[moneydance] Budget help

[Graham Borland]

Hi,

I've been using MD for a while but I need to start using the Budget
facility. I'm hoping someone can guide me through it.

1. What's the difference between having multiple budgets, and multiple
things in one budget? Is the idea that I should have one budget for
food, one for car, etc, or should I have all these as separate entries
in a single budget?

2. I need to stick to a tight budget. If I accidentally spend money on
something I haven't budgeted for (such as a CD or DVD I couldn't resist)
does this show up in budget reports?

3. Looking back through old posts to this list, last year (2005) there
were a few discussions about budgeting credit card repayments. In my
situation I want to make sure I'm putting at least X per month towards
paying off credit card debt, and if I'm paying too little I want MD to
scream at me. The consensus from what I can gather is that there's no
easy way to do this. Has this situation improved since last year?

4. Can I get a permanent mini-report on the home page? I need to be able
to see at a glance on a daily basis if I'm sticking to the budget, and
going through the process to generate the budget report (even if it's
memorized) is slightly tiresome. What I really want is a "Budget status"
area on the home page, just like the "Reminders" and "Calendar" sections.

Thanks for any help.

-- 
Graham Borland
graham at moonbog.net