Help wiki
How Kabacus works.
The application manual: step-by-step workflows, accounting rules, worked examples and administrator reference. Start with local books, or go straight to the task you need.
Start here
About this manual and implementation status
What this manual covers, which interface to use, and where behavior is still planned.
A worked household example
Follow income, reserves, a card purchase, a payment and reimbursement without counting money twice.
Glossary and accounting signs
The words, balances and identifiers used throughout Kabacus.
Save copies, back up and recover
Protect local books and browser storage, and know what history can recover.
Getting started
Install Kabacus, make your first books and record a first transaction.
Books, files and windows
What a set of books is, how files and windows work, and why money is exact.
Everyday use
Accounts and their kinds
How Kabacus decides what an account is from its name.
Recording and changing transactions
The Add chooser, previews, editing in place, voiding and conflicts.
Cash on Hand
What you can spend right now, and how it is worked out.
Reserves
Setting money aside for later, releasing it and moving it between reserves.
Credit cards
Card reserves, purchases, payments and one-revision fixes.
Loans and mortgages
Loan accounts, and how principal is reported.
People and shared expenses
Receivables, payables, splitting costs and statements.
Reports
The reports and what they count.
Reconcile an account
Check an account against a statement and lock in the agreement.
Activity and history
Revisions, who made them, diffs and reading the books as they were.
Beyond the window
Command-line reference
Common read and write commands, exit codes and revision-aware scripts.
Import and export
Bring hledger journals in and take the books out.
The web app and PWA
The same app in a browser or as a desktop shell, and how it differs.
On a phone
Tabs, the Add sheet and recording with the keypad.
Keyboard shortcuts and languages
Keys in the KDE app and the web app, and the languages offered.
Command line and MCP assistants
kabacus-cli, scripts, and letting an AI assistant work on your books.
Reference
Amounts, balancing and validation
Exact money, declarations, missing amounts, costs, dates and balance assertions.
Journal import compatibility
What survives an hledger import, what is reported and what stops it.
Troubleshooting and warning reference
Resolve shortfalls, conflicting edits, mismatched reserves and connection problems.
Running a server
Server configuration and operations
Storage, HTTPS, authentication, rule reloads and recovery for operators.
Running kabacus-server
Shared books over an HTTP API, the web app and an MCP endpoint.
Signing in and roles
OAuth 2.0 / OpenID Connect, roles and how apps and assistants sign in.