Sneak Peek: CheckBook 3’s Budgets

June 5, 2024 • Keith Gugliotto

Did we just say “CheckBook 3” for the first time in public? Why, yes. Yes we did.

We’re nearing the finish line with a major upgrade to CheckBook and CheckBook Pro and just realized we haven’t shared so much as a peep, let alone a pic. Here’s a first look at some new features (note the purple Smart Folders are just in CheckBook Pro) to give you an idea of what’s coming:

Budget with ease
Or budget yearly by month with ease

Budgets give you a simple way to make sure you don’t overspend. To start, you might set up a certain amount per month (or day, week, quarter, or year). If you want to get nitty, though, you can set up amounts per month per year and see all of that in a neat yearly view. You’ll also find our usual search, with options, plus printing (with the option to simplify the bars or just not print them at all) round out things.

And oh, yeah, we do dark mode now:

Budget in dark mode with ease

You’ll also get to tweak the colors for both light and dark mode so your work looks just right.

One more thing… Look closely at the list of Accounts and how it’s no longer in a drawer. You can still hide it, resize it, or move it from one side to the other, but now that it’s part of the document window you can also take it fullscreen without the weirdness of drawers.

So that’s a sneak at what’s coming. We expect it’ll be a month or two, yet. We’re not quite ready to talk pricing, but we can say anyone who purchases 2.x within 12 months of 3.0’s release will get a free upgrade, so if you’re considering purchasing now we’ve got you covered, and everyone else will likely get a 40%-ish discount.

What do you think? We’d love to hear your thoughts at customerservice@splasm.com. More details are coming so stay tuned!

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Take your CheckBook data anywhere with iCloud Drive

May 6, 2024 • Keith Gugliotto

What if you could work with your CheckBook or CheckBook Pro data on more than one Mac – or share it with other folks so they can work on the same data? Think of it: changes you make on any Mac will appear, usually within minutes, on all of the other Macs so your finances are always at hand.

All of that’s a snap with iCloud Drive. Let’s get started!

To share your document with other Macs signed into iCloud with the same Apple ID

  1. Open CheckBook or CheckBook Pro on the Mac with your current data.
  2. Go to the File menu, near the top left corner of your screen, and click the Move To menu item.
  3. Click the Where button, choose a location in iCloud Drive, and click the Move button at the bottom right corner of the sheet. If you’re already syncing your Desktop & Documents folders with iCloud Drive, you could choose one of those instead. We don’t usually recommend the Desktop folder, but that part’s always up to you.
  4. On any other Mac signed into iCloud with the same Apple ID as on the first Mac, visit the same location you chose in step 3, double-click your document, and you’re in business.

To share your document with other folks using iCloud Drive

  1. Follow the steps above to make sure the document with your current data is already in iCloud Drive.
  2. If you’re not sure exactly where your document is, open CheckBook or CheckBook Pro, go to the File menu near the top left corner of your screen, and click the Show in Finder menu item. Your document will be highlighted in the Finder.
  3. Follow Apple’s steps for sharing and collaborating.

Those are the basics, but if you hit a snag or have a question, reach out to support@splasm.com and we’ll be happy to help!

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CheckBook and CheckBook Pro 2.7.29

March 16, 2024 • Keith Gugliotto

2.7.29 corrects an issue we introduced in 2.7.28 that could prevent OFX/QFX imports from bringing in check numbers, makes migrating from Quicken®, using the File > New > Document from… commands, that much easier by automatically selecting the most recent Entry in each Account by default, and brings minor tweaks to the user interface and split line item performance. Please update and drop us a line at support@splasm.com if you find anything out of place!

Note: CheckBook Pro 2.7.29 for Mac App Store users is still in App Review and is not yet available on the Mac App Store. If you need the update right away, click here for steps to download and install the Splasm Store version, which works exactly the same, will automatically find your current data without any additional effort, and will work just fine until we release the next update.

Learn more and update CheckBook

 

Learn more and update CheckBook Pro

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CheckBook and CheckBook Pro 2.7.27

November 30, 2023 • Keith Gugliotto

2.7.27 brings a fix for a crash that could prevent CheckBook from launching on some of the new M3 Macs, improves OFX/QFX imports when account details are missing, and has several user interface tweaks, including improvements to the To, From, Description, and Category boxes in Entries and Schedules. Update to the latest and enjoy!

Learn more and update CheckBook

 

Learn more and update CheckBook Pro

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CheckBook and CheckBook Pro 2.7.25

October 6, 2023 • Keith Gugliotto

If you just upgraded to macOS 14 Sonoma and suddenly

  • all of your CheckBook or CheckBook Pro Account icons are upside down
  • half of the buttons are missing
  • you get a crash when you try to create a new transfer
  • split line menus aren’t disappearing when you tab away from them
  • the Entry Font and Account Font menu buttons aren’t working right
  • the Accounts drawer has strange, green-ish corners

then you’re not crazy and you’re not alone – but you don’t have the 2.7.25 update we released on September 25th. Grab the latest and you’re all set:

Learn more and update CheckBook

 

Learn more and update CheckBook Pro

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Life is like a staircase. And also soccer.

October 6, 2023 • Keith Gugliotto
A soccer ball and a staircase. Thanks DALL•E!
What DALL•E gave me when I asked for a soccer ball going down a staircase
 

This post is adapted from a message I sent to one of our users this morning. Since early 2021, we’ve gotten on the phone for an hour and a half about once a month. Sometimes, it’s CheckBook tech support. More often, it’s a lot of reflection and sharing our human experience. So, stuff like this.

This morning, my mom and I talked about how my kids are doing with soccer and how I’m explaining things as I coach the team.  One point was about how to explain to 6 year-old kids, and their parents, how no one turns into a superstar overnight.  Heck, you won’t even be decent at half of it after your first year – and almost all of us are in our first year.

So I told Mom, if you think of life as a staircase, where your skills or understanding level up as you climb, you’ll spend a lot of time on each individual stair and very little actually climbing to the next.  The time you spend on a stair is like how deep it is – and most of the stairs are far deeper than they are tall.  Sometimes, you feel like you’ve been doing the same thing on the same stair forever.  Other times, you might start to worry you’ve fallen back down a stair or two.  But then, you have to remind yourself you don’t really fall down so much as not give yourself what you need to be your best on whatever stair you’re on. Sleep, diet, other habits of just about every kind, who you hang out with, who you don’t, what kind of information you let your brain eat, what kind you don’t; the list goes on and on.

In some ways, I continued, life’s also a lot like soccer – you get out on the field, put a mental box around the position you play, and wait. “Oh, here comes the ball,” you might say. “Hey, it’s kinda coming at me but it’s a few feet out of my position so I’m just gonna let it go…” And, so, you miss a lot of the action. Why not run up to the ball, kick it around a bit, see what happens?

The point is, when you think you’ve got all your answers, whether you’ve just been running in place on the same stair for so long you’ve forgotten you’re on a staircase in the first place or you play a soccer position and don’t want to stretch out a bit for a ball that doesn’t care about positions at all, maybe you’re not meeting life where it’s at.  To play better, think outside of your position but don’t forget it, keep that next stair in mind even as you don’t worry too much about it.  And, give yourself what you need to play your best.  Sometimes, that’s a self kick in the pants.  Other times, it’s a self nod that you’ll get there when you get there.

None of this would make any sense at all to a 6 year-old, so I’m probably going to sell it with an analogy about how they’ve been eating at least three times a day, every day of their life (which, if you factor out their first year, is something like 5500 times), and they still make a mess.

Keep eating, reach for your own condiments, don’t sweat your messes. And clean up already.

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