Hello Kevin;
Just discovered this web sight and was reading through it when I came across
your post.
I also use Money 98. Who needs all the bells and whistles that come with the
updates. I never had any trouble with it from day one. I'm willing to bet
that I can do anything, accounting wise, with it that Money 2006 can do. Some
things in 2006 might be easier but all in all it's great for me.
Reading some of these posts where people are have nothing but trouble with
updates, makes my 98 look great.
Since they - Microsoft - want more of our money why don't they charge a
reasonable annual fee for using the update feature for us that do not want to
update. Keep it reasonable and I would buy it.
I must admit, that support did everything under the sun to help me when I
lost the update feature. They never once told me they had dropped the feature
for 98 users if that was the case.
I did asks them about another situation and they told me my warranty had run
out.
But what I was asking them had nothing to do about warranty. It was about
deleting accounts and investments in money and winding up with more MB in
properties than when I started with.
I will not give you my thoughts about Microsoft, but many PROS I have talked
to have very little good to say about them.
If I was them I would get a program on the market from the beginning with
all the necessary components in it to do the job and then charge a annual fee
for usage.
In the business I was in before I retired thats what ADP did. They got a
good program and then charged a monthly fee, believe me they had all the
bases covered. Suggestions were always welcome.
Dutch
- quote -

On Fri, 17 Jun 2005 12:26:21 -0600, "Dick Watson"
<littlegreengecko[at]mind-enufalready-spring.com> wrote:

- quote -

I wish you luck.

My biggest gripe with M2003 (and 002, 001,000) is in the investment
appreciation reporting. (That's aside from the expiration date for downloading
<vbg> )

There are two issues here (and prior to M2K it worked properly).

1. If you generate a report for a given time frame, the report will include
positions which were neither held nor had any activity during that time frame
(unless you manually deselect them).

2. When the report is generated, some of the columns refer only to the given
time frame, and other columns refer to the a larger portion of the DB for that
position. For example, assume you've held an equity position for five years
and are now generating a report for calendar year 2004. The balance for the
beginning and ending dates is correct. However, the columns for Buys, Sells,
and Income show the totals for other than the reporting period. And there does
not seem to be any rhyme nor reason to it. Here is an example:

I have had Altria since 1/15/1998.

I generate a performance report for that stock for 2005 YTD and select to show
calculation details.

Value on 12/31/2004 and Value on 6/17/2005 are correct.

Buys = sum of all buys done after 12/31/1998
Sells = sum of all sells done after 12/31/1999
Income = sum of all dividends received after 3/31/1999

Cost Basis = I've not gone into it deeply enough to figure out how they derived
this number

Realized gain/loss -- that's correct!
=(End Value) - (Start Value) + Income - (Sells during the period)

Of course, the latter two values you can only obtain by inspecting the actual
transaction record.

% Rate of Return for the period is also correct, and also derived from numbers
that are NOT on the report! It is the Realized gain/loss divided by the sum of
the Start Value and Buys done during the report period.


--ron

I'm betting the person at Microsoft with P/L responsibility for Money thinks
they do.

Besides, if Money make every single M* user on the planet so mad they never
buy one more anything from Microsoft, I'll bet Microsoft never feels the
sting. It's like a grain of sand under an elephant's foot. Not even in the
noise.

Further, many of us easily separate our feelings of love for the Money team
from our use of other Microsoft products. Am I going to jump to OpenOffice
or Linux because M06 sucks? Fugeddaboutit.

But believe in the Tooth Fairy if you want. Disgruntled M98 users will
change Microsoft!

"SDW" <SDW[at]discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:55116F10-88E2-4605-B6A3-7466B5729E56[at]microsoft.com...
- quote -

I would surely consider switching as well.

My only real requirement to try the switch is M04D transaction
functionality, including scheduled items, FCF and classification but less
all of the ebanking stuff which I can't care less about, plus either a
migration method for my data or sufficient openings that I can migrate it
myself. Besides the ebanking stuff, I'd gladly leave behind BP and DRP.
(They're chock full of bugs anyway.) LP and TE would be a loss but not a
deal-breaker.

