MultiCharts: Trading Software for Automated Trading and Backtesting

janus

steven, if you need to run an application outside of MC, all you have to do is build a small DLL stub that executes it. MC can then call the DLL, which in turn calls the .exe. If you need to pass information to the application then that can be done too. If you need to return information back from th...

janus

look up the function

Text_Float

What

Yet another useful but undocumented feature? I'm still using 5.5 so I hope 6.0 has a more comprehensive and up to date list of supported commands on PLEditor. Does it?

janus

Generally, signals and indicators are calculated the same way. However there are few nuances, such as the fact that there can be several signals in a strategy and, if all of them use plot1, it becomes not very clear, who will plot what. We don't have any issues running multiple indicator studies so...

janus

However, you can use the TL_new command for drawing trendlines. It covers some of the plotting ground:

Thanks kiasom but that's what I do sometimes already when I need to draw lines. This brings up another point. If we can draw trend lines in signal studies why not plot lines as well?

janus

Thanks Dave. I look forward to the 64-bit version. I don't understand why there should be a difference in the calculations. After all, don't we all expect them to be the same given we rely on the signal to behave the same way as the indicator? If there are differences in the calculations then it mak...

janus

Can someone please explain why plotting is not allowed in a signal study? I've been developing indicators as a function so I can call the same function in an indicator study for plotting, and a signal study for trading. On the face of it it appears silly to load two studies instead of one every time...

janus

If you compare EasyLanguage to other programming languages, you will find that a simple routine in EasyLanguage would usually require multiple more lines of codes in other languages. So EasyLanguage is truely easy in trading languages. It depends on what the programmer is trying to achieve. I can p...

janus

I have forwarded your suggestions to the developers. Could you please give us an example of such custom buttons? My pleasure. What I mean by custom buttons is to allow a programmer to act upon the status of the button to perform something in the study. This frees up the programmer to add other func...

janus

I was never a math enthusiastic so I apologise for this question :roll: : Can we multiply by 0.333333 instead of divide by 3 . I want to avoid the division by zero error, and since I'm multiplying by a fixed value, I was hoping that this could resolve the problem. How does this avoid the division b...

janus

As I alluded to before with my example of PV~Wave vs IDL, I look forward to a greater separation between TS and MC. Let each go their own way. Competition is good. Time will tell if I stay with MC but for now I'm very pleased overall. Sure I've complained a few times but then nothing is perfect. I l...

janus

Why must we connect via live chat for you guys to "clean" the database ? Why can't you guys either put up instructions or release a utility for us to manage it ourselves ? thanks Good question. I'm sure some of us have managed databases before. I've managed Oracle on HP-Unix, DB2 on IBM Mainframes,...

janus

I didn't realise that EasyLanguage compatibility was meant to be such an important issue. Of course there has to be a major break at some stage. I've seen this happen before with a package called PV~Wave. Another company spun off called IDL and used exactly the same language at the start. Then each ...

janus

Hi Guys, Strategy Trader and MultiCharts are different products and will have different manual order capabilities. So please don’t send ST comments to us. It is better to send them to FXCM. We are completing MC 6 and anticipating manual trading features this September-October. Thanks Andrew for cle...

janus

Yes, I already knew all that. I saw the FXCM logo on the MCFX section of MC's website. Doesn't answer my questions though. Is the FXCM website associated with another company? Or is MCFX and FXCM one and the same solutions?

janus

What gives here? Is there now another company about to offer these new features with MC but TSS is not including these features with MC 6.0? Confused. Let me guess. Because Forex trading is heavily reliant on real-time manual trading with snapshot decisions, the need for manual ordering was a high p...

janus

I don't see what is the big deal. With Interactive Brokers' BookTrader, I can fit the DOM, entry buttons, quotes, logs, P/L and Portfolio all in the same real estate ! There is even an option for volume@price histogram on the ladder. I can enter/exit orders with the buttons, or simply click on the ...

janus

I see. Looking forward to seeing manual trading added to the next release of MC.

janus

They have listened to this suggestion too but like yours is on some kind of "to do list".
http://www.fxcm.com/lp-strategy-trader-beta.html monitor on the left!

Sorry, but I fail to see your point. Please explain.

janus

Yes, they have listened to your suggestion but they haven't implemented it yet. Hopefully they will soon to catch up with competing products. Before they do they need to implement my suggestion for simple order entries/exits, which I discussed here: http://forum.tssupport.com/viewtopic.php?t=6159&st...

janus

Janus,

I know I am a bad case of unrealistic thinker

Perhaps, but you mean well, which is more the pity. Shame that TSS don't listen more to people like you.

janus

The solution clearly is to leave in place everything that's here, and simply add separate, unmanaged order entry capabilities for those who want to be "on their own" in managing their own orders, so that for instance orders can be used in loops and are handled more like a "print" statement is, rath...

janus

These suggestions are all good. Others and I could list many more. However, there's one major problem. TSS do not have the resources to do any of this in short order, let alone the majority of them. MC has great potential but lacks development resources. Just look at past posts that have asked for v...

janus

Sounds like you have a problem. I do get the same problem but very rarely - perhaps once a month - and I do re-loads many times during the week.

janus

That's odd. HDMS is for the historical as distinct from the real-time data feed. It only comes up when you do something like a re-load in MC. After a few minutes the feed is disconnected. I do get a message like the one below when this happens: TWS warning message: Id= -1; code= 2107; description= H...

janus

I have found this: http://www.symmetricom.com/resources/do ... /symmtime/

accurate and reliable. It also has a nice and useful display of clocks for different time zones - essential for those who trade on different exchanges around the world.

