I use Soulver with a file for each month’s expenses as well as a file for overall assets and liabilities. If you already have that app, it’s a great solution. It supports (global) variables and has natural language support.
hx8 · 3h ago
I love budgeting and I love plaintext, doing more with textfiles than most people. I'm going to give some quick feedback as someone that should be in the target audience, but doesn't find this particular application interesting.
* Setting the budget is one thing, but you never actually spend exactly the budget. There is no way import transactions which is crucial. It's a good habit to compare actual expenditures to projected budgets.
* One of the major problems that successful budgeters run across is how to track savings over time. Savings are shifting in nature. In bank accounts or bonds the interest the occur is predetermined. What if the savings is in stock, crypto, precious metals or collectables? It's a shame that my tool for tracking the value of my retro game collection doesn't communicate with my tool for tracking my savings accounts.
* I'm concerned about using your GUI tool to edit a text file instead of my own primary text editor. The nice thing about my text editor is that my font is set how I like, my keybindings are set how I like, and I know a ton of useful shortcuts. I'm not sure I'd want to spend the time to configure your tool, and even if they have the configuration options I'd want.
* Honestly there are a ton of budgeting apps with more features. Some good ones are even free.
jgalvez · 3h ago
Thank you so much for the feedback — this is a very early iteration.
I've been using it for several years and wanted to get it into an app. I've been getting a lot of suggestions and requests from early adopters. I will definitely take yours into consideration. There's a lot of room for improvements.
Re: GUI limitation, there's a CLI which is open source and free:
This is interesting. I really like the DSL. It is a little limited though, just because it works on the month-level only.
One thing that I think is missing is having different dates for transactions to occur. So like some things happen just once ever, or transactions on the last day of the month which shifts.
This just means the stats that are given by this app are a bit rough. Looking at the source it seems to estimate the projections. Not a bad thing, just something to note.
One last thing, if you haven't heard of Wails, and you like Golang, I recommend it when thinking about making a desktop version of a web app: https://wails.io/
daviesgeek · 48m ago
This is great. I’m gonna try it out but just looking at screenshots, this was really close to something I was going to try building not that long ago. I’m glad someone else did because I didn’t/don’t have the time right now (and don’t need another project for my ADD brain to hyper focus on )
k2enemy · 2h ago
I'm sure you're aware of the plaintext accounting/budgeting options, but for others that might be interested, here's a list: https://plaintextaccounting.org/#pta-apps
I personally use hledger, but beancount is also popular.
dave333 · 2h ago
I guess it's obvious that a plain spreadsheet does this job nicely. I use one row per day and one column for each account, e.g. rent, utilities, each credit card, savings accts etc. I make a new tab each year. Very easy to see in advance the low point in your bank balance each month/pay period.
jgalvez · 1h ago
Just wanted to give 2 cents on the rationale behind this:
Most people don't budget at all.
Most people live paycheck to paycheck. I have lived paycheck to paycheck for a long time. When your finances are in distress, and you have no planning, the least helpful thing you can do is trying a fully featured app, or even worse, a spreadsheet. It requires a lot of attention to details and they can get overwhelming and confusing to manage — not everyone is fluent in spreadsheet formulas, as basic as they may be, to the point of getting the setup right, and most template spreadsheets available pack a lot of unnecessary things and customizing them becomes a project of its own. There's also the feeling of despair realizing you're not even close to even having that much data or assets to put in. This is not only my opinion — this is what I've gathered asking friends and family on the topic.
So this is a way to keep things simple. Extremely simple. No integration to banks, no mental overhead, just a smart replacement for a piece of paper where you write down your income and your expenses. There is a lot of people that still use a physical notebook to keep track of their finances, in this day and age, out of sheer choice — it's a way to maintain focus on the big picture, and not miss any detail.
