Q --inv investment --pnl "unrealized"
+---++------------+------------++---------------+----------+-------------+------++--------+--------+
|   ||      Begin |        End || Value (begin) | Cashflow | Value (end) |  PnL ||    IRR |    TWR |
+===++============+============++===============+==========+=============+======++========+========+
| 1 || 2019-01-01 | 2019-03-31 ||             0 |       10 |       10.25 | 0.25 ||  9.53% | 10.53% |
| 2 || 2019-04-01 | 2019-06-30 ||         10.25 |        0 |       10.50 | 0.25 || 10.15% | 10.15% |
| 3 || 2019-07-01 | 2019-09-30 ||         10.50 |        0 |       10.75 | 0.25 ||  9.79% |  9.78% |
| 4 || 2019-10-01 | 2019-12-31 ||         10.75 |       90 |      101.00 | 0.25 ||  8.05% |  9.57% |
+---++------------+------------++---------------+----------+-------------+------++--------+--------+

   And for annual report, TWR now reports the exact profitability of our
investment:

$ hledger roi -Y --inv investment --pnl "unrealized"
+---++------------+------------++---------------+----------+-------------+------++-------+--------+
|   ||      Begin |        End || Value (begin) | Cashflow | Value (end) |  PnL ||   IRR |    TWR |
+===++============+============++===============+==========+=============+======++=======+========+
| 1 || 2019-01-01 | 2019-12-31 ||             0 |      100 |      101.00 | 1.00 || 9.32% | 10.00% |
+---++------------+------------++---------------+----------+-------------+------++-------+--------+


File: hledger.info,  Node: stats,  Next: tags,  Prev: roi,  Up: Top

57 stats
********

stats
Show some journal statistics.

   The stats command displays summary information for the whole journal,
or a matched part of it.  With a reporting interval, it shows a report
for each report period.

   Example:

$ hledger stats
Main journal file        : /src/hledger/examples/sample.journal
Included journal files   : 
Transactions span        : 2008-01-01 to 2009-01-01 (366 days)
Last transaction         : 2008-12-31 (2333 days ago)
Transactions             : 5 (0.0 per day)
Transactions last 30 days: 0 (0.0 per day)
Transactions last 7 days : 0 (0.0 per day)
Payees/descriptions      : 5
Accounts                 : 8 (depth 3)
Commodities              : 1 ($)
Market prices            : 12 ($)

   This command also supports output destination and output format
selection.


File: hledger.info,  Node: tags,  Next: test,  Prev: stats,  Up: Top

58 tags
*******

tags
List the unique tag names used in the journal.  With a TAGREGEX
argument, only tag names matching the regular expression (case
insensitive) are shown.  With QUERY arguments, only transactions
matching the query are considered.

   With the -values flag, the tags' unique values are listed instead.

   With -parsed flag, all tags or values are shown in the order they are
parsed from the input data, including duplicates.

   With -E/-empty, any blank/empty values will also be shown, otherwise
they are omitted.


File: hledger.info,  Node: test,  Next: Add-on commands,  Prev: tags,  Up: Top

59 test
*******

test
Run built-in unit tests.

   This command runs the unit tests built in to hledger and hledger-lib,
printing the results on stdout.  If any test fails, the exit code will
be non-zero.

   This is mainly used by hledger developers, but you can also use it to
sanity-check the installed hledger executable on your platform.  All
tests are expected to pass - if you ever see a failure, please report as
a bug!

   This command also accepts tasty test runner options, written after a
- (double hyphen).  Eg to run only the tests in Hledger.Data.Amount,
with ANSI colour codes disabled:

$ hledger test -- -pData.Amount --color=never

   For help on these, see https://github.com/feuerbach/tasty#options
('-- --help' currently doesn't show them).


File: hledger.info,  Node: Add-on commands,  Next: ENVIRONMENT,  Prev: test,  Up: Top

60 Add-on commands
******************

hledger also searches for external add-on commands, and will include
these in the commands list.  These are programs or scripts in your PATH
whose name starts with 'hledger-' and ends with a recognised file
extension (currently: no extension, 'bat','com','exe',
'hs','lhs','pl','py','rb','rkt','sh').

   Add-ons can be invoked like any hledger command, but there are a few
things to be aware of.  Eg if the 'hledger-web' add-on is installed,

   * 'hledger -h web' shows hledger's help, while 'hledger web -h' shows
     hledger-web's help.

