Abstract: Methods, systems and articles of manufacture for efficiently calculating an electronic tax return, such as within a tax return preparation system. A computerized tax return preparation system accesses taxpayer-specific tax data from a shared data store. The system executes a tax calculation engine configured to perform a plurality of tax calculations based on a tax calculation graph and the taxpayer-specific tax data from the shared data store. The system is configured to perform only the calculations in the tax calculation graph which are changed by new taxpayer-specific tax data received since the preceding tax calculation executed by the tax calculation engine. The system may also determine whether the new taxpayer-specific tax data does, or does not change the calculated tax return and the reason why.

Abstract: A computer-implemented method for generating explanations for a tax calculation or operation performed by tax preparation software is disclosed. A computing device executes a tax calculation engine in connection with the tax preparation software and operates on a tax calculation graph to perform a tax calculation. The tax calculation graph semantically describes data dependent tax operations comprising functional nodes connected to input nodes by one of a plurality of functions, wherein each tax operation is associated with one or more explanations. An explanation engine is executed to generate a narrative explanation from the one or more explanations associated with one of the tax operations and is presented to the user on the computing device.

Abstract: A computer-implemented method for generating explanations for a tax calculation or operation performed by tax preparation software is disclosed. A computing device executes a tax calculation engine in connection with the tax preparation software and operates on a tax calculation graph to perform a tax calculation. The tax calculation graph semantically describes data dependent tax operations comprising functional nodes connected to input nodes by one of a plurality of functions, wherein each tax operation is associated with one or more explanations. An explanation engine is executed to generate a narrative explanation from the one or more explanations associated with one of the tax operations and is presented to the user on the computing device.