janus

That's interesting about resolutions and size. I was considering buying a couple or more of 40" TVs that have DVI input as they are dirt cheap compared to PC Monitors of the same size. Now, I'm going to stick to PC monitors. Bit of history: back in my younger days at work around 25 years ago I used ...

janus

I agree. this is a low priority feature. There are many other feature requests that are far more important, and should be implemented first.

janus

You read my mind. I was thinking of the exact same issues for some time. I have a couple of studies that are applied to multiple charts with different time frames. The studies should run in a specific sequence to be effective but since there's no way to make this so I've resorted to a number of tric...

janus

How well do the built-in MC global variable functions (GVSetNamedInt, etc.) work when multiple studies run simultaneously on multi-core/threaded PCs? Are they written such that one can't read and and write to the same global variable at the same time (using I presume one of MS's built-in synchroniza...

janus

That's odd. I'm sure I noticed in the past that if you execute multiple orders in a single bar (or even tick if IOG is on and update on each tick is enabled) MC simplifies them into one resultant order. I could be wrong though.

janus

Tempers appear to be escalating here. I'm not surprised as I believe it's partly related to the market action, which looks scary. Anyway, the point I like to make is there is no such thing as a perfectly bug free application. Those who made a living out of programming know this is a fact only too we...

janus

What!!!! Yet more hidden keywords? Is "initialcapital" documented in 6.0? Or do we have to resort to TS documentation to supplement the pathetically outdated documentation that's available for 5.5?

janus

Another examples (screenshots + videos) that TSS may find inspirational for the planned manual orders feature: http://www.whselfinvest.com/en/f_plateforme_trading_futures_boursicoter.php Some nice features like auto bid, auto ask, sell / buy on the toolbar, trendline stops, etc. Yes, there are many...

janus

What I discovered about series functions is that if you have a work variable defined only in that function it will store that work field such that you can go back in time with the square brackets. The RSI function relies on this. Yes, that's the purpose of a series function. I don't think there's a...

janus

Can someone please confirm the following is correct? I'm passing a numeric array to a function, which is defined as NumericArrayRef so I can modify certain elements while in the function. It appears I can also reference any element in the array in the past using something like: array[3][2], which me...

janus

If that fixes the problem then I'm very disappointed. Although most PC users have that setting to 0 for backward compatibility, that setting is required only for 16-bit applications. Are you saying that MC is not all 32-bit compliant?

janus

Same. Every now and then I just try things to see if they work (break didn't use too). Full patch notes and updated documentation save users time. (Oh and a comprehensive outstanding bugs database). :D The main reason I don't actively beta test nowadays. Agree all the way Nick; including being a be...

janus

I've started using 64 bit hardware around 20 or so years ago (DEC and HP) but they were expensive back then. Now it's becoming common place. Let's hope MC fully utilizes the 64 bit architecture in the not too distant future.

janus

What you describe Janus sounds good. Looking forward to it. I think everyone knows it will get better (including MC too). I suppose we can use the usual "head in the sand" approach and just wait for PCs to get much faster and not worry about the "feature" in question. That should be fine for most c...

janus

It also may depend on the data provider. IB for example will sometimes provide different historical OHLCV values to the real-time ones. In the case of V the differences can be huge. They recognize this but ignore to fix it. So, when you run your study in real-time, then run it again after re-loading...

janus

Welcome to the 21st Century of 64-bit computing and cheap multi-GB memory PCs. Very soon we will have standard PCs with 100+ GB RAM as standard running super fast. Storing 10 years of 1 minute data in memory will not be an issue, that's for sure. In fact, with just the 64-bit systems now available t...

janus

Part of the issue is I have lots of advanced programming experience. So, "features" like "max number of bars study will reference" are more of a restriction to me given the type of studies I develop. I've become accustomed to it for now but I do sense that it's preventing a lot of other users coming...

janus

8000!!! That's a lot of bars not being used for plotting from the start. My "max number of bars study will reference" typically is 3000 or so. Still too much.

OK, it looks like I'm alone on this one.

janus

I just found out if I use the plot function with a very large offset, the study will do its usual thing and re-run the study. Before anyone says, well just set the "max number of bars study will reference" to a sufficiently large number and it will be fine; I can't. The simple reason is the offset c...

janus

I've confused you. I'm referring to real-time trading only, you are discussing back testing, which as we all know will never produce the same results, and as far as I'm concerned is near enough for all but the very active scalp traders.

janus

- in real-time "buy next bar at market" will get whatever fill the market provides - it doesn't wait for the next bar to end or even begin - it simply sends the order when the current bar closes. If the platform supported "buy this bar at close" it would do the exact same thing - both would send th...

janus

Thanks, very interesting reading. Haven't read all of it yet but what I've seen so far makes me think I should avoid NT. I agree with your statement: there's no perfect trading platform for everyone. If there were one everyone would be using it, right? A common theme is users agree MC has a long way...

janus

Yes, please post me the links. Thanks.

janus

Some attention? It needs a complete rewrite. One of the major bugs is the corrupted undo feature. If MS Word has the same bug and refused to fix it for many years, MS would have been sued for billions for lost productivity and everyone would have moved to another product. Now I noticed another bug. ...

janus

Well, and we simply need to remind TSS to add these to the help with search on the forum as a stopgap, as I'm sure we can all agree the peer support forum shouldn't be the primary documentation. Agree on the first and last point but not the second point. I am shocked to find out that I've been igno...

janus

so what happens often is that the minute bars built in real-time from the arriving tick data don't precisely match the minute bars delivered historically because the data feeds typically clean up and apply corrections to the historical data a lot more than they can clean up the real-time arriving t...

janus

I would recommend you break up the 6000+ lines of code into various functions. It would make the code far more readable and easier to debug.

