OK, so the plug-in is functional, but by no means done. It is, however, done enough that I can show a progress chart here.

Without further ado, I present a chart of my past two months progress towards my goals of 2008, followed by a summary of the results.

As of February 29, 2008, I have made small steps towards most of my goals for the year. One goal has made a great leap towards completion, though not through spending or receiving money.

1. Eliminate credit card debt. Out of the original balance of $9352, I now carry a balance of $8853, a 5.34% reduction. By the end of next week, much of this will be transferred to a low, fixed rate on transfers card, which will allow more significant progress.
2. Eliminate other debt. While I didn’t have any snowflaking money in February, I still reduced it by another $100, thanks to making my regular payment. This brings it down to $826 from the original $1043, 20.81% progress. I look forward to realizing the $300 drop this month, due to snowflaking in birthday money.
3. Increase Cash to $1000. Well, instead of increasing cash, I managed to decrease it to$150, but fluctuation is expected. As I continue to work on my budgeting and saving skills, this should stop fluctuating and start continuously going up.
4. Increase retirement by a total of $2247. I began the year at $1521 and have successfully brought it up to $1895, a total change of 16.64% of the desired increase.
5. Increase stocks by $117, from $283 to $400. Though I’ve added about $20 to my account since the beginning of the year, the value has taken such a hit that as of the end of the month, it was at $283, a 0% change. Note: In January, the value went down. I have decided that negative overall progress will simply be 0% progress.
6. Purchase $200 worth of savings bonds. In January, I had found out that I had a $50 EE bond and said I wasn’t counting it towards my goal. Despite that, I overstated my progress at 25%, when it should have been (and still is) 12.5%. Now that I have realized my mistake, I also realize that I need to schedule a few more purchases to meet this goal, since I originally set up 4 purchases of $25 each in electronic I bonds.
7. Increase my net worth by $13995. Thanks to revaluing my car, I am now at 40.1% of this goal. This is a one time thing, so don’t expect it to rise rapidly again until I start my new job (a couple upcoming interviews).

In a nutshell, it would appear that I am doing rather pathetically. But as always, I remember that I am also looking to improve my income, on which total success or partial failure hinges.

Just in the nick of time.

Previously I had stated that I was going to run my finances more like a business and created “Articles of Incorporation” to formalize it. Today is March 15, 2008 and I humbly present my February 2008 Current Report.

You’ll notice that I have simply put my Net Worth as the value of Stockholders’ Equity. As I work to understand how to prepare financial statements, I hope to figure out how to have the total be net worth and incorporate values such as retained earnings.

Stay tuned for goal analysis later today.

I’ve finished my plug-in for personal use, but not for general availability.

I want to create an admin interface for it, but I have to read uncommented code to figure out how to set everything up. For now, all it does is replace a URL enclosed in a pair of tags.

I suppose I could release it in current form, but I want to be able to use the database for data storage, rather than static text files. I also want the interface to allow people to define the charts without ever having to go to the associated website to learn the “language” of the chart. I’ll keep thinking on this, meanwhile trying to post a bit more regularly.