[HN Gopher] Monetal - Free Expense Tracker
       ___________________________________________________________________
        
       Monetal - Free Expense Tracker
        
       Author : kruiller
       Score  : 73 points
       Date   : 2023-07-28 13:40 UTC (9 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (monetal.app)
 (TXT) w3m dump (monetal.app)
        
       | t3lp3r10n wrote:
       | Hi, nice project, thanks for making it available. I am trying it
       | right now. Could you please add Colombian Pesos, COP, as
       | currency? Do you (or anybody here) know a trustworhty service
       | that process automatically sms and emails with financial info and
       | extract the expense from them? Thanks again.
        
         | kruiller wrote:
         | Thanks for your feedback. Ok, I will add COP in next release.
         | Unfortunately I don't know any service to parse sms, I enter
         | every transaction manually, and it doesn't take as long as it
         | seems.
        
       | pdimitar wrote:
       | Looks much better than what I currently use but alas, I also want
       | to be able to fill and view data from the desktop as well.
        
         | kruiller wrote:
         | Believe me or not, I use it 10 years with my wife and don't see
         | what additional info web version can provide. And for sure in
         | this case your data wouldn't be privately stored, then you need
         | a registration... and so Monetal wouldn't be different from
         | many many similar apps.
        
           | pdimitar wrote:
           | I am honestly not bothered by having an account, it's just
           | that sometimes it would be much faster to fill in entries on
           | the computer and my current app only has mobile variants and
           | slow animation transitions. It can get infuriating.
        
       | oneTbrain23 wrote:
       | If the developer is reading this, add the ability to take receipt
       | photo and attach pdf. You can cache them in a separate folder of
       | images and pdf. Also allow it to backup to cloud. Our phones
       | these days has huge storage, some reaching 2TB. Space isn't an
       | issue compare to years ago.
        
         | [deleted]
        
         | kruiller wrote:
         | Certainly not, sorry. My whole data for 10 years takes just
         | ~1.4Mb. I can easy export them and parse, migrate to another
         | device in a second and also make a backup instantly. I like
         | this simplicity as much as this site. If it has an ability to
         | post a photo and video it would be completely different story,
         | right?)
        
           | medv wrote:
           | You can easily compress photo to 1kb with losses. But for
           | recipes it's acceptable. I think you should do it.
        
       | vzaliva wrote:
       | Just heads-up: the developer is located in Saint Petersburg,
       | Russia. For some of us this could be pertinent for ethical, legal
       | or security reasons.
        
         | kruiller wrote:
         | No. But if it's important for you I am in Tbilisi, Georgia.
        
       | aiibe wrote:
       | I can't edit an account's amount to 1000 on iOS
        
         | kruiller wrote:
         | I recently added support for localised currency formats and
         | didn't tested every local. May be it's a reason.
        
         | kruiller wrote:
         | Oh, seems to be a bug =( . Please contact support@monetal.app
        
       | mpixel wrote:
       | Hey, this is pretty great.
       | 
       | I was looking for something simple and this honestly fits 90% of
       | what I was looking for as I don't want to spend hours managing
       | this stuff either.
       | 
       | One thing, when I add a record for loaning out money to someone,
       | the due date isn't visible on the main page and I can't seem to
       | find it.
       | 
       | I have a suggestion.
       | 
       | If I could see either or both the start and due dates, this could
       | also be used for tracking any investments as well -- though not
       | the intent of the menu as-is -- a simple UI addition or setting
       | would allow me to do a lot more in my case.
        
         | kruiller wrote:
         | Yes, there is no opportunity to add a due date. Not sure about
         | it but will think. Thanks.
        
       | jrochkind1 wrote:
       | > Why Monetal is free?
       | 
       | > This is indie project made by a single developer. App is
       | available for free, doesn't contain any ads or in-app purchases.
       | Registration also is not required, and that is why all your data
       | completely anonymous and could be transfered to server only for
       | app analytics (like most popular screens, which functions are
       | frequently used, which can be removed etc).
       | 
       | That didn't quite answer the question of "why".
       | 
       | So... does that single developer make money, or is just doing
       | this as a hobby for fun, or what?
        
         | kruiller wrote:
         | Hi! I have a full time job as iOS dev and that is my pet
         | project. It had in-app purchases before, but I dropped them
         | completely and make it free because huge amount of Monetal
         | users was facing problem since this war between Russia and
         | Ukraine. I don't collaborate with any company or share any user
         | data if that is what you mean.
        
