Narrowed Access

Since the introduction of backup and restore features, the add-on needs (read-only) access to your Google Drive files in order to find and read a backup file for a restoration. The scope of this access was restricted, but also meant (read-only) access to any Google Drive file.

This version now makes use of a non-sensitive scope, where the add-on only has access to the backup files it creates, and files you select with the Google Picker. The name of the permission will be changing from "See and download all your Google Drive files" to "See, edit, create, and delete only the specific Google Drive files you use with this app".

But this version also requires a new permission called "Connect to an external service". This permission allows an add-on to connect and read or write data to any external service, including outside of Google. While not ideal, the add-on will use that permission as a workaround until a Google Drive API bug (324994855) is fixed. The permission and workaround are used only to read your backup file during a restore process.

Summary

• Reduce access to your Google Drive files.

  • Then: See and download all your Google Drive files

  • Now: See, edit, create, and delete only the specific Google Drive files you use with this app

• Require new permission "Connect to an external service".

• Drop support to non-encrypted backups.

• Raise minimum password length from 8 to 12 characters for backups.

• Backstage code improvements.

Fresh New Look

Introducing a new freshly unified table for all your accounts and cards! Your wallet and all accounts and cards go under the same table now. You can work with all your statements in the same page and use the Sheets filter to narrow down your search! This new layout brings along improved performance and maintainability!

Follow-up Year

This release makes it easier to setup a follow-up year: similar to copying a budget sheet, a follow-up increments the financial year and forward cards installments. It should be handy by the end of the year!

Bug fixes, improvements, and small tweaks were bundled in this release as well.

Bug fixes, improvements, and small tweaks in preparation for the next features.

Your Tags Categories

• Define your own set of categories for tags! You can add up to 64 different categories for the tags. Open the categories editor in Budget n Sheets > Open panel > Tagging.

• A new analytics sheet for tags is available! Import it now at Budget n Sheets > Open panel > BnS Gallery and select "Tags by Category. Don't forget to mark the checkboxes in Tags!

• The analytics sheet "Stats for Tags" is temporarily unavailable while it is updated to support variable categories of tags.

• The analytics sheet "Filter by Tag" had minor improvements. More are coming soon.

• Backups include your custom tags categories.

• Bug fixes and improvements.

Colors For Cards

Now you can pick a color for your cards! This should make it easier to spot by color the many card entries in your annotations. The add-on also has a fresh look in some sidebars and dialogs.

This release brings improvements and a fresh set of pipes for the upcoming features.

In this release, the charset for codes of tags and cards is no longer restricted to a - z, A - Z, 0 - 9. You can use any character - except whitespaces.

Added Flexibility And Better Passwords

• You can make further changes to the settings and choose which accounts you would like to copy from another spreadsheet or restore from a backup. Do you need to start fresh? Give it a try! Open a new spreadsheet, click Budget n Sheets > Start budget sheet > Copy your data. Select your "to-be-retired" budget spreadsheet, then change the settings and accounts to your like.

• The password policy was really (really) bad... No more policy: a password strength calculator is in place to help you use only strong passwords!

For our technically-inclined users, learn about the tool we use to calculate password strength, called zxcvbn.

A Few Stops

The sheet Quick Actions for mobile apps was deprecated.

The option to transfer the admin role to a new owner was deprecated. You can create a backup of the budget spreadsheet and let the new admin restore it in a new spreadsheet.

Pave The Way

This minor release doesn't bring new features. Instead, it will be focused on improving and revamping the code while we pave the way for the next features.

Suggested Description

Now it is easier to find a description for your transaction: this release allows the spreadsheet to suggest a description for the transactions. The suggestion is based on the previous description: - it is a simple list of previous descriptions already used - there is no analytics or IA.

Improvements, fixes, privacy

• The Privacy Policy has been updated: we've removed the anonymized Usage Statistics.

• You can change the financial year in a restore process.

• In addition to formatting the whole table, the tool Format table now can format a selected range within a table.

• Bug fixes and improvements.

Encrypted Backups

This release adds encryption to backups: when you request a backup of your budget spreadsheet, you must make a password to encrypt the backup file before the add-on send it to you. You use the same password to restore the backup to a new spreadsheet.

It is strongly recommended that you use a password manager to generate and store unique, random passwords for each backup. If you lose your password, you will not be able to restore the backup.

Budget n Sheets is utilizing the AES implementation from Stanford Javascript Crypto Library (SJCL).

