[moneydance] using Jython and Moneydance

[Ric Werme]

Don Zickus wrote:
> Maybe my excitement has blinded me to the obvious, but can some help
> me with the initial step of starting a jython console and having it
> interact with Moneydance (basically load the apis I suppose).  My goal
> is to be able walk my way through Ric's primer and scripts using the
> console to familiarize myself with Jython before I started going
> crazy. :-)
> 
> Anyone have any tips?

I guess the first thing I'd recommend is to learn Python.  I went looking
for a new language several years ago (I was more of a C and Unix internals
person) and settled on Python.  While they pay me for writing C code, I
manage to work Python into almost any toolsmithing I need to do.  At home
it talks to a weather station over a serial port, converts spreadsheet .xml
files into web pages, does various CGI scripts, and pretty graphics.

More code reads incoming mail, extracting weather data, sending that to
a database where later another Python program fishes it out and emulates
a HTTP form query to upload it to a webserver where the Python CGI script
puts it in the database at the ISP and generates web pages with recent data.
It is pretty useless for writing Unix file systems, though.

A big caveat is that Jython is designed around a really old Python language
spec and its library support is pretty limited.

As for playing with Jython in Moneydance, I started out by experimenting in
the console, e.g.:

>>> ra = moneydance.getRootAccount()
>>> acct = ra.getAccountByName('Checking')
>>> acct
Checking
>>> 

You can do a lot with cut & paste.  You'll have to enter some extra carriage
returns and cut & pasting can mess up indentation, but that's how most
people learn Python or experiment with unfamiliar libraries.

Unfortunately, I haven't had the time to do everything I've wanted with
Moneydance.  Fortunately, there hasn't been that much I wanted to do!

	-Ric Werme