           | accidc wrote:
           | not sure if this is the right place to point out, I tried
           | installing the windows store version but it seemed
           | unavailable. I am wondering if the app is restricted to only
           | specific regions.
        
             | kruiller wrote:
             | Ahah, sorry bro, it was indeed available for Windows Phone
             | a long time ago, but I don't think it can be installed on
             | Windows now. And if you try to google "Monetal Windows
             | Phone" you definitely will drop any idea to have it =) I
             | support just Android and iOS versions currently.
        
           | sssilver wrote:
           | Why not give it an appropriate opensource license? That would
           | increase trust that business decisions won't be radically
           | changed at a whim, and if they do then people at least will
           | have the option of forking.
           | 
           | I won't try this app, because I worry that at any point you
           | may decide to change the business model. It's happened so
           | many times with so many apps. If it were opensource, at least
           | I'd know I can continue building it and running it myself,
           | and there'd be a chance that if it were popular enough,
           | development community would emerge around it.
        
           | jrochkind1 wrote:
           | Makes sense, thanks!
           | 
           | The answer on the page didn't totally explain it for me. I
           | did get the idea that you didn't share any user data, but
           | still had the question, okay, then, why? I think the answer
           | is that you already have a job, and do this as a side project
           | for fun and to be of service.
        
             | kruiller wrote:
             | Cool, agree, will fix it soon.
        
       | kruiller wrote:
       | 10+ years of development, No ads, no In-App purchases.
        
         | r0n22 wrote:
         | Are you looking at monetizing it other than donations?
        
           | kruiller wrote:
           | Yes, may be I will try to find a sponsor in the distant
           | future. I don't have any serious funds so I think it would be
           | easier to promote it while it's completely free. And for sure
           | I don't plan to integrate in-app purchases or annoying ads
           | which can effect current users in any way.
        
             | emrah wrote:
             | Keep in mind that free users are different from paid users.
        
       | T3OU-736 wrote:
       | Please consider making it available via F-Droid, too.
        
         | kruiller wrote:
         | I tried already several alternative stores but didn't notice
         | any impact from them. I'll check F-Droid also, thanks.
        
       | samldev wrote:
       | Do you actually run a backend for the syncing? I imagine you'd
       | have to find a way to monetize with enough users if so.
        
         | kruiller wrote:
         | Yes, there is some backend code to support sync between devices
         | and moving data from one device to another. I don't plan to
         | have a big backend code base, it's a bit of outside of my
         | expertise.
        
           | kruiller wrote:
           | Oh, may be I misunderstand you. So far it was ~1500 users per
           | day which is quite small amount considering I don't need to
           | store any big amounts of data. I pay for server and domain
           | myself, I can afford it and don't think it can be overloaded
           | in the near feature.
        
       | samldev wrote:
       | Is there no way to delete transactions?
        
         | kruiller wrote:
         | Account - Transactions - Long tap - Delete
        
       | Pererio wrote:
       | Nice! It's useful, thanks a lot!
        
         | kruiller wrote:
         | You are welcome! Feel free to contact support in case of any
         | questions. I do my best to respond to everybody)
        
       | gigatexal wrote:
       | If I give you my bank transactions are you going to collect and
       | sell this?
        
         | kruiller wrote:
         | What do you mean? As I said before Monetal doesn't store or
         | transfer user data, and that's why you don't need registration,
         | it's completely anonymous. It collects just analytics data just
         | for purpose which features are used more frequently and which I
         | can drop. I don't plan to end support for it, I am using it
         | myself)
        
       | wnolens wrote:
       | This is great. Appreciate the minimalist straightforward design.
        
         | kruiller wrote:
         | Great to read that. You can notice new features after using a
         | while. Some of them are hidden initially to keep new user
         | focused on primary features.
        
       | sydon wrote:
       | This looks pretty neat, might check it out.
        
       | m3kw9 wrote:
       | Free then with new paid features
        
         | kruiller wrote:
         | As I told it was already paid before and I don't plan to deal
         | with in-app purchases or ads again. May be just some sort of
         | sponsorship, but certainly shouldn't effect existing users.
        
       ___________________________________________________________________
       (page generated 2023-07-28 23:02 UTC)