In addition to the encrypted backup, you should regularly check your Google account's recent activity, take steps to secure it, and check your budget spreadsheet sharing options are correct.

New Restore Method

We're introducing a new option to start a budget spreadsheet: Copy your data. You can use this option to copy all transactions, data, and settings from an existing budget spreadsheet into a new one. This option is handy if your current budget spreadsheet is somehow messed up and you need a new and clean budget spreadsheet.

This option is compatible with budget spreadsheets at version v0.36.4 or later.

Developer Metadata

Version v0.36.4 of Budget n Sheets introduces the use of Developer Metadata: it allows the add-on to access and modify (add, edit and remove) metadata (small pieces of information) to the spreadsheet. It also allows the add-on to access and modify metadata from other spreadsheets. The metadata is not in use to track the user. Instead, it will be used in the next feature "Copy your data.

The budget spreadsheet details and settings stored in metadata are:

• Financial year

• Initial month

• Financial calendar

• Number of accounts

• Accounts

• Cards

• Budget n Sheets signature

The information listed above is stored with limited visibility as well: only the add-on can access and modify the metadata. The add-on doesn't allow other add-ons and scripts to access it either, and the add-on does not access metadata other than its own.

The Developer Metadata was introduced as part of the next feature "Copy your data: this option allows you to select an existing budget spreadsheet in the setup process. At the end of the spreadsheet build, the add-on automatically copies all transactions, accounts, cards, tags, and settings to the new spreadsheet.

Overview

This version of Budget n Sheets is introducing a handy new feature: backup and restore! In short, you can backup all transactions and settings of a budget spreadsheet in a file. The archive is then attached to an email and sent from you to yourself - more in detail below. To restore the backup, upload the archive to your Google Drive and create a new spreadsheet. In the setup process, there is now the options to "Set up as new" and "Restore your data.

Now, because the restoration process needs access to your Google Drive, the add-on will require your re-authorization to run. At first, this sounds like a big "NO, but the section "Access to Your Google Drive" below explains "how" and "when" the add-on will be accessing your Drive and how Google reviews the scope of permissions to protect users data.

Another new feature is "decimal places": you can choose how many decimals places to format the numbers automatically. For example, in regions where the currency doesn't have decimals places, the numbers are formatted as "$0" instead of "$0.00".

The add-on is also migrating from the Rhino to the V8 runtime: it translates into more performance and enhanced reliability for the users!

Access to Your Google Drive

OAuth client verification

Update 2020-12-08: The OAuth App Verification is now complete.

Permission to access your Drive is something Budget n Sheets didn't have - or needed - so far. With its introduction in Backup and Restore, the add-on must go (again) through OAuth client verification by Google. This process typically takes 2-3 business days. In the meantime, the add-on re-authorization will show a "This app isn't verified" warning message: you can wait for the verification before re-authorizing the add-on.

How and when

To be more specific, the access is limited to read-only since the add-on doesn't need to modify anything in your Drive. The add-on only accesses your Drive when you are starting a new budget sheet and select "Restore your data. Then, the add-on starts Google Picker to list only files that you own. Once a file is selected, the add-on tests if it is a Budget n Sheets backup, its integrity, and finally shows a summary of its contents.

Privacy-friendly

As a continued compromise with your privacy, the source code of the add-on is up-to-date in the GitHub directory. The add-on only accesses your Drive when it needs to and only files that you own.

Although the add-on could save the backup directly in your Drive, it was preferred to follow a less invasive approach by emailing it to you.

The add-on sidebars and dialogs run in a sandbox to protect users from being served malicious HTML or JavaScript. Because of that, you can't download the archive from the add-on, so it is emailed to yourself instead while, at the same time, dismissing the need for third-party services to deliver the file. This way also keep all your data contained and secured within your Google account.

Decimal Places

During the start of a new budget spreadsheet, you can choose how many decimals places the numbers should be formatted. You can change this option later in the Settings sidebar.

Rhino to V8 runtime

The Google Apple Script support for the V8 runtime was announced by Google back in February 2020. The V8 runtime brings enhanced performance and reliability and takes advantage of modern JavaScript advantages.

The Budget n Sheets' script migration from Rhino to V8 runtime wasn't straight forward: there were a few incompatibilities (now fixed), and V8 itself had a few hiccups at the time. While V8 is enabled from now on, many changes are coming to Budget n Sheets to take full advantage of it!

