orgzly-android VS beancount-mode

Funny enough there has been a commit that solves it and they just abandoned it.

Orgzly - The most featureful. An unfortunate mechanism that can't be turned off saves over your file with re-done spacing -- blank lines are added between headlines automatically, which isn't everyone's style nor is it Org specification. This clogs git, if you're using version control, with changes that are just whitespace. One may notice a toggle to turn off adding blank lines between headlines, but that just means turning blank lines off entirely, forgetting ones that you may have added. Fundamentally, as of now, Orgzly's parser doesn't try to remember the blank lines in your notes that you may have added with purpose.

But for me the most important aspect is org-agenda and in particular with packages like org-super-agenda, org-ql, and orgzly an excellent Android app. You configure the parameters and it shows you tasks/notes grouped/sorted by whatever attributes you want--priority, tags, deadline, keywords, etc. It takes a matter of 3 seconds to search for tasks with priority A to do within 2 weeks, for example (or you can of course pre-configure that search parameter bound to a hotkey--I have agenda views for different aspects of my life like school, work, business, shopping, etc.). The interface provides you the ability to quickly mark tasks and modify their properties in bulk like priorities and deadlines, etc.

I use Orgzly for modifying Org files, with Dropbox to sync my files.

emacs org-mode on linux/macOS with self-hosted syncthing and orgzly on Android works great for me.

But there is orgzly, they even mentioned considering neorg support, as it comes out of Alpha.

Which app did you try? I use Orgzly http://www.orgzly.com/ for getting the agenda on my phone and for small edits. And whenever I want the full experience I run a real emacs on my phone in Termux.

For syncing I use Syncthing.

Orgzly (version 1.8.7): Outliner for notes and tasks in plain-text

For me, the beauty of Beancount[0] is that it's just text files in Git. There's a web UI I use for generating reports, and a Python API with which I hacked together some import/export scripts, but 99% of my interactions with it are via Emacs[1] and Magit.

A ton of repetitive bookkeeping tasks become so much easier when you can copy and paste, or use keyboard macros or something like multiple-cursors[2], rather than have to click tens or hundreds of times in a GUI. Many years ago I used QuickBooks, and basic tasks like importing a bank statement took at least an order of magnitude longer than they do now.

Having my company's books in Git is also huge when it comes to auditing, concurrency, backups, and figuring out where things went wrong when accounts don't balance. As mentioned in another comment: `git diff` is a really powerful tool and it's awesome to be able to check out the books as they existed at a particular point in time. `git blame` is great for when things don't balance. Writing meaningful commit messages and comments keeps me sane when I try to remember a year later why something is recorded the way it is.

The biggest downside—or advantage, depending on how you look at it—is that there's no default or built-in chart of accounts, so you need a certain level of accounting acumen (or professional advice) to set things up at first. I'm pretty sure GnuCash aims to be more plug-and-play, whereas Beancount is more akin to a programming library that you use to build an accounting system that works for you. I agree with the grandparent commenter, who said that text-based accounting is "the best and most flexible accounting experience I've ever had." But the cost of that flexibility is that a certain level of base knowledge is a prerequisite.

[0]: https://beancount.io/

[1]: https://github.com/beancount/beancount-mode

[2]: https://github.com/magnars/multiple-cursors.el

I use org mode for task management. I have just discovered accounting with Beancount (a awesome plain text accounting tool), with emacs support

Interesting post. I'm ~6 mo into using emacs, but I'm a long time vim user. I use emacs for org mode and org-roam, and for personal finance[0]. And sometime, magit.And honestly... I may never use it for much more beyond this, and that's totally fine with me. Which I suppose is the point of flexibility -- people can use a flexible tool in the way that works best for them. My contribution here is to note that its _also_ ok to decide a tool, even an impressive tool, is something you only want in a few specific contexts without feeling bad about not adopting it everywhere.

I think its working out that way for me because I'm not actually much of a tinkerer. I very much like the straightforwardness of plain text, and I like all tools that empower me to put that in the center of my workflows. I can take or leave emacs, but I love org-*. Actually not too different from how I got into programming in the first place -- being able to write a plain text file in a certain format, point my browser to it, and boom it's a web page, was magic. And from there into actual programs -- use a certain format and boom it does stuff... The tools themselves - eh. Keep it simpler and I'm happier, but I'm not much for customizing them.

I can see how for the tinkering personality one can really get into emacs. That's not me, but emacs works for me for some things, and I've been happy to learn it for those.

[0]https://github.com/beancount/beancount-mode

what do you mean by that? i know that beancount-mode talks about outline-minor-mode, which is a minor mode that allows to use heading just like Org-mode (and indeed Org-mode was built on top of outline-mode), but i make heavy use of noweb and tangling.