[FEATURE REQUEST] Print Calendar

[Lucas]

#3369

I just realized that I wanted to be able to print our calendar to put up on a wall and get a quick view of our budget without opening the computer (which sometimes irritates my fiancee), and that printing CalendarBudget in it’s current form doesn’t quite work out as it should (it’s “acceptable”, just far from ideal).

Printing the calendar should (assume “Landscape” printing):
– Remove the menu on the top-right
– Attempt to show every item on a single day
– Either hide the categories on the left, or display them horizontally at the bottom (legend?)
– Attempt to fill the page (0 margins on the sides)
– Display “Budget for [month] [year] for account [account]”
– “Grayscale” or “Color” option (instead of depending on the printer for this, easier for most people).

You could also have a “list” view instead of a “box” calendar, where it shows you every day as a bullet list and sub-bullets for things to pay.

[Eric Poulin]

#3715

Would you want the daily entries all highlighted or just what you currently have highlighted by category?
Do you want the calendar to be equally distributed (pretty) or do you care if the Sunday column is narrower than the rest if there if no activity on Sunday?
Since a budget typically changes frequently, what is the purpose of printing?  Do you really want to see the same regular calendar view, or are you looking to refer to something specific that may be better displayed in a different kind of report?

CalendarBudget is designed so we can have a slightly different look when printing, although this has not been implemented yet.  I’m interested to know the need so we get the final output right.

[Lucas]

#3716

The printing is more for an overview of the current month instead of having to go on the PC, even if it’s printed on the 1st and not updated during the month. It could be used to jot down expenses quickly before doing an update on the PC, and to remind yourself that “oh sh*t, I have a chiro appointment, I need to take out money to pay him today”.

I see it as looking a lot like a normal looks like – black boxes with the date and entries in them. The entries don’t need to be highlighted but at least underlined to easier identification. Right now it’s obvious that it’s a calendar but hard to see because there are no separating lines between the dates, and the entries are just text without formatting, meaning it’s just a bunch of floating numbers and text.

Personally, I don’t mind if empty columns are narrower, but for me that’s not generally sunday (feb and march, that`s the 1st and the 15th, dates full of payments) or saturday (groceries, weekly gas, etc). It would probably be easier just to have it nice and equal all around. Right now though the most wasted space is with the categories on the left, as well as the big margins (not forgetting the menu on the top-right). Also if I print background colors and pictures, the calendarbudget logo repeats itself all over the place.

[Eric Poulin]

#3717

I can probably do an initial quick job to get it better and legible – then work out a fancy output when I have more time.
Thanks for the suggestions.  This is in line with what I’ve been thinking also.

[Lucas]

#3718

Awesome. And because I don’t want to do a separate topic for this… How about:

“Collapsing the Categories”. If one has a lot of items in some days, collapsing the categories on the left (“hide” them) would give more breathing room to the items that show up. What do you think?

[Eric Poulin]

#3719

Well – if people have a lot of items in a day, they need more vertical size.  Collapsing the category sidebar will give more horizontal, but won’t increase the amount of items they can see.
I’ll look into this possibility when I work on expanding the category sidebar to show specifics for each account.

[Eric Poulin]

#3720

I’ve made the category sidebar expand vertically giving more height to see all your categories.  Premium users have no ad, and thus have all of the space.

[Anonymous]

#3721

I’d like to be able to print off the calendar and be able to see all items in a day. Is this in the works?

[Eric Poulin]

#3722

It is in the works.  In fact, I am re-doing the home page now – should be finished by the end of the week – then I was looking for the next thing to do.  This one’s as good as any.

[Anonymous]

#3723

great! thanks!

[Eric Poulin]

#3724

Ability to print the calendar is complete. You can find it under the Reports menu.

[Author]

Posts