Backup and Restore

The Backup and Restore feature is an ongoing project for Budget n Sheets. In this release, the add-on can archive all the spreadsheet data in a file, and you can restore it later. That is one way to do it, and it is available right away.

The other way is to select an existing budget spreadsheet during the setup of a new one, so the add-on automatically copies all data to the new one. That last option is coming in a future release.

Regarding the restore from a file, you need to upload it to your Google Drive and start a new budget sheet - you can't import data from a backup into an existing budget spreadsheet.

Backup

You can create backups as long as the add-on is active in the spreadsheet and you are the admin of the spreadsheet.

To create a backup, click Add-ons > Budget n Sheets > Change settings > Backup. Click the "Back up now" button to start a backup.

A backup contains the following data:

• transactions from Jan, ..., Dec,

• transactions from Cards,

• all your tags from Tags,

• accounts and cards information,

• add-on settings.

All the data is encoded and archived in a file. Then, it is attached to an email that is sent from you to yourself. Notice here that "Send email as you" is part of the scope of permissions for Budget n Sheets, and the name of the sender will appear as "Add-on Budget n Sheets.

The approach of using your email to email yourself was chosen to avoid relying on third-party services to simply send a file.

Now, a few important notes regarding your backup file:

• It is NOT encrypted! So keep your Google account secured.

• The backup is a text file, and changing its content can impact the integrity and corrupt it.

Restore

You can restore a backup as long as you are the owner of the spreadsheet. You can only restore backups in a new spreadsheet.

To restore a backup:

1. Upload your backup to your Google Drive account.

2. Create a new spreadsheet.

3. Click Add-ons > Budget n Sheets > Start budget sheet.

4. In the "Let's get started" section, select "Restore your data.

5. In the "Restore from backup" dialog, click the button "Select backup.

6. Use the Google Picker to locate and select your file.

7. Review the summary of the backup and click "Restore.

In this release, the Summary chart now shows the average income and expenses in a line so you can review how each month is performed compared to the average. Now, the coming months that are still not accounted for in the stats are greyed out.

Other small changes are:

• Added a "Support" section to the Quickstart.

• The Accounts & Cards panel now shows account details in the listing.

• In counting the number of bank transactions, parentheses were replaced with brackets in the table header.

This release introduces an optimized spreadsheet load by suspending recalculations of months old activities.

Optimized Spreadsheet Load

The budget spreadsheet has to recalculate everything whenever you open it. The time the recalculation takes to finish depends on the specs of the budget spreadsheet, like the number of accounts, cards, and tags, and it only increases as the year goes on because of the increasing amount of the data from each month.

Since months old activities (month sheets, cards, and cash flow tables) tend to be less and less revised, the recalculation on open becomes unnecessary. To cut this burden, the add-on is now replacing the functions behind those (re)calculations with a static value.

• The replacement occurs during the monthly maintenance and only for 3+ months old data.

• The "Optimize spreadsheet load" setting is disabled for existing budget spreadsheets; it is enabled for new spreadsheets. The setting can be changed in the Settings sidebar.

• You can always restore the recalculation whenever you need to revise a previous month's activity: select a month sheet and click Add-on > Budget n Sheets > More > Resume month.

Blank Value

In previous versions, everything within a table range would be processed by the many functions and tools of the add-on. Every filled row in a table would be included in the accounting, regardless of blank rows between two statements. The tool Format table would sort everything within a table as well. On the other hand, the tool Update cash flow would stop at the first row with a blank cell in the column value, so any remaining filled rows were not posted in the Cash Flow. This lack of standard can potentially lead to confusion and damn the add-on with unexpected behavior.

From now on, a row with a blank cell in the value column indicates the "end" of the table. This change brings a few advantages and flexibility when updating the budget sheet.

"Migrating" to the new format

All of your budget sheets built with the add-on will be automatically updated. You can manually update the spreadsheet in Add-ons > Budget n Sheets > About the add-on.

Now, run through every table in the spreadsheet and look for any blank cell left in the value column. If there is a blank cell and the rows below are meant to be accounted, simply add a 0 (zero) in the cell. See the example below.

"New" tools

The new rule also applies to the tools Format table and Update cash flow: they stop reading the rows at the first blank cell. To make sure the desired rows are processed, move the rows upward and fill the rows between the statements with a 0 (zero) in the value column.

Tips and tricks

This new rule allows you to quickly review what the balance, expenses, and stats were like before the entry of new statements. Simply delete the value of the first new statement entered. See the example below.