   * Flags specific to the add-on must have a preceding '--' to hide
     them from hledger.  So 'hledger web --serve --port 9000' will be
     rejected; you must use 'hledger web -- --serve --port 9000'.

   * You can always run add-ons directly if preferred: 'hledger-web
     --serve --port 9000'.

   Add-ons are a relatively easy way to add local features or experiment
with new ideas.  They can be written in any language, but haskell
scripts have a big advantage: they can use the same hledger (and
haskell) library functions that built-in commands do, for command-line
options, journal parsing, reporting, etc.

   Two important add-ons are the hledger-ui and hledger-web user
interfaces.  These are maintained and released along with hledger:

* Menu:

* ui::
* web::
* iadd::
* interest::
* stockquotes::


File: hledger.info,  Node: ui,  Next: web,  Up: Add-on commands

60.1 ui
=======

hledger-ui provides an efficient terminal interface.


File: hledger.info,  Node: web,  Next: iadd,  Prev: ui,  Up: Add-on commands

60.2 web
========

hledger-web provides a simple web interface.

   Third party add-ons, maintained separately from hledger, include:


File: hledger.info,  Node: iadd,  Next: interest,  Prev: web,  Up: Add-on commands

60.3 iadd
=========

hledger-iadd is a more interactive, terminal UI replacement for the add
command.


File: hledger.info,  Node: interest,  Next: stockquotes,  Prev: iadd,  Up: Add-on commands

60.4 interest
=============

hledger-interest generates interest transactions for an account
according to various schemes.


File: hledger.info,  Node: stockquotes,  Prev: interest,  Up: Add-on commands

60.5 stockquotes
================

hledger-stockquotes downloads market prices for the commodities in your
journal from AlphaVantage.

   A few more experimental or old add-ons can be found in hledger's bin/
directory.  These are typically prototypes and not guaranteed to work.


File: hledger.info,  Node: ENVIRONMENT,  Next: FILES,  Prev: Add-on commands,  Up: Top

61 ENVIRONMENT
**************

*LEDGER_FILE* The journal file path when not specified with '-f'.
Default: '~/.hledger.journal' (on windows, perhaps
'C:/Users/USER/.hledger.journal').

   A typical value is '~/DIR/YYYY.journal', where DIR is a
version-controlled finance directory and YYYY is the current year.  Or
'~/DIR/current.journal', where current.journal is a symbolic link to
YYYY.journal.

   On Mac computers, you can set this and other environment variables in
a more thorough way that also affects applications started from the GUI
(say, an Emacs dock icon).  Eg on MacOS Catalina I have a
'~/.MacOSX/environment.plist' file containing

{
  "LEDGER_FILE" : "~/finance/current.journal"
}

   To see the effect you may need to 'killall Dock', or reboot.

   *COLUMNS* The screen width used by the register command.  Default:
the full terminal width.

   *NO_COLOR* If this variable exists with any value, hledger will not
use ANSI color codes in terminal output.  This overrides the
-color/-colour option.


File: hledger.info,  Node: FILES,  Next: LIMITATIONS,  Prev: ENVIRONMENT,  Up: Top

62 FILES
********

Reads data from one or more files in hledger journal, timeclock,
timedot, or CSV format specified with '-f', or '$LEDGER_FILE', or
'$HOME/.hledger.journal' (on windows, perhaps
'C:/Users/USER/.hledger.journal').


File: hledger.info,  Node: LIMITATIONS,  Next: TROUBLESHOOTING,  Prev: FILES,  Up: Top

63 LIMITATIONS
**************

The need to precede add-on command options with '--' when invoked from
hledger is awkward.

   When input data contains non-ascii characters, a suitable system
locale must be configured (or there will be an unhelpful error).  Eg on
POSIX, set LANG to something other than C.

   In a Microsoft Windows CMD window, non-ascii characters and colours
are not supported.

   On Windows, non-ascii characters may not display correctly when
running a hledger built in CMD in MSYS/CYGWIN, or vice-versa.

   In a Cygwin/MSYS/Mintty window, the tab key is not supported in
hledger add.

   Not all of Ledger's journal file syntax is supported.  See file
format differences.

   On large data files, hledger is slower and uses more memory than
Ledger.


File: hledger.info,  Node: TROUBLESHOOTING,  Prev: LIMITATIONS,  Up: Top

64 TROUBLESHOOTING
******************

Here are some issues you might encounter when you run hledger (and
remember you can also seek help from the IRC channel, mail list or bug
tracker):

   *Successfully installed, but "No command 'hledger' found"*
stack and cabal install binaries into a special directory, which should
be added to your PATH environment variable.  Eg on unix-like systems,
that is ~/.local/bin and ~/.cabal/bin respectively.

