Is there a way to convert a category summary report to spending cloud?

GBA123

If not, I would like to see this feature. thanks.

Boatnmaniac

I am not familiar with what a "spending cloud" is.  Please elaborate.

jacobs

@GBA123 There is a Spending Cloud option under Reports > Other Reports > Spending Cloud. Is that what you're looking for?

This report is a carry-over from the 2010-era Quicken Essentials program which provided the foundation for the current Quicken Mac. It hasn't been updated, so it has limited configuration options for fine-tuning it. I never see people talk about using it, and I've actually figured it would go away at some point, as the reports with the generic gray icon grouped under "Other Reports" all seem slated for disappearance. I don't see much value of a spending cloud, so I'd be interested in hearing why you find such a feature useful.

@Boatnmaniac A "word cloud" is a graphic which has the word in a document in alphabetical order but with each word sized larger or smaller in relation to how frequently it appears. In Quicken's case, a "spending cloud" does this with categories, showing all used categories in alphabetic order (or frequency order, or spending amount order), with the font size larger the more spending there is in that category. I don't find it particularly useful because it only has about four font sizes, so the distinctions are not very helpful, at least to me. I don't want os share my data here, but I can post an image from the original Quicken Essentials version which is pretty much identical today (except it's aesthetically worse, as it's minus any semblance of color):

Boatnmaniac

jacobs said:

@Boatnmaniac A "word cloud" is a graphic which has the word in a document in alphabetical order but with each word sized larger or smaller in relation to how frequently it appears. In Quicken's case, a "spending cloud" does this with categories, showing all used categories in alphabetic order (or frequency order, or spending amount order), with the font size larger the more spending there is in that category. I don't find it particularly useful because it only has about four font sizes, so the distinctions are not very helpful, at least to me. I don't want os share my data here, but I can post an image from the original Quicken Essentials version which is pretty much identical today (except it's aesthetically worse, as it's minus any semblance of color):

Thanks for the explanation.  Quite helpful.  I don't think QW has anything like this.  I prefer the way QW shows spending report graphs with the biggest spend categories shown in the graph legend at the top and also showing the actual spend summaries.  I know some people prefer visuals vs details but to me I relate better to details.  To each his/her own.

GBA123

Thanks. I see I actually made a word cloud last year and you're right it's not that helpful. is there a way to toggle from the normal report format to the graph. Is that available in QM? thx

jacobs

GBA123 said:

is there a way to toggle from the normal report format to the graph. Is that available in QM? thx

Do you mean to toggle between the Spending Cloud report and a Category Summary (or other) report? No, there's no "toggle", because each is a separate report, with its own configurable settings (date range, accounts, categories, etc.). But since each report opens in its own window, you "toggle" between them just by switching which window is in the foreground. 

GBA123

Thanks.