It's a way to express your finances in a portable, human-readable format that is essentially computable plain text. You can express your finances at a 10,000-feet level, know what your savings will look like, for motivation, and know where your money is going. This is it. Surely it will be too simple for many, but perhaps just about right for some.
You're also not vendor locked, your data is plain text and you can use the CLI (free and open source) to process it. I myself use the CLI and manage my sheets from Sublime Text. Yep :)
prokopton · 48m ago
The wording on the site/blog was confusing. The homepage says "Download Beta" and the blog says "purchase". Sure enough, when you click "Download Beta" you're asked to pay $10.
jgalvez · 43m ago
I've updated the button to reflect reality.
whall6 · 1h ago
It’s wild to me that people would rather build their own apps than use excel.
* Setting the budget is one thing, but you never actually spend exactly the budget. There is no way import transactions which is crucial. It's a good habit to compare actual expenditures to projected budgets.
* One of the major problems that successful budgeters run across is how to track savings over time. Savings are shifting in nature. In bank accounts or bonds the interest the occur is predetermined. What if the savings is in stock, crypto, precious metals or collectables? It's a shame that my tool for tracking the value of my retro game collection doesn't communicate with my tool for tracking my savings accounts.
* I'm concerned about using your GUI tool to edit a text file instead of my own primary text editor. The nice thing about my text editor is that my font is set how I like, my keybindings are set how I like, and I know a ton of useful shortcuts. I'm not sure I'd want to spend the time to configure your tool, and even if they have the configuration options I'd want.
* Honestly there are a ton of budgeting apps with more features. Some good ones are even free.
I've been using it for several years and wanted to get it into an app. I've been getting a lot of suggestions and requests from early adopters. I will definitely take yours into consideration. There's a lot of room for improvements.
Re: GUI limitation, there's a CLI which is open source and free:
https://github.com/galvez/plainbudget
The parser and processor have a comprehensive test suite.
npm i pbudget -g
I talk about the DSL design and its capabilities in detail here:
https://hire.jonasgalvez.com.br/2025/may/8/plainbudget/
One thing that I think is missing is having different dates for transactions to occur. So like some things happen just once ever, or transactions on the last day of the month which shifts.
This just means the stats that are given by this app are a bit rough. Looking at the source it seems to estimate the projections. Not a bad thing, just something to note.
I recently translated my own script-based cash flow simulator to a web app as well, which might be interesting: https://nicktrevino.com/tools.cashflow-simulator.html
One last thing, if you haven't heard of Wails, and you like Golang, I recommend it when thinking about making a desktop version of a web app: https://wails.io/
I personally use hledger, but beancount is also popular.
Most people don't budget at all.
Most people live paycheck to paycheck. I have lived paycheck to paycheck for a long time. When your finances are in distress, and you have no planning, the least helpful thing you can do is trying a fully featured app, or even worse, a spreadsheet. It requires a lot of attention to details and they can get overwhelming and confusing to manage — not everyone is fluent in spreadsheet formulas, as basic as they may be, to the point of getting the setup right, and most template spreadsheets available pack a lot of unnecessary things and customizing them becomes a project of its own. There's also the feeling of despair realizing you're not even close to even having that much data or assets to put in. This is not only my opinion — this is what I've gathered asking friends and family on the topic.
So this is a way to keep things simple. Extremely simple. No integration to banks, no mental overhead, just a smart replacement for a piece of paper where you write down your income and your expenses. There is a lot of people that still use a physical notebook to keep track of their finances, in this day and age, out of sheer choice — it's a way to maintain focus on the big picture, and not miss any detail.
It's a way to express your finances in a portable, human-readable format that is essentially computable plain text. You can express your finances at a 10,000-feet level, know what your savings will look like, for motivation, and know where your money is going. This is it. Surely it will be too simple for many, but perhaps just about right for some.
You're also not vendor locked, your data is plain text and you can use the CLI (free and open source) to process it. I myself use the CLI and manage my sheets from Sublime Text. Yep :)