Add QuickMath functionality to Quicken for Mac (103 Legacy Votes)

jacobs

This thread was referenced in another recently, so I came back to re-read it. It continues to be, for me, one of the key ease-of-use features from Quicken 2007 that is still missing in the modern Quicken Mac. I wrote above, two years ago, how I use this and why it's such a pain for me not to have it in Quicken 2018. I've stuck with Quicken 2007 for a number of reasons, but little by little, the developers have worked to close the gap on features that are important to me, and once a few more Reports feature enhancements get implemented, I think I'd be ready to make the leap to Quicken 2018/2019 -- if they would only create some functionality similar to QuickMath!

If you're reading this and also want this functionality, please make sure you click the blue VOTE button at the top right of this page. Maybe if we break 100 votes, it will move up on the developers' roadmap.

And I do understand that adding functionality which could not be done in any way (like selling individual security lots and major improvements to report printing) have been deemed higher priorities by the developers than usability enhancements like QuickMath which make the program easier and faster to use, but which can be worked around in the meantime. My hope has been -- continues to be -- that now that they've expanded the development team and gotten new programmers up to speed, and they've rebuilt some of the architecture that previously tied them to Intuit, that these types of enhancements would come quicker. Maybe in 2019...  

smayer97

For reference, this is what the Preference settings look like in QM2007:



Again, ideally, it should not be limited to just 10 settings, as there have been times where there have been need for more.

(If you find this reply helpful, please be sure to click "Like", so others will know, thanks.)

RickO

The workaround I use for quick math is a third party tool called Keyboard Maestro. I set up macros in KM for each quick math I want. For example, when I type Option-6, KM turns that into " * 1.06 <tab>" which quickly uses Quicken's built in calculator to add 6%. The only downside is that KM costs $36, but it is so powerful I use it for lots of other stuff. [I have no personal interest in KM, financial or otherwise.]

Harold

Quicken (Mac) is useless without QuickMathCodes so will continue to use QnMac2007.

smayer97

Quicken (Mac) is useless without QuickMathCodes so will continue to use QnMac2007.

I wold not call it useless since you can manually perform the calculations in the ribbon BUT it is much more of a pain if you have to do this often, which I do.

Randy Chevrier

RickO said:

The workaround I use for quick math is a third party tool called Keyboard Maestro. I set up macros in KM for each quick math I want. For example, when I type Option-6, KM turns that into " * 1.06 <tab>" which quickly uses Quicken's built in calculator to add 6%. The only downside is that KM costs $36, but it is so powerful I use it for lots of other stuff. [I have no personal interest in KM, financial or otherwise.]

Are you able to set those macros up so they only fire in Quicken? Otherwise I'm overrun with keyboard shortcuts that I don't need new ones that will fire at the wrong time in other apps.

Randy Chevrier

After waiting 4 years to move from QMAC 2007 to the new QMAC, I've found I'm missing 4-5 legacy items that is really cramping my data entry style. One of those is Quickmath. As described above, this feature saves time, hassle, mistakes and lots of mouse/keyboard shuffling. 

My particular case is using it for tax rates. I work, live, and shop in three different sales tax jurisdictions. So I set T/t for the Tulsa Sales Tax Rate, S/s for Stillwater Tax Rate and P/p for the Payne County Tax Rate. Because I use Quicken to keep track of my expense account I use splits and memos quite a bit to split purchases between personal and business. Because of that I have to manually calculate the tax on each split and typing "=*1.0881" for every line is a lot harder than typing "s", not to mention having to look at the chart to remember which rate to use. 

This was such a smart feature! Just as an aside, I find it strange that current Quicken Mac staff don't know the features of the previous version. Why is it that the users know more about the product than the staff? 

jacobs

@Quicken Marcus This idea thread had 100 votes on the old forum, and has gone untouched. Since the request here is basically for some UI work and not something disruptive to the core database, is there any chance of this idea getting a little developer attention and seeing the light of day sometime this year? It's still one of the biggest thorns in my side in terms of usability of Quicken 2019 versus Quicken 2007. Thanks.

Q.Hound

I just upgraded to QMac19 from QMac 2007. I miss QuickMath a lot. It is a pain to add local sales tax to every entry. That's eight key strokes instead of one and a much increased potential for a data entry error.  It looks like the feature vote link has been removed from this page. Any idea on how I can find it so I can vote for its addition to QMac. Does any other Mac financial software have something like QuickMath?

Q.Hound

I want my QuickMath back. I would go back to QMac 2007, but my bank stopped supporting it and would not fix the errors that arose in the bank's interface software.

jacobs

Mark Adamson said:

I just upgraded to QMac19 from QMac 2007. I miss QuickMath a lot. It is a pain to add local sales tax to every entry. That's eight key strokes instead of one and a much increased potential for a data entry error.

Yes, I agree. I've been hopeful that this would be a fairly easy piece to add when they has a UI developer between larger projects, but so far, it's gotten no love from the development team. I keep hoping...