   *I set a custom LEDGER_FILE, but hledger is still using the default
file*
'LEDGER_FILE' should be a real environment variable, not just a shell
variable.  The command 'env | grep LEDGER_FILE' should show it.  You may
need to use 'export'.  Here's an explanation.

   *Getting errors like "Illegal byte sequence" or "Invalid or
incomplete multibyte or wide character" or "commitAndReleaseBuffer:
invalid argument (invalid character)"*
Programs compiled with GHC (hledger, haskell build tools, etc.)  need to
have a UTF-8-aware locale configured in the environment, otherwise they
will fail with these kinds of errors when they encounter non-ascii
characters.

   To fix it, set the LANG environment variable to some locale which
supports UTF-8.  The locale you choose must be installed on your system.

   Here's an example of setting LANG temporarily, on Ubuntu GNU/Linux:

$ file my.journal
my.journal: UTF-8 Unicode text         # the file is UTF8-encoded
$ echo $LANG
C                                      # LANG is set to the default locale, which does not support UTF8
$ locale -a                            # which locales are installed ?
C
en_US.utf8                             # here's a UTF8-aware one we can use
POSIX
$ LANG=en_US.utf8 hledger -f my.journal print   # ensure it is used for this command

   If available, 'C.UTF-8' will also work.  If your preferred locale
isn't listed by 'locale -a', you might need to install it.  Eg on
Ubuntu/Debian:

$ apt-get install language-pack-fr
$ locale -a
C
en_US.utf8
fr_BE.utf8
fr_CA.utf8
fr_CH.utf8
fr_FR.utf8
fr_LU.utf8
POSIX
$ LANG=fr_FR.utf8 hledger -f my.journal print

   Here's how you could set it permanently, if you use a bash shell:

$ echo "export LANG=en_US.utf8" >>~/.bash_profile
$ bash --login

   Exact spelling and capitalisation may be important.  Note the
difference on MacOS ('UTF-8', not 'utf8').  Some platforms (eg ubuntu)
allow variant spellings, but others (eg macos) require it to be exact:

$ locale -a | grep -iE en_us.*utf
en_US.UTF-8
$ LANG=en_US.UTF-8 hledger -f my.journal print