By the way, I have found the PLEditor to contain several bugs and deficiencies, some of which I've posted before. It needs to be rewritten from scratch.

janus

Thanks Andrew. I hope this discovery has prompted a review of the rest of the PowerLanguage order commands to ensure they are recognised by the automation functions. It will need more than a review to fix the totally alien approach that MC (and TS, and perhaps some other platforms) deals with order...

janus

Provided one has all the necessary information, which is possible with MC, there is no reason why we can't have a true "at market" order type. If the information is not available then it should be anyway since the whole point of any ATS is to take over manual trading.

janus

That's all understandable but it doesn't prevent MC implementing a true "at market" order for those if us who are prepared to use it despite some of the issues. After all, someone trading manually would be disgusted with a platform that prevented them from submitting an "at market" order no matter h...

janus

Regarding TS, I don't think the "this bar at close" terminology is particularly encouraged - in fact I would say it's fairly actively discouraged for the reasons described above, and it's still in there only because they didn't want to orphan legacy code that uses it. I think it's fair to say they ...

janus

Using a fresh copy of tws working directory didn't help. Still have the problem with "use server timestamps" turned on. Now turned if off and all OK again. So, it appears attempting to use the IB gateway has nothing to do with it.

janus

** I DID try the gateway over the weekend(MC wouldn't connect to it, even after changing the port), I didn't think it could be related, now I wonder. Mine did work but as I posted before I prefer the full tws. Now I will rename the jts.ini and try again with "use server timestamps turned" on to see...

janus

So far I'm not having any problems since switching off "use server timestamps". If I do have problems again I will try your suggestion (although just renaming the jts.ini file has worked for me in the past with other problems - for example I tried the VPN option to play with but tws stopped working ...

janus

- just because they're connected to different data feed servers via dns round robin. I hope they are using something better than the standard DNS round robin approach. They should be using dual load balancing hardware to provide both more accurate load balancing and redundancy. Also, the DNS round ...

janus

Have you used the IB gateway recently for the first time? I did and wondering if it's something to do with that. You could rename the jts.ini file to force tws to create a new one to see if it helps.

janus

*** Turns out my database was corrupted and I had to replace it with a backup from last week, took about 6 restarts of TWS to get all of the history back, because of the irritating TWS pacing violation errors. Everything seems to be ok now. I still believe the TWS upgrade was at fault, as I had no ...

janus

Bruce is a valuable contributor to this forum and there is a lot to learn from his detailed explanations. Every one is entitled to his/her opinion but it should never get to personal attacks. I think forum moderator/administrator should step in and ban members involved in personal attacks. I agree....

janus

I have experienced this "phenomenon". The trendline is not a "new" trendline, (ie not a trendline with a new ID) but an old trendline with a new end point. There must is a twilight zone in MC... if you happened to click on the chart during this "TL" zone, it will move the end point of a trendline t...

janus

Has anyone noticed this bug? I have a study that draws trend lines. When I move my cursor to certain points on the background, the mouse pointer changes from a arrow to a hand indicating there's an object there. However, there's nothing visible there. When I right click it tells me there's a trend l...

janus

The simple course of action is for MC to add a Color Transparent option (white, black, blue, red, transparent)... and then do whatever they need to do internally to just make it work :) That way you can paint each plot using Transparent as needed, like in the iff() statement inside the Plot() state...

janus

I need to be able to set a transparent plot. This is easy in NT but so far seems impossible in MultiCharts. Can't be done, not with solid lines anyway. I wanted this feature also for a long time. I managed to do it by juggling with a long list of plotn statements and setting each one to "right tick...

janus

moment.... when you activate a strategy, go to "settings: interactive brokers" now you can change the client ID an the port FOR THIS strategy. I think you can start 2 IB instances (paper and live) and give paper: port 7496, client-ID 0 live: port 7596, client-ID 1 I think it works! This must be a n...

janus

Okay...that is what I was afraid of. Thanks, Kevin I haven't tried it but you also need to clone the data source in QM to configure the other port number, and add the symbols you need via the cloned data source. Then there's the problem of clashes with symbols already present for the initial data s...

janus

Yes, I have one of those too. However, I haven't configured it. I may do so one day by subscribing to a second cable ISP. My 3G wireless is from the same ISP as my cable but it does provide some redundancy as I've noticed my cable go down once but the wireless was OK. No doubt it could happen to oth...

janus

Once MC has the ability to manually enter trades/monitor position/close position in coming releases, this may be less of an issue than it is today, although there will always be a desire to see the same information from multiple angles for reassurance and control. I can do all that now using my own...

janus

Perhaps, we can use IB Gateway to autotrade with MC in one computer to minimize the computer resources usage while we use the second IB login to turn on TWS in another computer to monitor / close position if necessary. Sa I run the full version of tws and have no problems with lack of resources. Of...

janus

OK, that makes two of us. Not enough to prove it IB's latest upgrade of tws is the cause but sure looks that way. ** I usually run new versions of TWS on my backup machine for a week or so, to be sure it's stable, this time unfortunately, I didn't. Me too. I haven't updated the other tws yet so bef...

janus

OK, that makes two of us. Not enough to prove it IB's latest upgrade of tws is the cause but sure looks that way.

janus

What time zone are you in? Could this be to do with some times of the day you are in a different date than IB is? I doubt the time zone makes any difference. It's been working fine for many months. I'll experiment some more on Monday. The other thing I've been doing is turning off the filter for ba...

janus

for IB data feed,
use server timestamps -> should be unchecked.