Mark Adamson said:

It looks like the feature vote link has been removed from this page. Any idea on how I can find it so I can vote for its addition to QMac.

One of the annoying things on this forum platform is that votes appear only on the first page of a thread. In this case, we're on page 2 of this thread; you need to click the link to go to the first page, then find the blue voting box after the first post, then click the little triangle under the count and make sure the count goes up by one.(If you click a second time, it removes your vote. Stupidly, there's no way to see whether you have votes other than to click it and see if the count goes up or down.)

smayer97

there's no way to see whether you have votes other than to click it and see if the count goes up or down.)

Actually, there is a subtle way to know...if the little triangle under the count is grey, there is no vote registered for you; if the triangle is a solid black, your vote has been registered.

jacobs

Actually, there is a subtle way to know...if the little triangle under the count is grey, there is no vote registered for you; if the triangle is a solid black, your vote has been registered.

Ah yes, I forgot to dim the room lighting, turn up the monitor brightness, tilt my head slightly, and adjust the angle of my progressive lenses to a precise -5.5 degrees so I could spot the change of the few pixels from gray to black.

Randy Chevrier

smayer97 said:

Actually, there is a subtle way to know...if the little triangle under the count is grey, there is no vote registered for you; if the triangle is a solid black, your vote has been registered.

And if I understand UI guidelines at all, isn't a dimmed item indicate there is no action possible on that item? So this icon indicator is backwards. It should dim AFTER the vote not before the vote. 

smayer97

Randy Chevrier said:

smayer97 said:

Actually, there is a subtle way to know...if the little triangle under the count is grey, there is no vote registered for you; if the triangle is a solid black, your vote has been registered.

And if I understand UI guidelines at all, isn't a dimmed item indicate there is no action possible on that item? So this icon indicator is backwards. It should dim AFTER the vote not before the vote. 

The WHOLE way that votes are tracked and visible is poor anyway. And there are bigger problems yet still, like some votes cannot be cast until they fix a bug that prevents IDEA threads that do not have a status of NEW or NO STATUS from being voted on.... welcome to this wonderful new forum.

swisskent

I would like to see the Sales Tax Keyboard Shortcut, that was in Quicken 2007, added back into Quicken for Mac. This feature would save so much time for manual Transaction entry - esp. with Splits.

The feature would work this way: In a Transaction Amount, enter a value (e.g. $-10.50); press a designated Keyboard Shortcut (e.g. "T") to automatically add in Sales Tax (e.g. 8.31%).

In this example, Amount $10.50 + Sales Tax $0.87 = Total $11.37. The user would simply enter the Amount of $10.50, and then press "T". The Amount would change to $11.37.

The Sales Tax Rate could simply be stored in Quicken's Preference settings as a global variable. Users could update the Sales Tax Rate at any time.

jacobs

@swisskent The absence of this Quicken 2007 feature in the modern Quicken Mac has been a lament of many of us longtime Quicken Mac users since the new generation program was launched five years ago. Click here to see the existing thread on this topic, and, importantly, to add your vote for it. (To vote, find the blue box after the first post, and click on the little gray arrow to see the vote count increase.) With 100 "legacy votes" -- votes for this idea on the previous forum platform -- and 8 at current count on this site since February, this idea is getting into the number of votes where hopefully the developers won't be able to ignore it too much longer.

smali

In Quicken 2007, we could set up our own keyboard shortcuts. We used to be able to configure many of the shortcut keys, and I set the "t" to be my local sales tax rate, so all I had to do was type "t" when entering an amount and it would automatically add the tax amount to it. Now, I have to use the built in calculator and type "*1.0725 =" for each entry I want to add sales tax to.

ryland5

I have been a Mac Quicken user since 1993. It's been an extremely valuable tool for me and our family. It's been a bumpy road and I miss being able to buy the stand alone program in Lui of the subscription model. But one of the biggest things that I miss on a daily basis is the QuickMath functions. I seriously used this daily as I entered the receipts from all of our bills and purchases. Mostly to deal with sales tax. Not only mine but the two neighboring states that vary slightly but are easily accessible for us to purchase from. Not only that but sometimes I would make the functions work when splitting out a transaction amount categories or purchasers for sale items (ex. 30% or 40% off your total purchase) PLEASE bring this back!! Or teach me where it is hidden in this newest version. Customers use things that are most friendly and I think this does a lot for ease of use, time saving, less frustration. Thank you for considering :-) *If I knew how to vote for this add - I would and so would so many others

jacobs

@ryland5 and others who want to see this feature: go to the first page of this thread, scroll down a little until you see the blue box at the bottom of the first post. Click the little gray triangle under the counter and after a second you should see the counter go up by one.

The total count for this idea includes 103 "legacy votes" (as it says in the title) which are votes for the idea when this forum was hosted on a different platform prior to the current one. So the total votes, as of the time I'm writing this, are 103 + 33 = 136. 