Tag Table:
Node: Top68
Node: COMMON TASKS3281
Ref: #common-tasks3398
Node: Getting help3605
Ref: #getting-help3745
Node: Constructing command lines4298
Ref: #constructing-command-lines4477
Node: Starting a journal file5174
Ref: #starting-a-journal-file5359
Node: Setting opening balances6547
Ref: #setting-opening-balances6730
Node: Recording transactions9871
Ref: #recording-transactions10038
Node: Reconciling10594
Ref: #reconciling10724
Node: Reporting12981
Ref: #reporting13108
Node: Migrating to a new file17107
Ref: #migrating-to-a-new-file17258
Node: OPTIONS17557
Ref: #options17684
Node: General options17684
Ref: #general-options17819
Node: Command options21220
Ref: #command-options21365
Node: Command arguments21765
Ref: #command-arguments21906
Node: Queries22786
Ref: #queries22935
Node: Special characters in arguments and queries26897
Ref: #special-characters-in-arguments-and-queries27119
Node: More escaping27570
Ref: #more-escaping27730
Node: Even more escaping28026
Ref: #even-more-escaping28218
Node: Less escaping28892
Ref: #less-escaping29052
Node: Unicode characters29297
Ref: #unicode-characters29473
Node: Input files30885
Ref: #input-files31015
Node: Strict mode33314
Ref: #strict-mode33444
Node: Output destination34092
Ref: #output-destination34238
Node: Output format34663
Ref: #output-format34807
Node: Regular expressions36974
Ref: #regular-expressions37123
Node: Smart dates38859
Ref: #smart-dates39002
Node: Report start & end date40363
Ref: #report-start-end-date40527
Node: Report intervals42024
Ref: #report-intervals42181
Node: Period expressions42571
Ref: #period-expressions42723
Node: Depth limiting47096
Ref: #depth-limiting47232
Node: Pivoting47564
Ref: #pivoting47679
Node: Valuation49355
Ref: #valuation49466
Node: -B Cost50155
Ref: #b-cost50255
Node: -V Value50388
Ref: #v-value50530
Node: -X Value in specified commodity50725
Ref: #x-value-in-specified-commodity50920
Node: Valuation date51069
Ref: #valuation-date51233
Node: Market prices51655
Ref: #market-prices51831
Node: --infer-value market prices from transactions52773
Ref: #infer-value-market-prices-from-transactions53018
Node: Valuation commodity54300
Ref: #valuation-commodity54505
Node: Simple valuation examples55731
Ref: #simple-valuation-examples55929
Node: --value Flexible valuation56588
Ref: #value-flexible-valuation56792
Node: More valuation examples58739
Ref: #more-valuation-examples58944
Node: Effect of valuation on reports60949
Ref: #effect-of-valuation-on-reports61133
Node: COMMANDS68152
Ref: #commands68261
Node: accounts68943
Ref: #accounts69051
Node: activity69750
Ref: #activity69853
Node: add70236
Ref: #add70330
Node: aregister73123
Ref: #aregister73228
Node: aregister and custom posting dates74601
Ref: #aregister-and-custom-posting-dates74772
Ref: #output-format-175363
Node: balance75768
Ref: #balance75878
Node: Classic balance report77358
Ref: #classic-balance-report77529
Node: Customising the classic balance report78853
Ref: #customising-the-classic-balance-report79079
Node: Colour support81155
Ref: #colour-support81320
Node: Flat mode81416
Ref: #flat-mode81562
Node: Depth limited balance reports81975
Ref: #depth-limited-balance-reports82158
Node: Percentages82614
Ref: #percentages82769
Node: Sorting by amount83906
Ref: #sorting-by-amount84070
Node: Multicolumn balance report84564
Ref: #multicolumn-balance-report84748
Node: Budget report90345
Ref: #budget-report90486
Node: Budget report start date95775
Ref: #budget-report-start-date95938
Node: Nested budgets97270
Ref: #nested-budgets97413
Ref: #output-format-2100894
Node: balancesheet101055
Ref: #balancesheet101184
Node: balancesheetequity102696
Ref: #balancesheetequity102838
Node: cashflow103914
Ref: #cashflow104029
Node: check105245
Ref: #check105341
Node: Basic checks105946
Ref: #basic-checks106060
Node: Strict checks106553
Ref: #strict-checks106690
Node: Other checks106933
Ref: #other-checks107069
Node: Add-on checks107367
Ref: #add-on-checks107483
Node: close107936
Ref: #close108029
Node: close usage109551
Ref: #close-usage109640
Node: codes112453
Ref: #codes112552
Node: commodities113264
Ref: #commodities113382
Node: descriptions113464
Ref: #descriptions113583
Node: diff113887
Ref: #diff113984
Node: files115031
Ref: #files115122
Node: help115269
Ref: #help115360
Node: import116441
Ref: #import116546
Node: Importing balance assignments117468
Ref: #importing-balance-assignments117645
Node: Commodity display styles118294
Ref: #commodity-display-styles118461
Node: incomestatement118590
Ref: #incomestatement118714
Node: notes120059
Ref: #notes120163
Node: payees120531
Ref: #payees120628
Node: prices121048
Ref: #prices121145
Node: print121486
Ref: #print121587
Node: print-unique126383
Ref: #print-unique126500
Node: register126785
Ref: #register126903
Node: Custom register output131352
Ref: #custom-register-output131477
Node: register-match132814
Ref: #register-match132939
Node: rewrite133290
Ref: #rewrite133396
Node: Re-write rules in a file135251
Ref: #re-write-rules-in-a-file135381
Node: Diff output format136591
Ref: #diff-output-format136756
Node: rewrite vs print --auto137848
Ref: #rewrite-vs.-print---auto138023
Node: roi138579
Ref: #roi138668
Node: stats150878
Ref: #stats150968
Node: tags151756
Ref: #tags151845
Node: test152364
Ref: #test152463
Node: Add-on commands153210
Ref: #add-on-commands153338
Node: ui154697
Ref: #ui154781
Node: web154835
Ref: #web154934
Node: iadd155050
Ref: #iadd155157
Node: interest155239
Ref: #interest155362
Node: stockquotes155457
Ref: #stockquotes155573
Node: ENVIRONMENT155818
Ref: #environment155939
Node: FILES156924
Ref: #files-1157029
Node: LIMITATIONS157242
Ref: #limitations157363
Node: TROUBLESHOOTING158106
Ref: #troubleshooting158221

End Tag Table


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