I've been playing around lately with Access and a bunch of customized Money
reports exported to .CSV to see a) what's really magic about the
transactions/accounts/payees/vectors (category, classification,
etc)/FIs/currencies/states/investments etc. portion of the db design in
Money (conclusion: not a hell of a lot--and my db design supports n-level
deep splits, n levels of categorization, n vectors of categorization,
individual transaction-level currency exchange and so forth) and b) what it
takes to migrate my data out of M04 into something I can control the
horizontal and vertical of. I'm really only doing mental gymnastics and a
proof-of-concept DB design, so don't look for the shrink-wrapped code
anytime soon.

I'm just about to the point of being able to move all of the transaction
data and re-assemble it into atomic transactions--e.g., both halves of two
transfers from the reports reassembled back into the same transaction--in my
new table design. I haven't done any of the really heavy lifting yet:
scheduled transactions--including a recurrence model worth spit,
UI--arrgghhh, running balance register views, cash flow forecasting,
reports, etc. Nor does my design attempt to deal with any of the sexy
investment types or such essentials as perpetual free quotes download. For
purposes of the migration, I'm also only dealing with account types I
have--e.g., no Loan Made accounts, only Loan Taken. Needless to say (for
long time readers) my design makes no accommodation for storage of ebanking
data in transactions--though I can't imagine it's much of an impact on the
work done to date. I already support extensible Tag ("Print") and State
("Reconciled") data.

The biggest problems encountered so far are all about the goofy things Money
reports do--particularly as regards loan accounts. (I've reported some, but
not all, of these goofy report anomalies recently. The reports are
horrifically de-normalized.) I've only yet found three types of transaction
data--not BP, DRP, LP, quotes history, payee addresses, loan account details
or any number of other whatevers, just register transactions--that I can't
figure out how to get across. I haven't found a way to programmatically
migrate the paycheck tab association of the paycheck transaction split
elements. Transactions entered directly in a loan account cause real
problems since no report really can be made to show all of their data. Check
numbers associated with Void transactions are a problem since the report
denormalizes this crap into the same field, with Void taking precedence over
Num. I'm also still working out in my mind how to programmatically re-stitch
together the two halves of transfers between accounts in different
currencies. In a simple Transfer (one line in each account) it's impossible
to tell which account originated the transaction. Note that this migration
is a **lot** more than MoneyLink can do since it can't get classification
and doesn't know a Loan Account from a hole in the water.

One other thing I've concluded: the largest single contributor to the size
of a Money file is probably replicationid keys and associated kaka for
sync-with-the-web, -pocketPC, -Yodlee. All the transaction data from my 59MB
Money file is going to move across at roughly 9MB--including the code to do
the move, which I haven't separated out. No, I haven't moved the investment
price quotes--except in the investment transactions. But I've got many times
as much daily quote and 401k investment value history in another Access file
and it's only 11MB, so I'm doubting that'd make up the remaining 50MB of a
Money file. The only other thing I can think of to explain the bloat--now
that I'm in here slogging--is incredible sloppiness/denormalization or Jet
replication mechanics.

"Ron Rosenfeld" <ronrosenfeld[at]nospam.org> wrote in message
news:tn06b19ea6eorbutponh6d2p7nuqtrfe4p[at]4ax.com...
- quote -

BAD MATH. You are not taking into consideration that a 'disgruntled M98'
client has also bought thousands of dollars in other MSFT products in
addition to M98. They also have the lifetime potential to buy perhaps
$thousands$ more in future MSFT products. M98 users do not operate in a
vacuum. Looking at just the $2/year M98 value analogy is a myopic view.
These users also have friends and discontent via word of mouth and the web
spreads that MSFT behaves in this unscrupulous manner. I thought MSFT wants
more of my wallet share (XBOX, Office Pro, Windows forever, etc.). Any bad
experience with MSFT not caring or even admitting their bad business scruples
like breaking written promises has a market impact beyond the casual
financial user. Saying that MSFT can simply disregard what they sold the
public (when not many people will notice) is a terrible business practice.
This behavior is reprehensible and reeks of the arrogance with which MSFT is
often accused. This case bares it out. Let the truth be told.

"Dick Watson" wrote:

- quote -

On Fri, 17 Jun 2005 06:46:43 -0600, "Dick Watson"
<littlegreengecko[at]mind-enufalready-spring.com> wrote:

- quote -

That's true, especially if you consider the development of PF software in
isolation.

