BizCalc v1.1 ~~~~~~~~~~~~ BizCalc may be freely redistributed. Enjoy and pass it around with all the documentation files. This program is based on MortCalc, which was published on Fred Fish disk no. 385. I changed the name because some users thought that it was only for mortgage loans. Enter BizCalc, the do-it-all loan calculator! The original set of equations (enhanced to support periods less than a month) comes from an AmigaBasic demo signed by Amiga grand master Jim Butterfield. For the Table to screen option, I used the code of Teks, Pierre Baillargeon's compact and yet user-friendly file reader. Iconify routine is from Leo Schwab, "the guy in the cape". Compiled with Aztec 3.6a. WARNING ~~~~~~~ The author of this program shall not be held responsible for any lost incurred by users. Please don't blame me if some day your house is repossessed! :^) OPERATION ~~~~~~~~~ -from the CLI: BizCalc [-option -option ...] BizCalc ? This help screen Options: (where N is an integer or decimal value) -pN Principal N (decimal or integer) -rN Rate N -lN Length N (months) -bN Balance N -cN Compounded every N months (default: 1 ; Canada, 6) -nN N payments/year (default: 12) -f Change the default language from english to french -u Send unformated data (6 decimals, not rounded) to standard output (CLI). Can be redirected to the printer with the command line: BizCalc >PRT: -u. Why so many CLI options? So that you can run with your own values from a directory utility like DiskMaster, SID, etc. Please note that "1w" and "2w" must be used for compounding periods less than one month. Example: 1> bizcalc -l48 -n52 -c1w -from the Workbench: just double click on the icon. See PRESELECTION. Standard icon.library and mathieee.library are required; boot form a standard Workbench. Version 1.2, 1.3 and 2.0 are O.K. BUTTONS AND BOXES ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ If you are fluent with Amigese, run BizCalc right away and read this doc later for the fine points. Select the operation you want to do (the unknown value to calculate) by clicking in one of the buttons at the left (CAPITAL, RATE, LENGTH, BALANCE or PAYMENT). The amortization LENGTH is the length of the loan. The selected button stays highlighted and the message box confirms your selection. At startup, BizCalc will compute the monthly payments for the figures displayed in the value boxes (PAYMENT selected). To change a known value, select a box by clicking in it and edit the digits with the keyboard or the keypad (DEL, Backspace and the left and right cursor keys work the usual way). You may click CALCULATE anytime. [RETURN] is not needed to enter a value; however, it places the cursor in the next box. Also click CALCULATE whenever you loose the cursor. To clear a box, you may use the Right Amiga X combination (press X while holding down the right fancy A key). Clearing a box just makes room to enter a new value; to really change a value in memory, you have to click CALCULATE. This button enters all the displayed figures and the result is highlighted by the cursor in the selected value box. Clicking on the CALCULATE button updates the display and formats the output with $, %, etc. The value boxes accept any character but will read in only digits and decimal points. Naturally, any non-numerical entry may generate an error message. When the RATE and BALANCE are computed, errors messages may be displayed if out-of-limits conditions are encountered. The INTEREST box shows the cumulative interest amount paid. This is the only box that doesn't accept a direct input; this value is updated each time a new payment is calculated. The PRINT button gets you a hard copy of all the values. This short list is different from the "Table to the printer" menu option. CAUTION: BizCalc will hang and wait if this option is selected while the printer is not on line. This option is incompatible with the "Table to file" option. The "Compounded every" and "Number of payments/year" value boxes allow direct entry of integers or decimals values. This is the "expert" mode for those who know what they are doing. In a nutshell, in the U.S.A., mortgage loans are compounded monthly, but semiannually in Canada (every 6 months). There are no such legal restrictions for personal loans; for instance, a weekly loan (52 payments/year) will normally be compounded weekly (1w). If you don't feel ready for the expert mode, you might as well use the ">>>" buttons to select the correct values. Thus, BizCalc will accept "1w" for 0.2307692, which is the compounding factor for weekly loans. Or you may use the "Type of Loan" menu, which automatically puts the correct value in the "Compounded every" box, but only for mortgage loans, U.S.A. or Canada. Then, if the "Number of payments/year" is not 12, use the ">>>" buttons to set it. To Iconify, click the upper right pictogram; you can move the icon around. To restore the display, double-click the icon. To QUIT, hit the Close button in the upper left corner of the BizCalc window, or use the Project menu option. MENUS ~~~~~ Project Menu: Info help screen, Author's address, Calculate and Quit commands. Keyboard shortcuts: Right Amiga I, A and C. Amortization Table Menu: Click to toggle an option on or off *To Screen: Displays the list of all the payments in a small window. The computing of the amortization table may take some time, especially if the number of periods is over 100 (weekly loans, for instance). You can scroll up or down the list with the proportional button to the right, with the up and down arrow keys or by