Starting & Stopping The BasicBooks General Ledger

As originally shipped the the BasicBooks General Ledger program is called, "BBGL". You may rename the the BasicBooks General Ledger program if you wish, however this manual assumes you have not renamed the program and will refer to the BasicBooks General Ledger hereafter as ``BBGL''.

• If this is the first time you have run BBGL change to the directory (folder) where you want to be each time you run the BasicBooks General Ledger for this company. This can be either your home directory or, any other directory you have created for this company's data. However, remember that you must be located in this same directory each time you run BBGL in order to access this company's data.
• BBGL will automatically create a new sub-directory named, ``codata.d'' in your current directory the first time BBGL is run in this directory. ``codata.d'' will contain the files needed to allow you to manage companies and run The BasicBooks General Ledger. Only general information (name, address, telephone, etc.) about the companies you use will be stored under the ``codata.d'' directory. All the actual accounting data is stored in the company's Postgres database files.
• If this is not the first time you have run BBGL make sure you are located in the same directory where codata.d was created. If not, change ( cd ) to this directory.
• To start BBGL simply enter "BBGL" from the terminal command line (or in the "Run" window). (You may also wish to create a launcher button/icon on a menu panel.)

Since the BasicBooks General Ledger is designed to keep books for more than one entity you must select the company you wish to work on each time you start the BasicBooks General Ledger. After selecting the company, if the company already exists, the Main Menu screen will appear and you may make selections from the menu bar at the top. Each Main Menu item has a series of drop down sub-menus which are exposed when the Main Menu topic is clicked. For an explanation of these sub-topics and functions see the rest of this manual. Select the sub-menu items by clicking on the desired selection. If the company does not exist you will be given an opportunity to create a new company.

To quit the BasicBooks General Ledger move the mouse to the top menu bar and select;

• File -> Quit , or click the destroy 'X' in the upper right corner.