But other people are slowly developing personal financial software programs.
And, although I am not a M98 user, I will switch when the competition is at a
certain level.

If Money were continuing to provide me with what I need, I would not even have
been looking for another product.

I suspect there are a number of people like me. And if, let us say, a company
like Sun or Corel picks up the product, using that product might also entice me
to switch form MS Office to another product, or at least to evaluate it where I
would not bother before. Especially if they are more responsive to my
requirements than MS has been lately.


--ron

A competitor's attitude does not pay for software development. That takes
money. As previously noted, an M98 user is worth about $2 per year to a
developer. How many disgruntled M98 users does it take to pay for
developing, say, 100k LOC? (I keep meaning to go do a line count of
GnuCash.) Let's see. A good average is 3 or 4 LOC per hour. (In my business
we'd be thrilled to stay above 1.) That's a 300k hour investment at, say,
$75 per hour burdened. (It's not just paying the developers. You've got to
pay their taxes and put a roof over their heads and give them benefits and
so forth. $75/hr is probably a garage-shop operation. Where I work it's over
twice that. Maybe if you outsourced the work to India you could cut this
cost in half or less.) That's a $22.5M investment, just in the code. At
$2/year over seven years that takes 1.6M disgruntled M98 users ready to
switch JUST TO PAY THAT BILL over 7 years.

Let's assume that 10% of the population of the US does Personal Finance on a
personal computer. (I have no clue as to the validity of this number.)
That's, what, 28M people? Let's assume 1/3 of these use Money. (Another
pluck.) That's 7M users. Let's assume that of those, only half really buy
licenses, the rest are spouses or steal or whatever. That's 3.5M licenses.
Say half those licensees dump Money to buy "BetterMoney" immediately and
they pay $50 direct to the developer to download the code. Setting up the
infrastructure to do that business and to take the money and so forth is
free. No Sam's Club handle. No $20 rebates. So that's $87.5M in sales or a
gross of $65M. Out of that you have to pay for everything besides the
initial development. Support. Quotes servers. Data feed. Yodlee. End user
documentation. Ongoing development. Advertising. A net profit. Taxes. A
return on investment. Yada. Yada. If you add the international market, I'd
bet your costs go up faster than your revenue. You've got to bear the costs
of localization for progressively much smaller markets. I'd bet this is why
both Q and M are reducing the number of localized versions they ship, not
increasing.

I think you'll end up selling lots of ads and access to the customers as a
way to make this business case close. You won't give anything away for free
forever. And we just came full circle.

"Ron Rosenfeld" <ronrosenfeld[at]nospam.org> wrote in message
news:3ac5b1dkaun7sqesg03tiapl0t0m6mfc6v[at]4ax.com...
- quote -

On Thu, 16 Jun 2005 23:32:06 -0600, "Dick Watson"
<littlegreengecko[at]mind-enufalready-spring.com> wrote:

- quote -

I don't believe they care enough to even laugh. And this attitude will be an
incentive for others to develop alternatives.

- quote -

Not enough money in it. Don't forget, MS has tenacious lawyers.


--ron

Perhaps so, but it sure looks like Microsoft's going to get the last laugh.
I'm kinda surprised nobody's started talking about a Class Action suit.
That's been a popular vacuous threat suggested as a response to the Money
Team's past outrageous perfidies.

"Ron Rosenfeld" <ronrosenfeld[at]nospam.org> wrote in message
news:2nf4b1hjj395ut7f6gvh3jd16rjv556jis[at]4ax.com...
- quote -

On Thu, 16 Jun 2005 19:21:22 -0600, "Dick Watson"
<littlegreengecko[at]mind-enufalready-spring.com> wrote:

- quote -

Well, that's where we seem to disagree.

You know, pricing and features are a marketing decision. So I don't believe
that because they charged "only" $20 that excuses them from not living up to
their explicit and/or implied promises, so long as the technology exists.

Equis produces a stock trading program called Metastock. Quote access is
virtually mandatory to use the program. But they provide plenty of methods for
getting the data; some free; some with a monthly charge; and their data
structure is open enough so that others can write programs to provide the
information from free data sources.

