Why did Intuit stop allowing export of data in QIF

Unknown

I just learned that I am locked into Q2019Mac since there is no way in 2-3 yrs to export my data in QIF format if I want to change to another app--do I mis-understand?

smayer97

Unfortunately, that is correct. That said, there are a few alternatives (not great):

• You can copy and paste all your transactions in a register to wherever you want
• using reports, you can export data to CSV format
• not sure if there are any applications that can handle this but you can export to QXF file format (normally reserved to transferring to another copy of Quicken).

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

smayer97

smayer97 (QM2007, CDN user since '92) said:

Unfortunately, that is correct. That said, there are a few alternatives (not great):

• You can copy and paste all your transactions in a register to wherever you want
• using reports, you can export data to CSV format
• not sure if there are any applications that can handle this but you can export to QXF file format (normally reserved to transferring to another copy of Quicken).

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

Oh, BTW, Intuit no longer owns Quicken, as Quicken is its own company as of April 2016 (though it still uses Intuit for some online functionality).

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

mshiggins

smayer97 (QM2007, CDN user since '92) said:

Unfortunately, that is correct. That said, there are a few alternatives (not great):

• You can copy and paste all your transactions in a register to wherever you want
• using reports, you can export data to CSV format
• not sure if there are any applications that can handle this but you can export to QXF file format (normally reserved to transferring to another copy of Quicken).

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

Is there any suggestion to make a better export method available?

J_Mike

QMac register transactions can be exported to CSV format files (File > Export > Register...........).
There are CSV to QIF converters available.
You can still get there.

RickO

I will add this: Quicken's internal data format is not secret or proprietary. It is an SQLite database. Another software company could program their app to extract the data and import it into their format. I'm not saying it would be easy, but it could be done. It would be up to the other program to work this out.

smayer97

smayer97 (QM2007, CDN user since '92) said:

Unfortunately, that is correct. That said, there are a few alternatives (not great):

• You can copy and paste all your transactions in a register to wherever you want
• using reports, you can export data to CSV format
• not sure if there are any applications that can handle this but you can export to QXF file format (normally reserved to transferring to another copy of Quicken).

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

No. There was some very recent discussion about it with Quicken Marcus (product manager) starting here: 
https://getsatisfaction.com/quickencommunity/topics/quicken-for-mac-subscription-v5-9-released?topic...

but no one has raised a request beyond restoring the QMTF or improving the QXF format here:
Add Ability to Select Content of QXF File for Export

I guess the question would be, what format?

mshiggins

smayer97 (QM2007, CDN user since '92) said:

Unfortunately, that is correct. That said, there are a few alternatives (not great):

• You can copy and paste all your transactions in a register to wherever you want
• using reports, you can export data to CSV format
• not sure if there are any applications that can handle this but you can export to QXF file format (normally reserved to transferring to another copy of Quicken).

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

QIF would be a good start.

mshiggins

RickO said:

I will add this: Quicken's internal data format is not secret or proprietary. It is an SQLite database. Another software company could program their app to extract the data and import it into their format. I'm not saying it would be easy, but it could be done. It would be up to the other program to work this out.

Is the data structure known?

RickO

RickO said:

I will add this: Quicken's internal data format is not secret or proprietary. It is an SQLite database. Another software company could program their app to extract the data and import it into their format. I'm not saying it would be easy, but it could be done. It would be up to the other program to work this out.

It can be gleaned from the open SQLite database. Note: only applies to Mac version. I have no idea what Win version uses under the covers.

smayer97

smayer97 (QM2007, CDN user since '92) said:

Unfortunately, that is correct. That said, there are a few alternatives (not great):

• You can copy and paste all your transactions in a register to wherever you want
• using reports, you can export data to CSV format
• not sure if there are any applications that can handle this but you can export to QXF file format (normally reserved to transferring to another copy of Quicken).

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

That's the obvious answer...but all I see are statements that QUicken is moving away from that, for whatever reasons.

mshiggins

RickO said:

I will add this: Quicken's internal data format is not secret or proprietary. It is an SQLite database. Another software company could program their app to extract the data and import it into their format. I'm not saying it would be easy, but it could be done. It would be up to the other program to work this out.

So one can do SQL queries on the QMac database?

jacobs

RickO said:

I will add this: Quicken's internal data format is not secret or proprietary. It is an SQLite database. Another software company could program their app to extract the data and import it into their format. I'm not saying it would be easy, but it could be done. It would be up to the other program to work this out.

Sure, if you know enough to muck around in there, and want to risk doing something which could mess up your data file if you do something wrong. But for read-only purposes, you could do it if you could piece together the structure of the database.

mshiggins

RickO said:

I will add this: Quicken's internal data format is not secret or proprietary. It is an SQLite database. Another software company could program their app to extract the data and import it into their format. I'm not saying it would be easy, but it could be done. It would be up to the other program to work this out.

Thanks for the info.

bball629

RickO said:

I will add this: Quicken's internal data format is not secret or proprietary. It is an SQLite database. Another software company could program their app to extract the data and import it into their format. I'm not saying it would be easy, but it could be done. It would be up to the other program to work this out.

Would you know where to find the SQLite database on Windows? I can't seem to find any .db or .sqlite files anywhere in my quicken files or in the program files folder.

smayer97

bball629 said:

RickO said:

I will add this: Quicken's internal data format is not secret or proprietary. It is an SQLite database. Another software company could program their app to extract the data and import it into their format. I'm not saying it would be easy, but it could be done. It would be up to the other program to work this out.

Would you know where to find the SQLite database on Windows? I can't seem to find any .db or .sqlite files anywhere in my quicken files or in the program files folder.

The above statement only applies to QMac, as this discussion thread is about QMac.

But regarding QWin, it does not use a SQLite database.