The purpose of ASCII mapping feature?

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MidKnight
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The purpose of ASCII mapping feature?

Postby MidKnight » 29 Jul 2014

I'm somewhat confused by the purpose of the ASCII mapping feature. According to your online help it says:
"In such a case ASCII mapping is the solution; there are two principal reasons for using ASCII mapping:

1. If one or several ASCII files constantly used are periodically updated. Even if there are just a few updates per day, re-importing hundreds of symbols is difficult or just not feasible;
2. If tick/volume bars must be displayed on a chart.

When mapping, the file path and format is indicated once, and every time a chart is created the program finds the file automatically, converts it into the necessary format based on the preset configuration and displays the data. "

Point #1 seems to be saying that I should be able to create a an ASCII mapped symbol, update my data freely and simply open a chart to have that data reflected on the charts - is that correct?

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Henry MultiСharts
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Re: The purpose of ASCII mapping feature?

Postby Henry MultiСharts » 30 Jul 2014

Hello MidKnight,

That is correct.
  • ASCII mapping creates a link from the software to the ASCII file with data.
  • You do not need to create ASCII mapping instrument manually-it is created automatically upon mapping.
  • ASCII mapping does not import data into MultiCharts database (Edit data window of QuoteManager will be empty).
  • Each time you plot an ASCII mapping symbol-the data is taken from the file directly.
  • That is possible to map multiple ASCII files at the same time.

MidKnight
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Re: The purpose of ASCII mapping feature?

Postby MidKnight » 30 Jul 2014

OK - then I have a problem with it.

I have some ASCII mapped created symbols that do not update when I load the chart despite their corresponding CSV file having updated data. The only way I can get the updated to show is manually import the data through the quotemanager again for all the symbols.

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Henry MultiСharts
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Re: The purpose of ASCII mapping feature?

Postby Henry MultiСharts » 31 Jul 2014

MidKnight, couple of questions:
  1. What is your ASCII file resolution?
  2. Which resolution have you selected upon mapping?
  3. Which resolution do you use on your chart?
  4. How often is the file updated?
  5. What exact version and build number of MultiCharts are you running? (in MultiCharts go to Help tab-> About)

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Re: The purpose of ASCII mapping feature?

Postby MidKnight » 31 Jul 2014

1. The file is a daily data file
2. The import resolution was set to 1 day (automatically detected)
3. 1 day
4. Daily
5. Version: 8.8.9593

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Henry MultiСharts
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Re: The purpose of ASCII mapping feature?

Postby Henry MultiСharts » 01 Aug 2014

MidKnight, do you use Merging feature for this chart?
What is the session end time for this instrument?
At what time is the bar added to the file?

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Re: The purpose of ASCII mapping feature?

Postby MidKnight » 04 Aug 2014

Hi Henry,

This process is very confusing. What I did was manually add new symbol, select ascii mapping datasource. From there I went through the normal symbol setup definition. Afterwards I manually imported the data and expected the symbol to automatically map from there on. It did not. Only after I went into File | Map ASCII and follow that through did it eventually map. I'm not sure if this is the intended behaviour when adding a new symbol with ascii mapping selected as the data source. Its confusing as they both seem to use the words mapping and ascii but only one of them seems to actually do it.

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Henry MultiСharts
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Re: The purpose of ASCII mapping feature?

Postby Henry MultiСharts » 05 Aug 2014

Hi Henry,

This process is very confusing. What I did was manually add new symbol, select ascii mapping datasource. From there I went through the normal symbol setup definition. Afterwards I manually imported the data and expected the symbol to automatically map from there on. It did not. Only after I went into File | Map ASCII and follow that through did it eventually map. I'm not sure if this is the intended behaviour when adding a new symbol with ascii mapping selected as the data source. Its confusing as they both seem to use the words mapping and ascii but only one of them seems to actually do it.
I believe I already had that covered in my first reply in this topic. Does it work ok now for you ?

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Re: The purpose of ASCII mapping feature?

Postby MidKnight » 05 Aug 2014

Yes it works now Henry and yes you did cover it in your first reply. My point was why have 2 ascii mapping ways of adding a symbol but only have one of them actually perform the desired feature?

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Re: The purpose of ASCII mapping feature?

Postby Henry MultiСharts » 06 Aug 2014

Yes it works now Henry and yes you did cover it in your first reply. My point was why have 2 ascii mapping ways of adding a symbol but only have one of them actually perform the desired feature?
That is possible to add an instrument manually for each of the supported data providers. That is supposed that users will want to import the data into the instrument directly instead of getting the data from the data provider or from the ascii file using mapping.

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Re: The purpose of ASCII mapping feature?

Postby MidKnight » 06 Aug 2014

OK, and if you do insert a symbol manually under the ascii mapping selection, should it map onto the file on subsequent chart opens when new data is provided onto the file? Because it does not, despite being titled ascii mapping.

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Re: The purpose of ASCII mapping feature?

Postby Henry MultiСharts » 07 Aug 2014

OK, and if you do insert a symbol manually under the ascii mapping selection, should it map onto the file on subsequent chart opens when new data is provided onto the file? Because it does not, despite being titled ascii mapping.
No, there is no file path and parsing settings specified when you add an instrument manually.

The only proper way of doing ASCII mapping is via QuoteManager->File->Map ASCII.

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Re: The purpose of ASCII mapping feature?

Postby MidKnight » 07 Aug 2014

May I suggest that you remove the ascii mapping datasource dropdown list option when manually adding a symbol to eliminate confusion for the users.

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Re: The purpose of ASCII mapping feature?

Postby Henry MultiСharts » 18 Aug 2014

May I suggest that you remove the ascii mapping datasource dropdown list option when manually adding a symbol to eliminate confusion for the users.
This cannot be done as it will make it impossible to import data from a file into a manually added "ASCII mapping" data source instrument.


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