&Roger.Lum; &Roger.Lum.mail;
&Michael.Carpino; &Michael.Carpino.mail;
&Jack.H.Ostroff; &Jack.H.Ostroff.mail;
2024-12-01
5.2.0

# &kmymoney; Settings

The settings described in this chapter modify the behavior of &kmymoney;, allowing you to customize it to meet the needs of your unique financial affairs, and to modify its look and feel to match your personality. These settings can be changed through the Settings Configure &kmymoney;... menu item or by using the keyboard shortcut &Ctrl; &Shift;,. In order for any changes to take effect the Apply button must be clicked.

On the left of the Configure or settings dialog is a list of icons and labels, each representing a particular area of the program. When you click one of those icons, the right part of the dialog will display controls for configuring that area of the program, often divided into several tabs.

## General

### Global tab

KMyMoney configuration, general, global tab
KMyMoney configuration, general, global tab

Autosave options

  An autosave file is just a copy of your data file. The main point of these is that they are automatically created, according to the configuration settings, so you do not need to remember to take any action. Any autosave files created will be in the same directory as the data file currently open.

  Checking the Autosave periodically box instructs &kmymoney; to automatically save your file at the interval defined by the minutes field. The default value is 10 minutes. You can change this setting from 0 (autosave immediately after entering a transaction) up to 60 minutes.

  Checking the Autosave when file is modified upon close box instructs &kmymoney; to autosave your file when the program is closed, but only if any changes have been made. You also have the option upon closing the program to backup your &kmymoney; file.

  The Number of backup to keep can be set from 0 (Off) up to 20. The autosave files will be stored in the same folder as the main file. If your data file is MyFinances.kmy, then when an autosave file is created, it will be called MyFinances.kmy.1~. Any existing autosave files will have their number increased by 1, up to the specified number.

Fiscal Year

  &kmymoney; allows you to specify a fiscal year different from the calendar year. To do so, enter the day and month on which your fiscal year begins. This value is used for budgets and some reports.

External programs

  This setting does not directly affect the operation of &kmymoney;, but provides a convenient way to launch any external utility, such as an advanced calculator. The first step is to enter the full path to your chosen program in the Calculator text box.

  There is currently no direct menu item to launch the calculator, or whatever external program you have set. There are then two ways to launch the program.

  First, you can use Settings Configure Toolbars... menu item to place the Calculator icon on the Toolbar. Then, when you click that icon on the Toolbar, &kmymoney; will launch the selected application.

  Second, you can use Settings Configure Shortcuts... menu item to set a custom keyboard shortcut. (The entry is under &kmymoney;/Calculator in that list.) You can then use that shortcut to launch the application.

### Views tab

KMyMoney configuration, general, views tab
KMyMoney configuration, general, views tab

Startup page options

  When &kmymoney; starts up, this option indicates whether to start with the Home View (Start with homepage) or with the view displayed when the program was last closed (Start with last selected view.)

Type of the &kmymoney; view

  This lets you select one of three layouts for the View Selector, where you choose Selecting List or Tree view, the icons and their labels will be located at the left side of the window. The List view displays larger icons above the name of each view, while the Tree view has smaller icons to the left of the names. The Tabbed view locates the icons and labels in tabs across the top of the window.

Synchronize account selection of Ledgers View and Investments View

  If this option is selected, the accounts displayed in the Ledgers View and Investments View will be synchronized, meaning if you change the account displayed in one of the views, and then switch to the other view, the information for the same account will be displayed. This increases the efficiency of navigating between these 2 views. If it is not selected, selecting either of those views will show the same account previously selected in that view, regardless of the account selected in the other view.

### Filter tab

KMyMoney configuration, general, filter tab
KMyMoney configuration, general, filter tab

Accounts / Categories

  Checking the Do not show unused categories box hides unused categories in the Categories View. A hidden category is still available should a transaction require it. By typing a hidden category in the ledger it will become available for use.

  Equity accounts are used to track individual equities or investments held in an Investment Account. These should not be confused with the top level Equity group of accounts, which includes the account(s) which contain the opening balances for other accounts. By default, equity accounts are hidden in the Accounts View. Checking the Show equity accounts box will display the equity accounts in the Accounts View.

  By default, Categories are hidden in the Accounts View. Checking the Show categories in the accounts list view will display the Categories in the Accounts View.