MS does none of this and has chosen to cripple M98 (and earlier versions)
without providing any alternative other than to switch to a less capable
program. If marketing made a bad decision in pricing or advertising certain
program features, that should be MS's problem and not those who purchased the
product in good faith.






--ron

The only argument you MIGHT get from me is with the notion that failure to
explicitly state a cutoff date meant that they implicitly "promised" a free
service in perpetuity as part of a product that sold for about $20 and that
that implicit "promise" is one which Microsoft should have a lot of shame
for "breaking" after seven years. When people don't tell me something, I
don't usually interpret that as a promise to do something they didn't
explicitly say they weren't going to do. I could be corrected if anybody
would cite a place Microsoft promised this service in perpetuity. (I.e.,
"free online quotes forever" not just "free online quotes".)

Beyond that, I agree with everything you say.

"Ron Rosenfeld" <ronrosenfeld[at]nospam.org> wrote in message
news:cn64b11jj695u46v9fbgnb4j22p99eqeb9[at]4ax.com...
- quote -

On Thu, 16 Jun 2005 14:41:28 -0600, "Dick Watson"
<littlegreengecko[at]mind-enufalready-spring.com> wrote:

- quote -

Well, it's more a matter of philosophy with me. And I'm currently on M2003,
which has a definite cutoff date.

But I do not subscribe to the philosophy that because a promise might be
impacting on the "bottom line", that it is OK to break it.

I'm sure the MS doesn't give a hoot about what I think; but it does reflect on
their ethics for me, and for other users.

For now, there is no real alternative. But the failure to improve the product,
coupled with the lack of support for older versions, will surely lead me and
others to be open to products from other companies. Perhaps by the time my
M2003 becomes non-functional, MoneyDance will be a more capable product.

If MS were actually improving the product, there would be an incentive to
upgrade, even with the time-limited downloading features. But there is not.

In the past, I've had some features of my Money program become non-functional.
i don't recall the details or the versions, but I'm sure it had something to do
with online issues. And MS customer support has provided me with a few free
upgrades over the many years I've been using this product, because of the loss
of functionality. As a result, I have stayed with the product, hoping that a
version will come along that will have at least the features that I'm used to.
(I've given up hope waiting for them to bring back some of the older features
that made it more convenient).

Heck, I would even pay a license fee to keep my M2003 version working after the
cutoff date.

Maybe M2006 will be an improvement. But the way things have been going, I'm
not holding my breath.


--ron

I guess you guys all have a bone to pick with Microsoft. Good luck. Let us
know if you find somebody there who cares. I'm STILL not trying to defend
Microsoft, just trying to be realistic about what's going on here.

Maybe we'll have this same discussion a year from now when M99 users lose
quotes? We can do it once a year until, what, 2009, when they cutoff M02
users?

"Ron Rosenfeld" <ronrosenfeld[at]nospam.org> wrote in message
news:buk3b1hrfuhdqijv7llkk1gbotq59pt4em[at]4ax.com...
- quote -

On Thu, 16 Jun 2005 10:47:39 -0600, "Dick Watson"
<littlegreengecko[at]mind-enufalready-spring.com> wrote:

- quote -

I've not been asked it but I'll answer it -- and my answer is that, since the
stock quote service was promised with no cut off date, I expect MS to continue
to provide that service either for the life of the company (MS and its
successors) or until they have documented that the service is no longer being
used for some reasonable length of time, say a year or two.

I suppose if the internet stops functioning in a manner that can be accessed by
computers that are also able to run M98, then that would also be a reason to
stop providing the service. But that's probably not going to happen any time
soon.

And there certainly are reputable companies out there that provide lengthy
warrantees on their products.


--ron

I can admit nothing one way or the other because I don't have a clue why M98
users are having problems getting quotes. I'm not shrinking or hiding behind
anything, true or otherwise. Why did you trust MSFT (or any one else?) to
provide some service for free forever in the first place? Why would you
think that an expectation with a reasonable chance of satisfaction? I was
reacting to the poster's suggestion that since the data being provided to
M98 users is the same data available "for free" (i.e., someone else is
paying for it not the web site user) on the MSN web site it doesn't cost
Microsoft anything to maintain and provide the M98 quote service. Since you
seem so pious on the subject, I'll ask you the same question others have
declined to answer in this thread: Do you expect Microsoft to offer free
quotes via the existing M98 interface to any M98 users left in the year 2314
or 2475 or 3911? If not, then when do you think--a date, not "when the last
M98 user dies" since Microsoft has no way of knowing this--it would be
reasonable for them to tear down this service interface?

