AccInABox
=========

Welcome to AccInABox, a general business/accounting package written in Python.

This name may need a bit of explanation. "Acc" is an accountant. "Box" 
is the computer. You can set the system up with various rules and 
parameters, and then leave your staff to operate it without supervision. The 
program acts as your accountant, and will control what the staff can and 
cannot do.

Requirements
============

It assumes that you have Python 3.9 or greater installed on your system.

In order to use it, you need a database. There are three options -

* For single-user or demonstration purposes, you can use the sqlite3 database
    bundled with Python. Just create a directory to store your data, and supply
    the full path to the directory when prompted by init.py (see below).

* MS Sql Server 2005 or greater.
    If you use this, you must install the package 'pyodbc'.

* PostgreSQL version 9 or greater.
    If you use this, you must install the package 'psycopg2'.

In addition, you must install the package 'lxml'.

Setup
=====

To start, run the program 'init.py'.

It will ask you which database you are using. Depending on the answer,
    it will ask for the information needed to connect to the database.

The program runs a web server, which allows you to connect to it from any
    internet browser. init.py will prompt you for a host address and port
    number. The program will use this when starting the server.

There will be a small delay while init.py populates the database with setup data.

To run the program, run 'start.py'.

To access it, connect to it using any browser. It will prompt you for a user id
    and password. The defaults are 'admin' and 'admin'.