Nice picture! (Did anyone else try to determine if the 1's and 0's meant anything in binary? Because it doesn't seem significant, but the geek in me had to try and see.)

Does anyone know if GNU Cash will download transactions in real-time much like Quicken does?

Consider moneydance ( http://moneydance.com ). Works on most platforms. Does what you need, including on-line banking. Doesnt' clutter things up with stupid things you don't need. Or at least that I don't need.

Thirty bucks. Not free, but cheap.

@aparsons: The authors of these sorts of articles (and I've seen lots of them) always overlook what people really use Quicken and Money for - online banking. AFAIKT, none of the products supports online banking.

@Hawkins: Good one, at least there's one alternative that understands what consumers want.

Those rings are awesome, it just looks like those rings you would say see on a simpsons episode, but nonetheless hilarious and awesome.

@Hawkins: I agree. Lifehacker turned me on to Moneydance, and I LOVE it!!

11011 == 16+8+2+1 == 27
However, if its a signed binary number it would be -5. (5 == 00101 -->Use 2's complement--> 11010+1 == 11011 == -5)

wesabe is the best thing that's happened to my money situation since i got my first job. not only is it really freakin easy to use, their customer support is the best i've ever encountered.

I have started using Bank of America's portfolio solution and got to say its pretty damn good. It has a few issues with updating sites, but it will usually do it in a day.

I started using it because BoA charges for direct links for packages like Moneydance (which I wanted to use) while their Portfolio manager is completely free.

@mantari: I wondered that too.

11011 = 27 = escape (in ASCII)

When I googled it I got
http://primes.utm.edu/curios/page.php?number_id=2689

and

http://www.ssa.gov/pubs/11011.html

Does anyone know if anyone's built a money management database using OpenOffice?

How does Moneydance compare to MS Money? I'm using MS Money 2005 (I think that's the version) and really think it's a bit bloated for what I need, but I like the management and tracking that it does. Can Moneydance automatically download info from my credit cards and credit union that both already support Money? I'd rather not have to go to each site periodically and download data files separately.

There is a freeware program that I use called Money Box and you can get it at http://www.moneybox.ai/ It is one of the easiest money programs I have ever used. J.B.

I've used Quicken from 2002 until my conversion to Linux over a year ago. Quicken is the only software I would actually purchase, but they don't provide that option for Linux users. Quicken works OK in WINE, but not well enough. Yesterday I gave up and created a spreadsheet to track all my finances. It's free and highly customizable. No, it doesn't do online banking, but my credit union's website handles that need.

While on the subject of free alternatives to Microsoft's price gouged crap, use Open Office by Sun Microsystems instead of Microsoft Office Professional. Does EVERYTHING it can and more. Can save to formats that MS office uses or even save as a .pdf file for websites. Best of all COMPLETELY FREE.