Why? I've been told by TSS I could turn it on to try and fix another issue I had (but didn't help).

janus

After updating to the latest IB tws today, I've noticed something odd with real-time updates. What I noticed is MC stopped collecting and displaying real-time data. So, I tried to run the previous version if tws but nothing came up - it appears to be broken. So, I rebooted my PC, then reset the IB s...

janus

Determining if a trend line intersects price is a simple matter of looking at the two end points, calculating the slope, and using the equation "y = m x + b" to figure out the trend line's price at each bar along the way, so you can compare with those bars' low/high range. There are very likely cod...

janus

Simply voting on forums to attract users will only backfire as they discover the same "smaller" issues and annoyances, and spread the word. So, to make MC more popular simply fix the "smaller" issues and annoyances in the first place

janus

try this... open 2 copies of the forum, and send PM from the 2nd copy. That may explain why I didn't get any responses to my messages. Surely though this has to be fixed. Or will this "small" bug remain at the bottom of the list forever along with all the others relating to MC as I discussed on ano...

janus

Regarding the implementation of hundreds of suggestions for minor improvements and minor bug fixes, no doubt these to some extent should be worked in along the way with each revision, as parts of the program are being revised, and as it makes sense in the context of ongoing efforts. Major bug fixes...

janus

That would be very useful. However, the other approach, which has been suggested before a couple of times at least is to have a time based trigger so that a study can be forced to run after a predetermined limit when an update tick was not received. Also, the study will have to know if this is the c...

janus

I'm not sure how accurate this report is. Now that these alleged critical issues are being exposed to the public, they need to be answered by TSS and if true fixed ASAP before any new feature is even discussed let alone implemented. Although not related to the above, I have encountered numerous anno...

janus

It should not require much to get it going. If you have trouble, you can change the default port from 4001 to TWS's default of 7496. Yes, that's the trick. I'm puzzled as to why they use 4001 for the API socket - must be a mistake. Anyway, I'll stick to using the full tws as I like to keep track of...

janus

More information here:

http://www.jurikres.com/down/Some%20Pro ... nguage.pdf

janus

We need to have a rectangle drawing feature. Any time soon? At the moment I'm using line segments but that's resource hungry. A rectangle drawing feature would also reduce the amount of code substantially. For completeness we should also have them for ellipse and arc, although I have no need of them...

janus

All so true. May I add that as computers get faster and faster, the optimizations of today become redundant tomorrow.

janus

Thank you for all you reply! I have also heard that avoiding the use of functions and programming them in the code help speedin up. Is that true? It depends if the function storage is Simple or Series. Simple makes negligible difference but Series can make a significant difference. 99% of my functi...

janus

If you have an "if" statement like this: if high > close[1] and close >= close[2] then begin and if the first test fails the code doesn't even bother to check for the second test. So, it's not necessary to have indented if ... then begin blocks, apart for making the code more readable if there's a l...

janus

But if ever comes the time that TSS engineers have nothing to do and are looking for potential bells and whistles, this can be the feature worth looking at with favourable eye. That's will never happen as they will always be busy. So, to overcome this dilemma, they should spend at least some time e...

janus

I agree; small change but nice feature to have. Also, provide an option to make the wick the same color as the body.

janus

Yep, this is the Qcharts method. If you are feeling a little crazy (frustraited) you can move the chart in circles and real fast too :D LOL the best time to do that is after a bad trade. Yes, but I actually believe it's the natural way to move an image around. That's how most image editing software...

janus

You can move the chart with the mouse by holding the space bar down and - left click in the chart and drag the mouse to move the chart horizontally - left click in the Y-scale and drag the mouse to move the chart vertically Thanks for that. It works fine. Still prefer the more intuitive approach bu...

janus

My vote is for every trick in the book. The more TSS can make MC convenient the better. Total agree. The sooner the better too so MC can become more popular. I fear that the longer they skirt around the various bugs and inconveniences the riskier it will become for them to remain a viable competito...

janus

We will just copy the list into the new thread so it becomes current again :). I keep updating it without much hope it will be implemented any time soon. If it grows large enough and the time is right, we might see some progress. I see. I'll wait until the new list started. I have over 17 recommend...

janus

I added it into the list of shortcuts: http://forum.tssupport.com/viewtopic.php?p=32030#32030

I thought 6.0 was frozen and is now undergoing final testing, which means no new features allowed. If so, we need a separate list for new features in the next version (7.0?).

janus

try this: http://www.freestockcharts.com/ the scrolling method is VERY intuitive. Yes, I saw that too and I like it too. However, I and I bet many others will be satisfied if MC just added the drag feature I described. In fact why not have both? It would be as intuitive as one could get. At the mom...

janus

I started using yet another tool and it's a luxury to use compared to MC. To scroll a chart all ones needs to do is drag it using the mouse in any direction (up, down, left, right, etc.) It's smooth and fast. MC needs to incorporate this feature ASAP.

janus

It doesn't work for me even on a 1 or 2 minute chart. It's just one of the many bugs in MC. After getting 6.0 out of the way, MC should spend at least little time purely focused on fixing the numerous bugs still sitting around. It's becoming annoying. I'll wait and see what 6.0 final is like.

janus

The cost of development license today is prohibitive. As a result, no advancement is being made. That being said, the free license is not an alternative also, because adding more users to the user's base will increase the demand for a tech support. The license figures mentioned in my previous post ...

janus

I think that we need to focus our attention on the 2nd licence, when used for development/beta tests. I agree. The point of the matter is if MC wants to maximize their development/beta testing user base to iron out as many of the bugs as possible in the least time to expedite the official release a...

janus

I would be extreemely happy if the scrolling speed in MC (using scroll lock) is increased.