If you want to go find "more reputable firms to go deal with", knock
yourself out. I see nothing to indicate that Intuit is "more reputable"
than, or even 'as reputable' as, Microsoft. Maybe gnucash would be more to
your liking?

"SDW" <SDW[at]discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:AD7166FB-392C-453A-A002-00E3461288CA[at]microsoft.com...
- quote -

So you are admitting that MSFT cut off this documented feature to it's MS
Money clients to save a buck? If MSFT has made a conscious decision to
disable the link then state the facts on this web site and notify the support
center properly. Don't shrink and hide behind the fact if it is true. Why
would I trust MSFT to it's written word again? The users are powerless except
to find more reputable firms to deal with.

"Dick Watson" wrote:

- quote -

Comments inline.

"Ed" <friday[at]fishinthe.net> wrote in message
news:11b1bpu46qmh554[at]corp.supernews.com...
- quote -

But they can change the underpinnings for the website stuff at will and you
are never the wiser. To keep supporting M98, they have to maintain the same
interface to the net that they had in fall of '97 since the M98 side is
hardwired. That has costs associated with it.

- quote -

Consider yourself lucky or tolerant. I had more problems (i.e., defects)
with M98 in a week than I had in 3 weeks with M05.

- quote -

As noted, there are any number of reasons Microsoft will probably not miss
customers whose last Money purchase was M98. They might even view it as good
riddance. (I'm not convinced they miss those of us who bought M05 and then
returned it for our money back.) As noted, I'm not defending it, I'm just
telling you how the world works.

- quote -

Suit yourself. If loss of quotes is such a big deal, why not move on now:
http://www.buy.com/retail/product.as...00&spf=1&sp=1?

"Dick Watson" <littlegreengecko[at]mind-enufalready-spring.com> wrote

- quote -

That's not the point. They already have the servers. Providing delayed
quotes to those who purchase their software is a selling feature. You can
set up a portfolio at their website and get free delayed quotes all day long
even if you didn't purchase the software.

I also use Money98 user and have had no problems with it other than quotes.
The quote feature has always been a little unreliable but now it just
doesn't work.

Disabling this feature with or without notice isn't going to have people
running out and spending money on more Microsoft products, I think it will
be just the opposite.

I bought Money 2004 Deluxe and didn't care for it as well, I gave it away to
a family member. I think I'll just get by with Money98 until the end of the
year and then upgrade, with another brand. I'm no big fan of Quicken either
but I'll find something.

Wanna bet? The information is only one part of the problems. It takes
servers and protocols--different between M98 and M05--and so forth. It also
generates support calls. All of that costs real money.

"MSFT forces users hand" <MSFT forces users hand[at]discussions.microsoft.comwrote in message news6EEA665-0F08-488A-BAFD-EE38A3806A14[at]microsoft.com...
- quote -

Dick,
I have read the email threads on this subject. MSFT has apparently disabled
the online source for financial quotes. This is an apparent move to either
discard the troublesome Money98 users and/or spur demand for the lastest
version on MS Money. For most folks Money98 has met their needs and spending
additional 'money' every year to get the lastest flavor from MSFT seemed to
hold little incremenatl value. Well, MSFT has now forced our hand. While not
admitting they did anything and without any premeditation they are calling
the MS Money 98 users stupid for staying on their software so long. The fact
is, it cost MSFT no more 'money' to have the online quote site availalble for
'98 users as it does for the 2005 Money users. It is the same financial
institution information for either application version.

I pulled this directly from my MONEY documentation
" download market prices using Online Quotes
If you have Internet access, you can use Online Quotes free of charge to
electronically download the latest prices (less a 20-minute delay) of all the
major stocks and mutual funds you track in Money.
Money will then automatically update the prices in your portfolio, and make
a record of the date and price in the Update Price dialog box, which you can
view by clicking Update Price in the Investment Portfolio.

Copyright -- Microsoft Corporation


"Dick Watson" wrote:

- quote -