  Checking the Do not show zero balance equities box will remove any zero balance equity accounts from appearing in the Accounts View.

Schedules

  Checking the Do not show finished schedules box hide all finished schedules from appearing in the Scheduled transactions View.

Transactions

  Transactions prior to the date in the Do not show transaction prior to field will not be displayed in the Ledgers View. This can be useful if your data includes many years of transactions; setting this to one or two years ago hides older transactions.

  Setting this option to January 1, 1900 (the default value) is a good way to debug date-related data import problems, in case some dates were erroneously very far in the past.

  Checking the Do not show reconciled transactions box will filter transactions by reconciliation state. Transactions that are marked as Reconciled will not be shown in the Ledgers View.

### Support tab

KMyMoney configuration, general section, support tab
KMyMoney configuration, general section, support tab

Logging

  &kmymoney; can create a log file when it imports data. This can be useful for troubleshooting problems, but it is important to be careful, as these log files can contain sensitive data, such as usernames and plain-text passwords, as noted in the dialog.

  For any logging to take place, specify the path to the directory where logs will be created in the Log path field. You can also click ... to the right of the field, and use the file chooser dialog to navigate to the chosen directory.

  If you check the Log imported statements box, whenever &kmymoney; imports data, it will save a file called `kmm-statement-`yyyy-mm-dd`T`hh-mm-ss.sss`.txt` in the specified directory. This file is an &XML; file with all the data just imported.

  If you check the Log OFX transactions box, whenever &kmymoney; uses OFX direct connect to retrieve transaction data, it will log all the interactions it has with the remote OFX server. It will append these to a file called `ofxlog.txt` in the specified directory. As mentioned above, this file is likely to contain account and user names and plain-text passwords.

## Home

### Home page display sections

KMyMoney configuration, home view
KMyMoney configuration, home view

These options allow you to customize the appearance of the Home View (also called the Home Page or Main Window) by choosing which information to display there and the order in which it appears. Selected sections can be reordered by clicking the respective Up or Down button. A section may not appear, even if the appropriate entry is checked, if it would be empty.

Assets and Liabilities

  This will display a list of asset accounts on the left and liability accounts on the right. These and the other account lists on the Home Page are sorted in alphabetical order, unless otherwise noted. Normally, only open accounts will be listed, unless Show all accounts has been selected.

  For this and the other account lists on the Home View, the display will include the account name, date last reconciled, and current balance. In addition, there may be other columns displayed, as configured in the Account information display Lower on this window.

Scheduled payments

  This will display upcoming occurrences of Scheduled transactions, distinguishing those which are overdue, due today, or due in the future. It shows the date, schedule name, account, and amount of the payment, and the account balance after the payment. By default, it will show up to six transaction. If six are displayed, there is a link you can select to show more, up to 30 days in advance.

Favorite accounts

  This will display the accounts that are identified as Favorite accounts in the Account Edit account... Configuration dialog.

Payment accounts

  This will display all Payment accounts; these include any account into which income can be deposited, and/or out of which bills can be paid.

Favorite Reports

  This will display a list of all reports that have been identified as a favorite in the Configuration dialog of the Report. The list is in the order of the date when each report became a favorite.

Forecast (schedule)

  This will display a forecast for asset and liability accounts, similar to the Summary Tab of the Forecast View. Details of the display can be controlled with the Forecast Configuration dialog.

Net worth forecast

  This will display a chart of your forecast net worth for the next 90 days.

Budget

  This will display a current month summary and overruns for any defined budget(s). If no budget is defined, it will display no budget or overruns, with the actual current month spending.

Cash Flow

  This will display a Cash Flow Summary analysis for the current month.

### Homepage/Summary page scaling

Zoom factor:

  This option allows for the selection of the font size as a percentage to fit the Home View based on the user preference.

Remember zoom factor when leaving the program if manually changed with mouse-wheel

  Selecting this will save your font size preference if you have changed it on the Home page by using the mouse-wheel.

### Account information display

These options allow you to customize what information is included in any list of accounts on the Home View.

Show account limit information

  Displays the account limit as set in the Account Edit dialog.

Show balance-status of mapped online accounts

  Shows the balance status of mapped accounts, and accounts which have had transactions imported. The status is symbolized by an icon in the column preceding the account name. Note that the colors described here may be different than displayed for you, depending on the display theme selected. A green checkmark indicates the online balance and local balance are the same. A red warning sign indicates a mismatch between the local file and online-balance. A mailbox with a green arrow indicates that the local file has transactions newer than the most recent online update. This alerts the user to perform an online-update.