I too would be very happy with that. At the moment it's very tiring to use MC for scrolling through historical data. It's as if MC was really designed for real-time traders only.

janus

Many times when i use the scroll bar at the bottom to move sideways, I lose track of where I am as it's too sensitive, especially with lots of data loaded. The arrows method that moves the chart sideways by one bar at a time is far too slow to be of any use in this cases. The page up/page down metho...

janus

When I hear ''two different streams'' or ''two different sources'', it makes me laugh. There is only one stream / source that the broker / data feed provider is given by and from the exchange!!! Actually, I was referring to the two data streams that are available from IB to all us "common folk". On...

janus

But, in short, IB is a little different than everybody else in that they don't treat 1 minute as a native type and instead will let you request bars of any arbitrary length such as 15 seconds, etc. and whatever you ask for, they combine the data they stored to make for you. It's in this process whe...

janus

When I plotted 1 min / 5 min / 10 min chart real-time based on OEC / Transact data) the bars would show some volume data. After closing MC and reopening it, the volume data on bars were different than the volume I had observed real-time on the same bars. I do not know the reason for this adjustment...

janus

The way IB's historical data works, it doesn't store "minute data" like a lot of data feeds do, but rather you tell IB you want "1 minute" as your interval, and it consults its own database of snapshots and combines them into group Now you confused me. MC stores three types of data - tick, 1 minute...

janus

This is very simple. Brokers and data feed providers filter ticks. I explained reasons on their end for filtering the ticks. I understand all that. So, what does MC do when it tries to plot a historical volume for a 1 minute chart? Does it request 1 minute snapshot data (if there is such a thing) f...

janus

As I understand it those who do require accurate historical volume data (and perhaps this relates to price as well) they download historical data from another source and replace the data in MC's database, and do this on a daily or weekly basis. I can't be bothered so I will put up with the mangled v...

janus

I do understand - I believe it to be more of a procedural problem as I said than an economic one in this case. What I suspect, although I don't speak for anyone but myself in this, is that they may possibly be in the predicament of being unable to change it very much short of a major version revisi...

janus

Remember, IB isn't a tick data feed. They have a problem, but it isn't the same as the problem Tresor is describing - IB's problem has to do with how snapshots are handled which is more of a long-standing "snafu", whereas Tresor is describing a capacity/economics problem resulting in the data feed ...

janus

This makes perfect sense. Yes, I mean they have been dropping ticks on purpose. You are missing the point. See my previous post. Also note that I've already discussed this with TSS support and they are in agreement with me that IB is doing something very wrong. In other words, it's as if they are d...

janus

In fast moving markets, brokers typically combine adjacent updates if the price is the same so that they don't send multiple updates per second, or in some cases, multiple bid/ask updates per last trade price when the bid/ask prices are still the same. I see. It doesn't explain the huge discrepanci...

janus

In my view the thing they most omit is real-time or historical updates to bid/ask sizes when the inside price hasn't changed (this is a common flaw when people try to code "pulled quote" type algorithms to attempt to detect fake-outs and manipulation, because they're not seeing every size update ty...

janus

(ii) incorrect volume data feed / filtered tick data feed that results in volume data being massacred. There are 2 reasons why filtered tick data is being provided by a broker: - its frontend would crash / would be sluggish if immense unfiltered data is connected to it; - a broker would need to inc...

janus

from my understanding, no data provider has the definitive claim to accuracy... :-( I know. However, a package I use that's provided by a bank displays the exact same volume in real-time and historical, and is the same as reported by the exchange. If they can do it so should so called professional ...

janus

Interesting to note that after scanning through the IB SMF forum that this problem had been recognized many times before over the past several years. So, to be blunt, don't trust IB's historical volume, and treat real-time volume with some care, which makes back testing using historical data pointle...

janus

I can understand occasional "simple" errors. No data provider is perfect. What I'm seeing with at least one contract is the volume displayed in MC in real-time on a minute chart around twice on average than that of the historical volume after I re-load the chart. During very quiet times such as as n...

janus

I appreciate your comments about IB's dilemma, and to a certain extent I agree. However, we are just talking about one thing here - volume, not a significant change in there ordering system or interface. I don't know how they calculate volume of contracts but I would have thought exchanges throughou...

janus

Another way of looking at it is IB should remain focused on providing a reliable, efficient, and fast order service. The specifics of the volume issue are secondary. Having said that, they should enter the 21st Century and fix it eventually. BTW, I have tried to discuss it with IB but it appears the...

janus

That's fine but one still has to do extra work to keep the limit order alive if it's not hit. I prefer it be kept on the queue at IB's end until one decides to cancel it. Anyway, as long as I know how it works I can program around it. That's what computers are for

janus

As far as I can tell, the limit orders are passed to IB on the next bar (or update if IntrabarOrderGeneration is turned on) and remain there until it's hit or the bar closes, whichever occurs first, unless if the study issues a subsequent limit order from the next bar. In that case if the first one ...

janus

Given there can be a huge difference between real-time volume and historical volume from IB due to the different ways they calculate the two, is there a way for a real-time study to retrieve the historical volume for just the current bar once that bar is completed? I suspect there isn't a way so I m...

janus

That is correct, and is exactly what I would do to check TWS for the limit order's arrival (I'm just tied up at the moment.) I'm tied up too, which is why I prompted the query as I expected someone would already know the answer. Someone might still respond but I will do the check later anyway to co...

janus

a 5 minute experiment should be able to quickly establish that.

