moneydance

Moneydance for iOS updated for iOS 7

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On Wednesday InfiniteKind, the company behind Moneydance, released a fully iOS 7 styled version of .

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Don’t be surprised to find that the functionalities of the iOS app are the same as the old version that I reviewed on this blog some time ago.

The restyling of the app has been done with an eye on usability as well. For example, the expense’s description and categories are now grouped together with the transaction date and account details.

The functionality to create split expenses is still a bit clunky but at least now it is fairly clear how to enter the split section. I would love to see the default split category to be changed to be an expense rather than an income because 99% of the time a split transaction is an expense.

All in all this is a well thought update. The developers even took the time to create a new icon, which is pleasant to look at and in line with iOS 7 guidelines.

As already highlighted in the review, Moneydance for iOS is a simple companion app of Moneydance for Mac, hence the decision to release this app for free. I’ve already praised this software many times, so if you’re looking for a robust personal finance solution go get it.

I’ll finish this mini review with the request to Moneydance’s developers to consider introducing support for iCloud Drive when it’s released this Fall. Dropbox is nice but more and more people will consider going all Apple once is released.

Recommending Moneydance 2014 for Mac

The reason for this post is to recommend Moneydance, a multiplatform personal finance software created by InfiniteKind.

I would not vouch for any application if I didn’t know anything about it. In the case of Moneydance, I can recommend this software beyond any doubt. The reason is simple, I have been using this software every day for the past eight years. During this time, I have lived in four countries, had registered bank accounts in four different currencies, managed investments accounts of different kind and regularly enter transactions in six currencies.

After such a long time, Moneydance is still fast like the first day and most important it has proven to be robust. This software is one of those applications that you buy, and gladly purchase the yearly updates because you want the company that developed it to keep maintaining it.

Make sure to understand that your personal financial application should be one of the most reliable software you use, and should not buckle even after entering thousands of transactions. So do yourself a favour: Forget the fancy looking apps out there and get serious about the software you use. Moneydance is that software.

If I had to summarize Moneydance in three adjectives, they would be: Robust, reliable and flexible. Surely Moneydance is not going to win any Apple UI awards – mainly because of its Java foundations – but it does its job better than any other personal financial software available. You can throw at it current accounts, saving accounts, investments, assets, and pension funds, and it will keep on giving you reliable results.

Moneydance gives you the possiblity to automatically download transactions from your bank but the way I use it is purely manual. Together with its iOS companion app that I reviewed some time ago, I enter transactions as they occur, and in any moment I have a holistic view of my financial situation. Of course, you have the standard set of features you’d expect in this type of software like automatic updates of currency exchange rates, automatic scheduled transactions, transactions splits, encryption, password protection and so on. You can find the full list of features right here.

The analysis capabilities of Moneydance are extremely good too. Obviously after using the application for eight years, I have collected thousands of transactions. Thanks to Moneydance’s graphs and reports I am able to get detailed graphs about how my spending habits have changed over the years and understand how I spend my money.

My wife and I share Moneydance’s datafile on Dropbox, so both of us can update the data and know instantly how we are doing. Synchronization over Dropbox works great. For the security conscious you can setup a point-to-point sync between the desktop version of Moneydance and the iOS one.

Another reasons I gladly pay for any upgrade of Moneydance is because I think this software has incredibly potential. I’d like the developers to finally release a native Cocoa application, and add support for other sync methods (hello iCloud Drive) so as to be able to give its users the choice to synchronize data using the desired solution.

At almost EUR 50.00 this is not a cheap software – at least for today’s standards – but you pay for a well done application, which will not let you down. Other personal financial software might look like a fancy Japanese sport car, Moneydance on the other hand is like a reliable Mercedes c220 Cdi.

Moneydance for iOS updated to version 1.6

Last night was updated to version 1.6. The new version is a maintenance and bug fixing release that will please hardcore Moneydance users. The readme file for the new version reports fixes in these areas:

  • Reset default new transaction date to the current date when app is reactivated from the background
  • Show future transactions with a different background colour
  • Fixed issue in which changes to certain fields were not saved if Save was pressed while the cursor was in the text field.
  • Fix crash on sync in certain situations
  • Fix issue in which editing split amounts would sometimes confuse the payment/deposit status of the split.

Moneydance 2011 adds compatibility with OS X Mountain Lion

Moneydance 2011 for Mac has been updated with the developer digital signature required by OS X Mountain Lion.

You can download the updated version from this link.

The file you need to download is Moneydance.zip with timestamp 27th July 2012.

Other users and myself had initially some problems but it looks like that this latest build works fine.