Show number of not marked transactions per account [!M]

  Inserts a column after the account name, showing the number of not marked transactions in the account.

Show number of cleared transactions per account [C]

  Inserts a column showing the number of cleared transactions for the account.

Show number of not reconciled (not marked + cleared) transactions per account [!R]

  Inserts a column showing the number of not reconciled transactions for the account, &ie;, the sum of all not marked and cleared transactions.

Show date of last reconciliation

  Inserts an additional column showing the last reconciliation date for the account.

## Ledger

The settings and options in this section allow for the modification of the transaction ledger displayed in the Ledgers View.

### Display tab

Show a grid in the ledger

  Selecting this option displays grid lines in the Ledgers View. This is an additional viewing option that may make it easier to visualize separate transactions and their component parts.

Show transaction form

  Selecting this option displays the transaction form at the bottom of the ledger, and that is where you enter or edit a transaction. If the transaction form is not displayed, you edit a transaction within the ledger itself. With this option enabled, fewer transactions are visible in the ledger, compared to when it is disabled.

Display overdue schedules with planned date

  Scheduled transactions with future dates are shown in the Ledgers View for the relevant account. When the date passes, and a scheduled transaction becomes overdue, it is no longer shown in the ledger, unless this option is selected.

Ledger entry details

  Show all ledger entries in full detail

  Selecting this option makes the ledger show all the information for all displayed transactions, with separate lines in the Detail Column for Category, Tags, and the Memo. If it is not selected, Category, Tags, and Memo will not be displayed. This has the same effect as selecting the Show Transaction Detail menu option.

  Use the ledger lens

  Selecting this option displays all the detail lines for the selected transaction, even if Show all ledger entries in full detail is not selected.

  Show all split details in ledger

  Selecting this option shows more details about split transactions.

Information headers

  Show group headers between transactions

  Selecting this option will display group headers in the ledger. These refer to time periods or milestones such as Last month, Last week, This month, Last reconciliation, Next week, and Next month.

  Show header for the previous and current fiscal year

  Selecting this option will display group headers in the ledger for the current and the previous fiscal year.

  Reconciliation group headers

  This dropdown controls the display of group headers for reconciliations. If Don't show reconciliation entries is selected, then no group headers will be shown for reconciliations. If Show last reconciliation entry with date and balance in ledger is selected, only the most recent reconciliation will be indicated by a group header. If Show all reconciliation entries with date and balance in ledger is selected, then a group header will be shown for all previous reconciliations.

### Sorting tab

These three sections allow you to set the default sort order of transactions in the Ledgers View. In all cases, the list on the right shows the fields which have been selected as part of the sort order for that view, and the list on the left shows all the fields available for sorting which have not yet been chosen. To sort on an item, select it (single mouse click) and click the right arrow between the two lists. You can adjust the relative order of the fields by selecting one and adjusting its position in the list using the up and down arrows to the right of the list. You can switch between ascending and descending sort for any item by double-clicking it.

The fields available for sorting are the same for all three sections: Amount, Category, Entry Order (the date the transaction was created, not the internal transaction id,) Number, Payee, Post date, Reconcile state, Reconciliation date, Security, and Type.

#### Normal view subtab

This tab controls the default sort order of the regular Ledgers View.

#### Reconciliation view subtab

This tab controls the default sort order of the ledger while in the Reconciliation View. This is the display of transactions shown during the process of Reconciliation.

#### Search view subtab

This tab controls the default sort order of the ledger while in the Search view.

### Data Entry tab

These options affect the process of creating new transactions.

Auto increment check number

  Enabling this will automatically increment the check number whenever entering a new check transaction. It has the same effect whether you use the Ledger Lens or the Transaction Form.

Keep changes when selecting a different transaction/split

  When enabled, selecting a different transaction or split will save any edits made to the current transaction. When disabled, selecting a different transaction split will prompt you whether or not to save any changes.

Use Enter to move between fields

  When enabled, pressing &Enter; will change the focus to the next field of the transaction. When in the last field, the transaction will be saved. When disabled, navigation between fields would occur by using the key or the mouse. Pressing the &Enter; key would save the transaction, no matter which field is currently in focus.

