Directive

A directive is any dated entry in a Beancount file. Unlike Ledger, where directives are optional configuration, Beancount treats everything as a directive — transactions, account openings, balance assertions, price entries, and metadata all follow the same pattern: a date followed by a directive type.

Core directives:

• open — declares an account. Accounts can’t be used before they’re opened.
• close — closes an account. No postings are allowed after this date.
• txn (or *) — a transaction with balanced postings.
• balance — asserts that an account’s balance equals a specific amount on a date.
• pad — inserts an automatic balancing entry between two accounts.
• price — records a commodity price for a given date.
• note — attaches a text note to an account on a date.
• document — links a file (receipt, statement) to an account on a date.
• event — records a life event (e.g., address change) for tracking purposes.
• commodity — declares and configures a commodity.

The strict directive model means Beancount rejects anything it doesn’t recognize, which catches typos and formatting errors at parse time rather than silently ignoring them.