Why is my edited budget not saved?

megnmac

I edited my budget to delete unused categories, and clicked save. The budget appeared exactly the same as before it was edited.

megnmac

Using Quicken for Mac 6.01

jacobs

@megnmac  I'm not seeing this when I make edits to my budget.

Let's first make sure we're on the same page…

• You open your budget
• You click Edit Budget
• On that Edit Budget screen, you click Select Categories in the bottom left
• In the pop-up list of categories, you uncheck some of them (just pick one or two for the purposes of testing)
• Click Okay. At this point, you're back on the Edit Budget screen. Are the categories you unchecked in fact absent here?
• If so, then click the Save button in the bottom right of the Edit Budget screen. At this point, are the categories you unchecked absent here?
• Try clicking on an account in the left sidebar, then come back to Budget. Are your deleted categories still gone?
• Now quit Quicken, then relaunch, and open the budget; are your deleted categories still gone?

Assuming it works this time, then the question is what happened previously. That's hard to answer. One thought: do you just have one budget? It's relatively easy to inadvertently duplicate a budget -- Duplicate Budget and Editor Budget are adjoining lines on the Budget menu.

The only other oddity with saving I can think of is if your data file is residing on a cloud storage service, like Dropbox or iCloud. If your file is in Quicken's default location (in you're Library folder), that's not the case, but if you moved it to your Desktop or Documents folder, you may be intentionally or unintentionally having those folders stored in the cloud -- and odd things are know to happen when Quicken's data file is in the cloud instead of rooted on your desktop Mac. 

megnmac

Thanks for your response. When I return to the Edit Budget screen, the categories are still there. I don't use Dropbox, but I do use iCloud, although I didn't think I had saved it there. Is there a way to find out where stray copies might reside? I was able to edit the Reports categories without difficulty, and want to use the same categories for a budget.

megnmac

I checked iCloud - the backups for Quicken2017 are there in the documents folder. I tried putting them in the trash, but the budget categories did not change. Any suggestions?

jacobs

So are you saying that from the Edit Budget screen, you click Select Categories, uncheck one, click Okay, and the category you just unchecked remains on the Edit Budget screen? I can't reproduce that, and I can't even think of what could cause that.  

megnmac

That's right. Budgets have never worked for me - I had hoped they were improved. Reports work just fine, so I try to adapt a report to budget.

jacobs

Hmmm… it makes no sense to me that editing a category in your edit budget screen is just ignored.

Can we go back to where your Quicken file is stored, just to see if that can be ruled out? Go to Quicken Preferences > General and check the box for "Show file name in title bar". Then Command-click on the red Q in the title bar, to the left of your filename. Does the dropdown which appears show:
   Your data file name
   Documents
   Quicken
   Application Support
   Library
   [your home folder]
   Users

That's the default location Quicken uses for data files. You don't need to have your file there, though. (If your data file is located somewhere in your Documents folder, and if you have your macOS preference set to store Desktop and Documents folders on iCloud, that might be responsible for some oddities.)

megnmac

If my home folder is "apple", yes.

jacobs

Sorry, I don't understand your reply. Are you referring to the name of your user home folder? The location of your Quicken data file? What exactly do you see when you Command-click on the Q icon as I asked above? 

megnmac

Tucker4.quicken > documents > Quicken > App Support > Library > Apple > Users > Macintosh HD > Apple's iMac G5

jacobs

Gotcha! So that answers the question of whether your Quicken data file is stored on iCloud; it appears it is not.

The next thing I might try is creating a new budget, at least for testing purposes. Select Budgets > New Budget and let Quicken create a new budget. Edit the budget, select categories, delete a category or two, and see if they disappear as expected from the Edit Budget screen, and then when you save that, the main budget screen.

megnmac

I did that after your earlier reply, but I'll try again. The categories I am trying to get rid of date before 2007, so have been through many new versions. I have backups up the wazoo - do you think it would help if I deleted some of the old ones?

megnmac

When I go too the edit screen the changes I made are still there, but if I click OK to go to the budget page they haven't changed.

jacobs

On the Select Categories window, you click the blue OK button. Then the Edit Budget screen should refresh to reflect the categories you changed. Now you must click the white "Save" button in the lower right of this Edit Budget screen. "Save" returns you to the main budget screen -- and you're clicking Save and seeing the categories you removed still showing up?

I just haven't been able to replicate this erroneous behavior.

Have you tried with a category that has no subcategories, and deleting a subcategory of a category with multiple subcategories? I'm just trying to suggest different things that might give a clue what's going on. 

megnmac

The edit screen still shows the changes I made initially, but when I click OK there are no changes to the screen that is showing, so if I click save I'm saving a budget without the edited changes.

jacobs

Sorry, you lost me again.

There are three screens involved: the main Budget screen, the Edit Budget sheet, and the Select Categories to Budget window. Let me try again using that precise terminology…

From the main Budget screen, you click Edit Budget to open the Edit Budget sheet. From the Edit Budget sheet, you click the Select Categories button to open the Select Categories to Budget window.

After you make a change in the categories in the Select Categories to Budget window, you click the blue OK button to save those changes. This returns you to the Edit Budget sheet, where you say you see the change in categories reflected. From here, you click the white Save button to save the changes and return to the main budget screen. 

You've twice said you're clicking on an OK button, not the Save button. The only OK button is in the Select Categories to Budget window, and you've already clicked that to close the window, right? So I'm thinking there must be something different between what I'm saying and what you're seeing/doing.

megnmac

I started again from scratch and tried selecting all categories, not just used, and unchecked all categories I didn't want. I think that solved the problem. I thought I did that initially, but maybe I didn't. Those categories must have been there before 2007 - I thought they were long gone since they weren't in the reports. Thank you for your patience, I appreciate the help

jacobs

So glad to hear you got over the hump!