Match names from start

  This option controls payee matching. When enabled, payee names will always be matched from the start. When disabled, any substring will be matched. Also, when enabled additional options for matching can be established in the Matching Tab of the Payees View.

Automatic reconciliation

  This option needs to be documented.

Initial cursor position within the date field

  When you advance into a transaction's date field (either by creating or editing a transaction, or using or &Enter;), this dropdown determines whether the cursor will start in the Day, Month, or Year portion of the date.

Default reconciliation state

  This dropdown allows you to select the default reconciliation state for new transactions: Not reconciled, Cleared, or Reconciled.

Autofill

  This option allows you to select the desired behavior for autofill. This controls which, if any, previous transactions for the same payee are displayed, and which, if any, of those transactions are used to auto-fill details of the new transaction.

  - No Autofill

    This will deactivate autofill, and you must manually enter all details for the new transaction.

  - Same transaction if amount differs less than percentage set below

    With this option selected, when you enter a new transaction, &kmymoney; will display a list of previous transactions for the same payee and account. If the amount of a previous transaction is close enough to the amount you have entered, it will be considered a match, and details from that previous transaction will be used to autofill details of the new transaction. Close enough means within the percentage specified in the box next to Same transaction if amount differs less than, and can range from 0 to 100%. If the percentage is 0, all previous transactions for the payee and account will be displayed, and you can select one of those transactions to use for autofill by clicking it.

  - With previously most often used transaction for the payee

    With this option selected, when you enter new transaction, &kmymoney; will fill in all the transaction details based on the previously most often used transaction for the selected payee.

Use memos from previous transaction

  When selected, the memo from the previously entered transaction will be automatically entered as the memo for the new transaction.

### Import tab

Match transaction within days

  Search for matching transactions within the range of the imported transaction +/- the given number of days, which can be set from 0 to 99.

Ask for a new payee's default category

  If this option is selected, whenever a new payee is detected during an import, the user will be asked for the default category for the payee.

## Scheduled Transactions

These options allow you to modify the behavior of Scheduled Transactions.

### Startup options

Check schedules upon startup

  Enables checking the schedule upon startup of &kmymoney;. If a scheduled transaction matches the schedule criteria set then &kmymoney; will produce a notification requiring handling of the transaction.

Enter transactions this number of days in advance

  Specify how many days in advance a scheduled transaction should be entered.

### Processing Days

Use holiday calendar for region

  Select the region of the world that best suits your needs.

### Ungrouped Item

Number of days to preview schedules in ledger

  Specify how many days in advance should scheduled transactions show up in the ledger. For future scheduled transactions displayed in the ledger, you can enter or skip them by right-clicking them.

## Online Quotes

These settings determine how price quotes are retrieved from different online sources. These include stock, bond, and other equity prices, as well as prices for precious metals and currency conversion.

This section allows you to change the online quote sources for &kmymoney;. Generally speaking, this is an advanced feature, and should only be attempted by the most technically adept users.

For more details, please refer to the Online Price Quotes section.

The initial list and configuration of online quote sources is set up when &kmymoney; first creates your data file. If an online source makes a change which requires a change to these settings in order for &kmymoney; to continue to use it as a valid source, the user must make the necessary changes, using this dialog, based on instructions posted at one of the suggestedsupport options. Hopefully, in the not to distant future, the way online source configuration is handled will be changed so that &kmymoney; can automatically fetch any necessary updates to these settings without requiring the user to make any manual edits.

## Colors

These section allows you to customize the colors used within &kmymoney;. If Custom colors is not checked, then default colors will be used.

To customize colors check the Custom colors checkbox. You can then modify any of the colors by clicking the color button, which will open color select palette. This will provide unlimited options in color selection. You can select a defined basic color, pick a color by clicking anywhere on the displayed color palette, input an &HTML; defined color, or specify values for Hue, Saturation, Value, Red, Green, and Blue.

## Fonts

This section allows you to modify the fonts used within the Cell or Header fields.

Use system fonts

  Select this to use system fonts. Deselecting this option allows you to select the fonts of your choice.

Cell font

  Specify the custom font to use within each cell of the ledgers.

Header font

  Specify the custom font to use for the headers of each view within the ledger.

## Icons

This option allows for the selection of icons that will be displayed.

