Install guide
About five minutes, once. Your computer warns about any program from a small maker it has not seen before; the steps below say exactly what it shows and what to click.
Windows
- Open the file you downloaded, the one ending in
Setup.exe(in Downloads, or at the bottom or top of your browser). - A blue box says Windows protected your PC. Click More info, then Run anyway. It asks only this once.
- The installer asks where to put it and whether you want a desktop shortcut; the choices it offers are fine. It needs no administrator password. Click Install, then Finish.
- It opens by itself the first time; afterwards, open Irish Personal ALM from the Start menu or the desktop.
- A black window appears with a few lines of text, and then your browser opens on the program. The black window is the program running: leave it open while you use it, and close it when you are done.
Mac
- Open the file you downloaded, the one ending in
.dmg. A window shows the app and your Applications folder: drag the app onto Applications. - Open Applications and double-click Irish Personal ALM. The Mac says it cannot check it for malicious software (or that it is from an unidentified developer). Click Done or OK.
- Open System Settings, then Privacy & Security. Scroll down to the line about Irish Personal ALM and click Open Anyway, then Open Anyway again and your password if asked. It asks only this once.
- A Terminal window opens with a few lines of text, and then your browser opens on the program. The Terminal window is the program running: leave it open while you use it, and close it when you are done.
Using it
- Enter your figures. The program opens on a form: you and anyone you share your finances with, your pay, pensions, savings, property and spending. Each box says what it is for.
- See the plan. The plan as it stands appears first; the changes it works out for you follow a little later on Your plans.
- Try a change. Move a slider and every page shows what it does.
- Keep the files. Client brief, in the menu, opens the plan in a few pages: print it or save it as a PDF. Under For checking, the verification pack opens the same way, with its data file to download for a spreadsheet.
- Save your figures from the form, to open them again another day.
The trial and the licence
Everything works for 30 days from the first time you open it; a line at the top of the page says how many days are left, and the brief and the pack say they were made in a trial. After that the program shows your computer's licence ID, 32 letters and numbers. To keep using it, email that ID to , and paste the licence that comes back into the box on the same page. The program checks it on your computer; nothing is sent anywhere.