CyborgOne

Whoa - I'm very confused: I just updated, and saw the note regarding 6.7.1 fixes. The first line indicates:

• FIXED - Fixed insertion behavior with the QuickMath calculator when using the ‘=’ sign.

…so I was initially very happy, thinking that this feature had been quietly (re-)added in the recent past!

BUT, I'm disappointed to report that this assertion appears to be a complete lie: I can (still) not find ANY "QuickMath" functionality in Quicken for Mac at all. Why would such an item be listed in the Release Notes, if it's (still) a missing feature?

Are they now erroneously conflating "basic math operations" with the long-overdue "QuickMath" feature? This situation now might be even more frustrating, if this sorely lacking feature request might possibly be closed as "Oh, we already handle that" (no - no, you do not!).

jacobs

@CybergOne You're just misunderstanding their terminology. The recent release note refers to the mini-calculator which pops up in amount fields. There was a bug introduced in version 6.7.0 where pressing the equal sign would enter the last value entered rather than the result of the calculation. Version 6.7.1 fixes this bug. And that's a good thing, not a bad thing.

You're correct that this is not the same as the functionality called "QuickMath" from the legacy Quicken 2007 application — a feature many of us longtime users are still eagerly hoping to see implemented in modern Quicken Mac — but I don't think anyone is trying to lie about it. The release note refers to fixing a bug, not an entirely new feature in Quicken Mac. I have had previous offline conversations with members of the development team, and I can say that they do indeed understand the old QuickMath feature — and users' desire for it. I know it had been planned for development at least once in the past and got bumped for things they considered a higher priority. I am cautiously optimistic that they may have it back on the roadmap for later this year. As you likely know, the developers almost never pre-announce features before they are released, so we're left to wait and hope. Only time will tell. 

CyborgOne

Thanks, @jacobs  - I greatly appreciate your response.

I agree that it's wonderful that they fixed an existing issue, but it's troubling that they identified the feature as "QuickMath" - when that term has been clearly used for the Quicken 2007-era functionality which is still missing. And, I recognize that I should not have used the term "lie" - that was overly-argumentative of me, as this appears to simply be a confusing bit of nomenclature. But, I wish the terminology used would be consistent, and that a fix to the "built-in calculator" would simply have been identified as such, rather than misleadingly using the known term for an omitted feature.

And, I'm glad to hear that you have spoken to the development team, and that there may be some light at the end of the tunnel regarding this feature's reappearance in the (near?) future. Every time it takes me 10 keystrokes to perform a simple calculation which was previously performed with a single QuickMath macro keystroke, it's incredibly frustrating. I - and others - will continue to hold out hope that this, and other significant quality-of-life improvements, will be prioritized and implemented in the near future, 

jon857

Same old dinosaur in mid-2022. This can't be that major of a software improvement to not by included in one of the flashy but useless upgrades that are being consistently rolled out.

jacobs

jon857 said:

...one of the flashy but useless upgrades that are being consistently rolled out.

@jon857 One person's "useless" is the answer to some other person's prayers. I don't find the recent upgrades to be useless. For instance, I appreciate my investment Portfolio view now showing a more accurate breakdown by asset class; it was previously pretty useless to me as a mutual fund investor. The point is simply that there are hundreds of feature requests users have put forth to the developers, and not every one is goofing to be valuable to each user. that said, I'm an outspoken user in this thread advocating for the development of some equivalent of the old Quick Math functionality in the modern Quicken Mac, and remain optimistic that it will show up one of these days.

qmac_scott

A very long time ago, a version of quicken that I used had a setting in preferences where you entered your sales tax rate, and then when entering any amount in the register you could follow it up by pressing the t key and it automatically added the tax amount. I would love this feature back since typing "* 1.0xxx" is a pain (our tax rate has 2 decimal places). Thank you!

qmac_scott

@Quicken Marcus it's been about 4-6 years since you replied to this and it seems at the time you misunderstood the request. Is this something that can be considered again? The important part here being a single keystroke that performs a predefined calculation on any given numerical entry. In my situation I would use t for sales tax addition. Thank you very much!!!

jacobs

@qmac_scott @Quicken Marcus is no longer the product manager for Quicken Mac. (He still works at Quicken, but not on Quicken Mac.) @Quicken Victoria is now the Quicken Mac product manager. But I can tell you that I did have a conversation with Marcus subsequent to his post at the beginning of this thread, and he did understand the request for QuickMath functionality. Where this sits on the development team's roadmap is something the folks at Quicken very rarely divulge. Unless @Quicken Victoria chooses to do so here, we're all left waiting for this to rise to the top of the priority list. 

qmac_scott

Thank you for the information, @jacobs !

Randy Chevrier

So @jacobs and/or @QuickenVictoria (a user name I can NOT get inserted here!) … how would one (or a group) get an issue to “rise to the top”? This feature is like an iPhone in 2005 for most users. They don’t know they want it but after they get it they will wonder how they lived without it. And for the rest of us we agonize EVERY TIME we create a split and want to calculate the tax on that split portion of the transaction. It’s so frustrating.