Individual icon settings

  The dropdown list presents a selection of icon themes available for use. Additional icons may be available for downloading and use depending on the operating system or &Linux; Distribution installed.

## Plugins

This section provides information about the available plugins, and allow you to modify the behavior of some of them. Note that the list of plugins displayed will depend on which plugins &kmymoney; found when it started. It does not matter whether the plugin was compiled as part of the application or added as a separate package.

KMyMoney configuration, plugins
KMyMoney configuration, plugins

Every plugin can be enabled or disabled, according to the state of the checkbox to the left of the name of the plugin name and icon. In addition, at the right, there is an information &infoicon; button for each plugin, which will show the plugin version and author(s.) For some plugins, further information on configuring and using it may be found by clicking &configicon; configure just to the left of the information button.

Until recently, there was only one plugin that required configuration, the Check printing plugin. Now, there are several plugins which have configuration pages which are invoked from this page. These are listed in the following sections. Note however, that many of them have already been described earlier in this document.

### Check printing plugin

There is a plugin for printing checks, which is included with the source of &kmymoney;, and which should always be enabled. It allows printing of a check based on the data from a selected transaction, with the layout controlled by an &HTML; template. You need to use a template which is matched to your pre-printed checks. A default, built-in template is provided. You may also choose a custom template. To do so, click &configicon; configure to get the Check printing configuration dialog displayed. At the top you can check the box to use a custom template. To the right of that is a button which brings up a file chooser, to select an alternate template file.

A template file is an &HTML; file, in which specific strings are used to reference fields from the transaction and from the current account and institution to show where they will be printed on the check. &kmymoney; ships with a default, built-in template. At this address, you can find the HTML source file of the default template, as well as some additional templates. You should either be able to use one of them or to modify one to suit your needs. Note that only a subset of the HTML standard is supported — the detailed documentation on that can be found here.

### CSV Importer

Some aspects of configuring the CSV Importer plugin have already been discussed here. However, there is also a dialog which can be invoked here.

configure csv importer plugin
configure csv importer plugin

#### Autodetecting

It is generally best to let the plugin autodetect the field delimiter, decimal symbol, and date format. However, it is possible to disable this behavior for each of these items by unchecking the appropriate box.

In some cases, a csv file to be imported contains the name of the account somewhere in the first lines of the file. You can request the plugin to automatically look for this by checking the appropriate box, separately for banking and for investment imports.

#### QIF export profile

Although it is currently better just to use the QIF exporter plugin directly, it is still possible to have the CSV Importer export a QIF file. In this case, you can use this dropdown to select the default QIF export profile to use.

### Forecast View

This is described in the Configuring the Forecast section of the Forecast Chapter.

### iCalendar

&kmymoney; is capable of exporting a file in the iCalendar format, so you can import your scheduled transactions into &korganizer;, or another calendar program, so you can be reminded of scheduled transactions. Actually exporting the file is done with the File Export Schedules to iCalendar menu item.

configure icalendar export
configure icalendar export

The exported file will contain one event for each scheduled transaction. There are controls to configure whether to have the calendar show reminders for the events, as well as how many reminders, and how far ahead of the events the reminders are created, although these seem not to currently have any effect on the file created.

The final field on the dialog allows you to specify the default name and path of the exported file. As usual, you can either type the full path, or click the file selector icon at the right and get a file selector dialog. Currently, the file save dialog does default to the folder specified here, but you still need to enter the actual file name at the time of export.

### KBanking

This plugin adds support for HBCI/FinTs, OFX, and PayPal online banking by using AqBanking, which is an open source project on its own. HBCI/FinTs used to communicate with banks are only used in Germany.

Configuring this plugin is not done through this dialog, but with the Settings Configure Aqbanking... menu item, and there is further information there.

### QIF Exporter, QIF Importer

These are described in the section on QIF Profiles. As pointed out in that section, QIF Import and QIF Export are implemented as separate plugins, they both utilize the same set of profiles.

### Reports view

This provides a dialog where you can configure some default values to be used when displaying Reports. The details are described with the other Report Configuration settings.

### XML Storage

The default storage of your data is in &XML; format, described in the chapter on File Formats. Because the code which reads and saves your data is implemented as a plugin, the configuration dialog which controls some aspects of this storage is accessed through the Plugin section of the general KMyMoney Configuration, although it is described in the above linked section.