clicking up or down in the small window. Memory is allocated dynamically, so BizCalc multitasks nicely with other applications. *To Printer Outputs a summary of the values and the complete table. It is advisable to check the list on the screen first. *To File Saves in the current directory the summary and the complete table in a file whose name defaults to BCalc.lst. Works in append mode; all the tables are joined one after the other if the file name is unchanged. This is handy to update permanent files or if you change one or more factor some year, like a lump sum payment on the anniversary of the loan. To change the path or file name, edit the file name displayed in the message box, for example: "dh0:finances/my_loan_table.lst", to save your file in the Finance drawer of dh0:. IMPORTANT: Type [RETURN] to enter the new file name. Type of Loan Menu: Canada option in the Mortgage submenu will change the default U.S.A. monthly compounding to legal canadian semiannually compounding. The correct value is dispayed in the "Compounded every" box. With the startup values, PAYMENT is $132.15 (USA) and $131.04 (Canada). BizCalc values have been verified with annuity tables and are very reliable. If you have a weekly or biweekly loan, then use the ">>>" button to set the "Number of payments/year" box to 52 or 26 weeks, respectively. SHORT CUTS ~~~~~~~~~~ To clear a box, you may use the Right Amiga "X" combination (press X while holding down the right fancy A key). The Right-Amiga "Q" combination undoes any change and gives you a second chance. All the value boxes (exept LENGTH) need digits only, so you don't have to enter any comma, $ or % ; CALCULATE does that for you. As for the LENGTH box, it uses any non-digit character(s) to separate 2 integer fields (years and months). So, the following entries are equivalent: 10 yrs 2 mo. 10 ans 2 mois 10/2 0y122 (122 months is 10 years and 2 months) The years field is mandatory, but the months field is optional. Please note that the LENGTH box accepts integers only. All the other boxes take both integer and decimal values. BizCalc rejects negative values. You may operate BizCalc without the mouse if you use the arrow keys within a box and the key to move from box to box. Place the mouse pointer on CALCULATE and simultaneously press Left Alt and Left Amiga to simulate a mouse click... CAUTION: The Right-Amiga C keyborad shortcut works as indicated, but a small bug eats up the cursor. Type Left Arrow to get it back without changing anything else. I didn't squash that bug because it has a handy side effect: the cursor will come back in the starting box instead of in the results box. Some users may actually prefer that. This shows quite appropriately that one man's bug may be another man's feature. ROAD TEST ~~~~~~~~~ BizCalc can do a lot of things besides calculating your instalments. For instance, using the startup values, you may want to know how long it would take to pay the capital if the payments were set at $150. To find out, select the LENGTH box (unknown value), then edit the PAYMENT value box to $150.00 and click CALCULATE. You may wish to know the balance on a loan after, say, one year. Just select BALANCE as the unknown value and enter 1 in the LENGTH box. For lump sum payments, find the BALANCE at that date and subtract the lump sum amount. Then go on with these new values. Watch out for asymptotic values or else, you may have to pay your mortgage for the whole eternity. For instance, select LENGTH as the unknown value and try to increment the CAPITAL until you get an error message (which will show up when the LENGTH exceeds 9999 months!). You will find out that at some point just before the error message, a difference of one miserable dollar in the principal adds *years* of payments. If you add fractions of cent (say $0.003) to the PAYMENT, you may notice an increment of a few dollars in CAPITAL. The rounding off of figures also explains why you may have in few cents left (or see a minus sign) in BALANCE when the amortization LENGTH is over. Use the CLI -u option (unformatted) if you need a precision of six decimals. BizCalc gives you all the figures you need to shop for a mortgage. You no longer have to take for granted everything your loan agent tells you, and you may even teach him a trick or two. PRESELECTION OF DEFAULT VALUES ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ You may change some startup values by editing the Tool Types box of the icon (Workbench ICON menu item). CAN=1 and FR=1 will change the defaults options to Canada and French, respectively. Delete these entries to get the default values (USA and English). Invisible language selection is a welcome feature in a small world like ours. You may use the same tool to change the default startup values. For instance, typing in CAPITAL=44832.44, RATE=11.75, LENGHT=134, BALANCE=4000, COMP=2w, NPY=26 will start BizCalc with these values. Notes: LENGTH has to be in months 1w must be used for "one week", and 2w for "two weeks" Lower/upper CASE are important! AGITPROP ~~~~~~~~ The next version of BizCalc will incorporate a lot of new features, like a complete set of help screens, file manipulation options, an Arp file requester to load and save config files, a file reader, amortization tables with actual calendar dates and more. This version is available to registered BizCalc users only. So, if you use BizCals regularly, do yourself a favor and order BizCalc Professional by sending $15 to: Michel Laliberté 875 Dollard Outremont, Québec H3V 3G8 Canada Any comment is welcome.