I will try it later today. If it passes it to the broker, I should see the limit order on IB's API order management page, just like when I see my market orders there.

janus

You could, but because the limit order is in there first (before you detect it's hit) it might get you a fill faster and with a better price. It all depends on how MC handles the preset limit order. If it handles it internally then I don't think the difference would be significant. If on the other ...

janus

You should be able to do this fairly simply in EasyLanguage/PowerLanguage using an intrabar order generation strategy. Simply put the limit order in the market, and if the price is touched and you don't get a fill, convert it to a market order and keep restating it until you do get a fill. I'm a li...

janus

In QM, when I use the "Fields to collect..." menu option for a symbol and remove the tick in the tick box for the say Trade Tick, I find such data is still being collected. I delete all tick data, wait a while and see new tick data stored. I do not have any chart displayed for that symbol other than...

janus

Microsoft has released a number of time zone updates for Windows XP since the release of SP2. All applied a few weeks ago. It doesn't explain how it fixed itself though. It's still working fine. Perhaps I had to cycle the Exchanges & ECNs -> Time zone setting in QM as I explained to pick up the Mic...

janus

I would try to detect the divergence in time flow between ComputerTime and the (Date & Time of the current bar). The time difference when online will be consistent in the liquid market, subject to internet & data feed providers, and any bottlenecks in between. That's pretty much what I do already. ...

janus

Something very strange happened to me today. The chart of a symbol wasn't being updated in real-time despite the fact it was showing up fine on IB's tws screen. When I looked at the actual data in the database using QM, the timestamps were offset by 1 hour, only for today. This explained why it wasn...

janus

A more general capability that would permit a good data feed alert and that has been discussed somewhat elsewhere is simply timer operation. If the indicator gets a recalculation every X milliseconds, you can simply make note of how long it's been since you had a new trade tick, and if the data fee...

janus

I also has to change both of these to execute some code if BarStatus = 2 rather than the normal test. Each script is unique this way. It depends on the script. Some do not need these changes of course. That's exactly how I've been doing it for a long while. I also use it to sound an alarm if during...

janus

Is there a way for a study to detect whether MC is running in on-line or off-line mode? I'm referring to the choice one is given when starting up MC.

janus

It would need to be consistent with the way TS handles it or TS DLLs would be broken in general, and they're not. Does that make sense? I've done some tests and it appears float and double make no difference in MC. Also, please read what Andrew said here: http://forum.tssupport.com/viewtopic.php?t=...

janus

Does anyone know if the use of the float and double data types in front of a variable definition makes any difference to the data storage thereof in MC? In other words, does float v1(0) causes v1 to be allocated only 4 bytes of storage, while double v2(0) causes v2 to be allocated 8 bytes of storage...

janus

I seriously doubt there's a bug that's specific to only moving average strategies (unless it's improperly written, but that would not be in the category of a platform bug anymore, and we are told they said there was a "known issue) - to say there's a problem that only manifests in moving average st...

janus

so it's a sort of constant cat and mouse game as long as they have no direct support for logging in and programs like these have to identify the window, pretend to type in keystrokes, etc. I can understand the need to have an automatic login utility. It's not so much to save typing but to overcome ...

janus

Various aftermarket / 3rd party tools offer automation to log you into TWS and keep you logged in, but it's a bit of a hassle. In the past IB's policy has been that you should be there to authorize each connection, which puts them slightly at odds with the desire to have 100% automation. That's rig...

janus

I like using tws to close orders in an emergency if and when MC stuffs up. It hasn't thus far but I like the idea of having tws there just in case. It also allows me to view the orders coming through for peace of mind that the orders did actually get acted on by IB. If all this can be done with the ...

janus

I'm posting because, according to what Live Desk Help told me, Auto-Trading (using moving average signals) currently does not work on Multicharts. Since that is the reason I bought a lifetime license, I am concerned. I would like to have more information about the nature of the problem and what is ...

janus

(b) you could be slightly smarter about it, and track just the highs in your array. While this example may be arbitrary, there are a lot of similar sorts of calculations that aren't. I do this already - I store specific information about the turning points, such as the bar number, high/low and magn...

janus

I am curious what it is about your strategy that requires you go back all the bars. I thought I was high in using 1000 for maxsbarsback on two of my studies and 500 on some of the others. I am thinking of writing print statements with the offsets I am using and having a program read then in to find...

janus

The solution I proposed is just one of several. However, it's of little consequence as I have it working the way I like it and I can reference data going back as far as I like. With PCs getting faster and faster, the delay introduced in using dynamic arrays is not a problem. One side benefit is I ca...

janus

You cannot. You would need to call the same functions the indicator in the third chart does to get the resulting values. I'm sure this has been suggested before. We need database querying functions in MC and one can define the secondary symbols in the main symbol properties box. Meanwhile, a workar...

janus

Yes, I know most other platforms do it the other way. Your explanation as to why MC limits how far back one can look at first looks reasonable. However, how does MC get around it when one displays huge slabs of price and volume data on a screen? Does it access the data direct from the database? If s...

janus

I wish there was a feature to turn of "maxbarsback" auto-detection completely. It's more often a pain for me as I like to reference data many hundreds of bars back. I check to make sure I don't reference back past the first bar. Even if it was turned off and the study tries to reference an invalid b...

janus

Gee Janus. I get the impression you are at the level (in C knowledge etc) where you could actually develop for TSS.

No thanks; been there done that. I did enjoy it back in my younger days - too old for that now.

janus

I've seen some quite indented EL code in my time, and trust me when I say that when you come across a line that looks like "end; end; end; end; end; end; end; end; end; end; end;" at the tail of it and there's something mismatched somewhere above, it's a mess to figure out who left what out of the ...

janus

Yes I noticed Andrew and others come and go in waves. I just hope they fix as many bugs in 6.0 as possible before the official release. I don't mind it being delayed for a while to achieve this goal. It's not like Microsoft where they can release regular fixes after a major release. Come to think of...

janus

Also if the study can some how in the future have commands to figure out if it is being executed late (meaning it is having trouble keeping up with the rate that the ticks are coming in to MC during very fast markets) then the trader may want to bypass this study (testing for this at the very top o...

janus

Thanks, I thought it was just wishful thinking. I already use all those other approaches, plus a few of my own, such as spawn_message, which spawns another process to display a windows message (to avoid hanging the study), alert messages to my own catch-all console app, writing messages to log files...

janus

Is there by any chance an undocumented command to exit a function from any point within that function?

janus

One thing I did try some time ago was to plot the price based on the bid or ask, to get a more responsive reaction during really slow markets. It worked well. The study still used the trade price for computations by using the data from another chart in the same workspace. However, a timer based solu...

janus

Understood. In general, there would be a keyword or API property to say whether it's a timer-driven calculation underway.

