I was an accountant for a SaaS business with operations in the US. It was B2B, and used a plug-in (Vertex) with the ERP to calculate sales tax in each state.
Gnucash is an actual double entry bookkeeping system. Firefly is not.
I want to like Firefly, but you cannot properly record all liabilities. Also, you can't mix income and expenses in the same account. For example, if I get a refund, it has to go to an income account. Not net off against an expense, which is the usual way bookkeeping.
I'm a UK accountant, but I'm currently working as a finance software analyst.
I spend quite a bit of time coding to solve problems. Normally turning a csv into another csv (Python), or writing Javascript for our ERP (Netsuite).
There is little competiton for roles, they're well paid, and you get exposed to some interesting(?), process type problems.
My point is that there are lots of careers where coding isn't the main thrust of the role, but is really useful.
I learned Python whilst in a role where I was underemployed and it looked enough like work that no-one bithered me about it. I also fart around with computers and code in the evenings.
I am sure there are tasks you could automate in your own role to give you confidence in other roles. Or maybe even carve our a more coding based niche. Understand code and law? Great!
I created a Flask app called holly. It was originally made to record when I'd given my kids different medicine, but has now expanded to an event scheduler, meal planner, and checklists.
A number of years ago, I came accross the FAST standard for financial modelling, and a company F1F9 that teach financial modelling. Somewhat related I suppose.
I recently gave brain.fm a go. I found it really distracting. I normally listen to music contantly, but dont normally feel too distracted. I could def feel bran.fm's throbbing.
I suggest you look at the IFRS (International Financial Reporting Standards) which you need to follow if you list in Europe. Goodwill is only on the purchasors balance sheet. You can push goodwill down to subsidiaries, but only under USGAAP.
> Initial recognition: research and development costs
> Charge all research cost to expense. [IAS 38.54] Development costs are capitalised only after technical and commercial feasibility of the asset for sale or use have been established. This means that the entity must intend and be able to complete the intangible asset and either use it or sell it and be able to demonstrate how the asset will generate future economic benefits. [IAS 38.57]
To my knowledge, under IFRS you cannot put IP on your own balance sheet. If you're bought by another company, it goes on the balance sheet as "goodwill" which is the difference between the price paid and the book value of net assets.
R&D spend is pure cost to the business. There might be tax advantages to doing it (UK has some addital tax benefits), but broadly just hits the income statement.
I'm pretty sure that USGAAP has similar rules, however, I would apply a health warning to what I've said.
Whilst not strictly non-fiction, I'm going with The Goal bg Eli Goldratt. It's a novel about accounting. Specifically, Goldratt's Theory of Constraints.
It presents the idea that manufacturing accounting is wrong.
I've been using Gnucash since 2016. I import bank statements into it and produce financial statements. I've also tried Firefly and Hledger.
I think that Gnucash offers the right mix of UI and reporting for me. I think Hledger looks quite good, but would reuqire a bit more effort to learn on my part and, tbh, not sure I have the energy.
I want to like Firefly, but I'm an accountant, and it it not true double entry. So I find it emotionally difficult to use - it's simply not correct. I think that it has it's use-case, like if you only care about cash out of a bank account, but it doesnt work so well for loans or investments.
My day job is a finance system manager, so I end up having strong opinions on how finance software should work.
From "running a business" point of view, get Shopify integrated with your accounting software. Xero is a good start. It will give an actual idea of what your business is doing.