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Author Topic: IDEA: Spending Fund Tree  (Read 5853 times)

mouser

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IDEA: Spending Fund Tree
« on: November 12, 2009, 08:18 PM »
Here's my idea for a simple program to help you control how much you spend on some things by establishing a policy for how much you can spend.

It should be a list view with 3 columns for each row.

The first column will be the item description.
The second column will be the amount of money currently in the "fund".
The third column is the daily accumulation amount.

So i might add the following entry:
"Board Game Fund", $10, $0.25

What this says is that i'm starting off the game fund with $10, and it should add 25 cents to the fund every day.

When you start the program, it needs to UPDATE the fund values based on how many days have elapsed from the last upate.

So if i come back to the program in 10 days, i should see:
"Board Game Fund", $12.50, $0.25

At any time i need to be able to edit an item to change the values; the most common thing will be to set a fund value lower after some money is spent from the fund.

Get the idea?  I'm thinking it could be useful for people who want to help curb their spending on certain luxuries.



Thoughts:
  • Might be nice to not show the last column, and only show it when editing an item.
  • Internally, the best way to store data for an item might be like this:  LastSetValue, LastSetDate, DailyAccumulationValue -- and then dynamically calcuate current fun value as LastSetValue+(CurrentDate-LastSetDate)*DailyAccumukationValue; in other words, only store the date and value of last fund value set, rather than UPDATING a current fund value each time.  This would make the program more robust against changes in system clock, etc.
« Last Edit: November 15, 2009, 10:31 PM by mouser »

mouser

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Re: Coding Snack Idea: Spending Fund Tree
« Reply #1 on: November 12, 2009, 08:19 PM »
this might be something suitable for NANY 2010.

housetier

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Re: Coding Snack Idea: Spending Fund Tree
« Reply #2 on: November 12, 2009, 10:36 PM »
and for a bonus add projections, i.e. how many days until some amount is reached, given the current increment.

skwire

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Re: Coding Snack Idea: Spending Fund Tree
« Reply #3 on: November 13, 2009, 09:11 AM »
Did somebody say listview? :-*  Mouser, damnit, you know I can't resist listview-based applications.  Please, I beg, somebody else take this so I don't have to.   ;D ;D ;D

mouser

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Re: Coding Snack Idea: Spending Fund Tree
« Reply #4 on: November 13, 2009, 04:35 PM »
just close the browser window and step away from the keyboard  ;D give someone else a chance with this  ;D

skwire

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Re: IDEA: Spending Fund Tree
« Reply #5 on: December 17, 2009, 06:48 AM »