That's true. So when is this feature coming?

janus

I was thinking about the case where a trader is basing a study on an index symbol that sometimes doesn't have volume (eg, DOW cash via IB) and uses a global variable to send a message to place an order via another study based on the underlying futures contract. That's how I used to trade. Now I base...

janus

But i read here in the forum, that plotting from signals will come. Now that would be great. It's tiring to have two studies, one to draw indicators and one to place orders based on the same indicator logic. Even if the computations are in a function that's used by both studies, the code is execute...

janus

That is correct. A typical use for this would be that perhaps you want to put a limit order out there, but if there is no fill, you want to cancel after 10 seconds, even if there is no trade tick in the next 10 seconds. APIs usually contain keywords/properties that you can reference to identify whe...

janus

It would helpful to be able to have a strategy/signal calculated on a timer interval basis (e.g. every 1/2 second, or any other interval as specified in milliseconds) in addition to every trade tick. I agree. Don't some platforms operate that way? I actually prefer it. The study is triggered as now...

janus

Unless you are talking about something that is very thinly traded, it's improbable you could get an execution in the marketplace "before the next tick" in real life anyway. That's what I meant. Unless a market is very slow and the trader is interested in true immediate "at market" order placement t...

janus

I have not problem with a perfect editor. The sooner the better and it is good for TSS to do that (like right now) if they can swing it. However If I think back about time I lost due to MC or EL or Editor failings, most of it was time waisted finding bugs due to just having a print statement for de...

janus

If I set IOG is false, how can I sell/buytocover immediately? Not wait for next bar. Thanks! One thing to note is there is no "immediate" buy/sell/cover in MC, not even with IOG turned on. At best it's on the next tick update. In virtually all cases this is fine. However, in very quiet markets the ...

janus

Interesting story but it doesn't help MC to make their development environment much better for those who want to develop their own studies. I'll probably continue to develop new studies for some time to come. One thing I am sure of. If I need to develop complex studies I will be doing it either in a...

janus

For me I guess it is different. I prefer to disgard programming all together and just trade (after 25+ years of programming it is boring these days). I'm glad you've reached your potential. That's something any trader would love to achieve in their lifetime. I'm not there yet. Neither are most othe...

janus

Programming your approach to trading is not infinite. Eventually it will be 99% done (maybe even 100%) and you will not care much about the editor. The funny part is maybe it will be fixed by then. That's not a sensible approach to try and encourage MC to gain maximum expose. In the case of a serio...

janus

My question is this. What is the standard for when to save? I think it is actually every single key stroke? Also how far back? I have never tested it in any app. Well, one obvious solution is to undo only complete words or lines, not partial words as it's does sometimes. I agree there are higher pr...

janus

I do a lot of complete exports of all studies fairly often to protect myself.... I do soemthing very similar. I have three external hard drives and a couple of USB sticks for my backups. I encrypt a batch of them every so often and remotely store them on another site. I also do a lot of my developm...

janus

It seems that you have to click undo twice to get one undo. I have never had to undo past that. Yes, that's true. However, it sometimes has a mind of its own and does a partial undo of the previous one. Start with a new indicator with the following text: inputs: Price( Close ), Length( 14 ), PctDn(...

janus

I really don't understand how anyone can put up with the horrendous bugs in the PLEditor. For example, I'm getting frustrated about the bug in the undo feature. Often when I undo a series of previous modifications, it goes back too far and undoes only part of a modification. It throws me off track a...

janus

Janus inspired me to look at various flavours of Basic's by posting his DLL example recently. Thanks a lot Pavel You are welcome - glad to be of help. It's worth nothing I've gone well beyond just using DLL's. I now have a small DLL stub to act as a gateway to other applications to perform parallel...

janus

I found this approach to using multiple time frames in a study very useful. It's one of the features I like about MC. However, I now have the need to have rolling times. In other words, if I have a 2 minute sub-chart, I need to look at the two minute bars generated by odd and even bar numbers. The o...

janus

Yes, it's becoming too clear that PLEditor needs a complete revamp for two big reasons. One, it lacks a lot of features pointed out here. Two, it has too many bugs. Just today I lost a whole study that took me a lot of time to develop. When I opened it up it was empty. Fortunately, I had backups so ...

janus

Yes, PLEditor has some serious bugs when editing large files. Also, the undo feature breaks sometimes and one ends up undoing only part of a previous edit. It can get so bad that I just give up and restore the original file. On another matter, I like to see run-time errors display where the error oc...

janus

I am with Janus on this,meaning why not allow this flexibility for those that wish to use it as Janus explained,For those like Bruce is suggesting can still do as done now,but at least allow MC with some other options. This applies to many features in MC,excellent,but sometimes lacks flexibility,wh...

janus

t doesn't always make sense to do what you're describing and wait until the next calc to put one order or the other in the market You imply that MC has a real 'at market" order type for all kinds of entries and exits. It doesn't. That's something else I like to see put in. If my study decides to en...

janus

Essentially, what you are saying is, you don't want it to be like EasyLanguage anymore - you want it to be like a more basic platform where there's no position management and everyone is on their own to manage orders. I'm not opposed to adding that as an option, but to suggest that the way it is is...