The developer digital signing of applications is required if you have set the security setting on OS X Mountain Lion to this:

You can still force an application to launch even if it’s not signed by a developer by:

  • Changing the security settings to Allow applications downloaded from anywhere.
  • Opening the application by using the contextual menu (CTRL + click on the app and choose Open).

Moneydance for iOS with Dropbox sync now available

Moneydance for iOS has been updated to version 1.5 to include the welcome Dropbox sync integration. The new version has been in beta for the past three months and finally it is now available from the iTunes Store.

This new version of is not that much different from the old one that I reviewed last year on this blog. The big change is in the setup screen that now shows a new option to sync your .md data file across your devices using Dropbox.

You can find detailed instructions on how to setup Dropbox sync by following the steps in this knowledge base article.

Up to now Moneydance users were able to sync the data on their iOS device with their Mac/PC via WiFi. That worked quite well but in order to make it work you had to be on the same LAN as your main computer. That meant that the iOS version of Moneydance was meant to be more of a companion to the real desktop version rather than an independent app.

The fact that now you can sync your accounts via Dropbox, means you free your iOS device from your laptop and finally update your finances across your devices from anywhere in the world.

A typical scenario is the way my wife and I use Moneydance:

  • The Moneydance data file is stored on a shared Dropbox folder.
  • Each of us has a copy of Moneydance installed on our respective Macs pointing to the data file on the shared Dropbox folder.
  • I also have a third copy of Moneydance for PC installed on my work laptop that points to the same file.
  • Whenever each of us updates Moneydance, the other person will be able to see the change.

With the old version of Moneydance if I updated Moneydance on my iPhone or iPad I had to wait to go home – and sync the iOS device with one of my laptops – before the new transactions became available to my wife’s computer.

With Dropbox integration this last step is not needed anymore. Every time I update Moneydance from my mobile device, the change is automatically applied to all Mac/PC thanks to Dropbox synchronisation.

The . I cannot recommend enough Moneydance. It’s the only software that I use in my private life that would somehow affect me if it disappeared tomorrow morning. My wife and I have been using it since 2006 adding a dozen accounts (current, savings, credit cards, pensions, etc.) with three different currencies and in six years it has never failed. Fantastic software.

The developers have pledged that this is only the beginning and that we should see more coming from them. Looking forward to it.

Moneydance for iPhone

My wife and I started using Moneydance for Mac back in 2006 when we got married. We installed the software on both of our computers and stored the database file on a shared folder in Dropbox.

In this way each of us can update the expenses and check the balance? independently. The software has proven to be über-reliable and robust in these four years. We have added more than eight accounts between current/savings/credit cards/investments and recorded thousands of transactions without Moneydance missing a beat.

There is also an iPhone Moneydance app that I’ve found very useful. The app is free and it is more of a companion to the desktop version of the software than a stand-alone application. I see this as an advantage rather than a limitation. I want the apps on my iPhone to be light, fast and stable. If I need to run some complex reports or analyze data I am more than happy to do it on my Mac, comfortably sitting at home with a cup of coffee.

What I need is an easy way to record expenses while I’m on the go. The best example was a couple of weeks ago when I went on holiday only with my iPhone and left my Mac at home.

The iPhone app and its desktop counterpart sync effortlessly via wifi if the two devices are on the same network. This is a proven solution used my many vendors and I find it a good solution.

According to the Moneydance blog the company is working on a version of the iPhone app with Dropbox sync. I can’t wait to see that in action!

To enable the sync over the air on the desktop application you need to install a Moneydance extension. This is easily done from the Extension menu.

After installing the app on the iPhone you need to pair the devices. When you first launch Moneydance app on the iPhone you will see a screen with a long pass key that you need to enter in Network Sync Settings —> Add Device on Moneydance for Mac/PC.

After you have done that the two devices start syncing (the first sync will simply copy your transactions from the desktop to the iPhone) and then you’re ready to go:

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Entering a transaction is as easy as clicking on the ‘+’ sign on the upper right corner of the screen.

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You can select the account for that transaction, date, description and the amount is easily entered using the numeric keypad. After that you just need to tap on Save.

When you click on an account you can see the list of transactions synced with the desktop.

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A useful feature of the sync Moneydance desktop extension is the possibility to sync 30, 60, 90 or 365 days in the past.

The app settings are really simple. You have the option to add a passcode to access your data when you launch the app:

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My conclusion is that this is one of the most useful apps that I own. It’s free, it’s stable, and it’s the perfect companion for a software that has proved to be close to perfect. Thanks Moneydance for writing this software and for constantly improving it.