janus

That's why there are exit order types like "sell" and "buytocover" - so that you can specify several exits without a reversal, and so that you can't be assured you won't close out more than you opened. That's the other point. I can't re-use the same sell or buytocover command on multiple exits afte...

janus

You didn't answer the question. Using only EasyLanguage buy and sell statements that aren't exit specific, how can I have a "sell next bar at x stop" and a "sell next bar at x limit" in place for the following 60 second bar, yet not use IOG, and be assured there will be no unintended reversal? You ...

janus

Let's say MC uses buy/sell type statements rather than entry/exit specific statements. I want to have a stop and a target in place for the following 60 minute bar, without using IOG. They're spaced closely enough together that one or both of them could be hit in the next 60 minutes, but they're far...

janus

Although MC is *THE* top-notch charting program on the market, I am looking forward to the future of MC being the type of software an intraday trader can reliably use to trade with (vis a vis: NT with ATM, or TT) and not just do back-testing research with. It might take a year (or two) more and I w...

janus

In simpler terms, I see Removing a server, removes a potential point of failure. J~ That's assuming the dongle never fails, which is almost 100% true but not perfect. So, I like the idea of having the DRM by default and the dongle as an optional extra for those who like to have redundancy. If the D...

janus

Interestingly enough, this is the opposite of the reason EasyLanguage was made this way in the first place. Most people in fact have the opposite problem, in that they want to do things like put on a long position and have various exit orders out there e.g. a stop AND a target AND a trailing stop A...

janus

It's amazing how many trading systems already now incorporate manual override features for orders. I was so desperate to have it in MC I had to develop my own add-on, which I mentioned before. In fact I now believe it should be at the top of the list of new features for the next release of MC - all ...

janus

IGMarkets system also allows you to do the same - move the line up or down the chart by dragging it. It doesn't stop there. One can use a sloping line as well. Another useful feature is autonomic pattern recognition for completed and emerging patterns to assist in the placement of the sloping trigge...

janus

And there is of course the order bar in TS. In IGMarkets they go one step more and allow you to use the mouse pointer to draw a horizontal line on the chart to set the buy/sell (limit or stop). I'm thinking of implementing something like it myself by using the trend line draw feature in MC and have...

janus

Here's what I've implemented, and would like to see incorporated into MC for better integration. I'm adding more features over time (eg, auto scaling in and out of contracts, profit targeting, stop limits, etc.) but the main features I've implemented are sufficient for MC to have built-in for now. A...

janus

Failure to integrate manual ordering with the automation system to create seamless operation is a gigantic, persistent flaw in more than one competing product. TSS has an opportunity to craft a superior solution. Yes, it would be more than just a nice feature - IMHO it's essential. However, it's no...

janus

True/False check boxes is a trivial change. I don't understand why it isn't already implemented from version 2. We are now at version 6 beta. To be honest I wouldn't even expect to have to type in "true" or "False" even in freeware package. Sorry. If systems like IGMarkets can do it then so can MC. ...

janus

TJ you make many valid comments. I have mixed feelings with EL. It's good for basic stuff but when my code becomes really complex, it has many major drawbacks. That's one reason I now write most of my code externally in another language. I have used VC++ and VB.Net but now use FB as it's more than e...

janus

As promised here's some sample DLL code using FreeBasic. The screen shots are how the FB looks in FBIde and FBEdit. As I said FBIde is the simplest to use, but FBEdit is better for Windows gui developers as it's a lot like Visual Studio in terms of look and feel.

janus

I am new to this in developing a DLL. To a starter, what language will you recommend? And where can I find the resources / information that I can develop a DLL? Sa I think the easiest one to use is FreeBasic or PowerBasic - both are very similar. The first is free as the name implies but the latter...

janus

I would like the ability to separate Signal Generation from Trade Management. Currently trading software designs merge these 2 functions into one giant strategy. But it would be neat if we can have a strategy to just generate trade signals and hand off the signals to another entity to manage the tr...

janus

Yes, I've experienced the same issue. To get around it I've decided to write all my complex rules in another language and access it from a much simplified study in MC as a DLL. That way I've made it more portable so if I ever decide to use another package (unlikely at this stage) I won't have to rew...

janus

The whole process can be simplified. All we need is a simple buy and sell order type. I like to write my studies the same way I would trade manually. For example, I sell 10 contracts then buy 5 later to take profits and be net short 5. So, rather than saying sellshort 10 (assuming I was flat) then b...

janus

If the files have not been posted up, you can call TSSupport to fix the problem, no need to wait for MC6.0 for a fix!! Sa I missed this one. MC should have a download section on the web site for bug fixes/patches such as these. One shouldn't have to wait for the next version to have such a serious ...

janus

Yes I find it strange that if one uses Sync mode it doesn't really sync with the broker position at start up. Yet in Async mode there appears to be an option to do so. I'm confused too, which is why I always start with a flat position before turning on auto trading in Sync mode.

janus

It's a bug - fixed in 6.0 beta according to MC. Should have a bug fix for 5.5 but I'm prepared to wait for the official release of 6.0, which is reported to be soon.

janus

3. I believe you should have possibility to backtest your stop limit amounts first before you decide what will be your limit value. Otherwise you will guess. I disagree. I for example do not use MC's back testing at all. I use MC simply to automate my rules for disciplined trading. I continually fi...

janus

I think we will implement stop-limit orders in MultiCharts 6. Excellent! I wouldn't be too concerned if you can't get it to work in back testing mode, at least for now. If it is only made available in real-time mode it will be fine. There are other order types that would also be very useful in real...

janus

miltonc4, short and sweet. Can't really disagree with what you said. However, I think they can fix the issue so it doesn't happen again. They better do it soon too. If it does happen again during a peak period there will be a lot of very angry users.

Search found 838 matches