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Log of Changes and Improvements to Sierra Chart
This list contains major items of development, and changes and additions which users need to be informed about.
This is not a comprehensive changes and additions log. And it should never be relied upon for such. It only represents a very small percentage of the actual development being performed every day. The vast majority of development is not documented here. Or receives, one small comment after it is all complete. There are not version notes for each version. The main Sierra Chart documentation is updated as needed relating to the changes and additions.
The maintenance of this page has mostly been abandoned by Sierra Chart development for many years due to the difficulty of maintaining it and because users can be incorrectly misled by or misinterpret notes that are made here. This does not change, the development of Sierra Chart which is very active every day and new releases are made nearly weekly or several times a week. The Sierra Chart project is still very active, with extensive development and it remains a very high quality software in the world. The engineering is at the very top of the world.
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1267 Release Date: 2015-07-02
- Added a new input to the Numbers Bars study named: Enable Diagonal Zero Bid/Ask Compares.
- Added to the Alerts tab of the Study Settings window an option named: "Use Full Precision When Evaluating Alert Formula (can cause unexpected results)". When this option is enabled, all of the values referenced in the study Alert Condition Formula are not rounded off to the corresponding Value Format but used in their full precision.
- Added the Forecast Oscillator study.
- Corrected a problem from the prior release where the last study in a Study Collection was not being applied to a chart.
- Low-level improvements to the Continuous Futures Contract feature where invalid price data in the historical Daily data files which Continuous Futures Contract charts rely on, is automatically detected and corrected. When re-downloading data in an Intraday Continuous Futures Contract chart, the historical Daily data is fully re-downloaded as well if it is relied upon.
- Added the ability to the Time and Sales window to filter on Combined Records.
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1265 Release Date: 2015-06-25
- Added the ability to set the Step Amount for the Triggered Step Trail Stop and Triggered Step Trail Stop Limit Attached Orders.
- The number of regions available for studies and the base graph has been increased from 8 to 12.
- Added new rollover methods to the Global Symbol Settings.
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1264 Release Date: 2015-06-19
- Can now set the begin/end time for Rectangle Chart Drawings, and the begin time for Extending Rectangles through the Chart Drawing Configuration window. These settings are only valid when creating the Rectangles, and once created they can be modified as normal Rectangle drawings. When a Chart Drawing is created in this mode, the date from the initial Pointer left click is used along with the specified times. If the times are reversed, then an additional day is added to the ending anchor point (Example: draw from 18:00-03:00).
- Added the ability to cut a Rectangle Chart Drawing. Previously could only cut Extending Rectangle drawings.
- Made corrections to the code in the Random Walk Indicator study.
- Added keyboard shortcuts for the Custom Text Drawing buttons which can be added to the control bar.
- Enhancements to Attached Orders. The Move to Breakeven functionality for stops now supports 2 steps. There is also a Negative Offset in Ticks Triggered action type. This works similar to Offset in Ticks Triggered, except that a position which creates a loss will cause the stop to move towards breakeven.
- Corrected a problem where the new control bar was displaying on detached charts. This has been disabled for now.
- In an earlier release the Select Drawn Volume Profile By Outline Only option has been added to Global Settings >> Tool Settings.
- Added the Bollinger Bands - StandardDeviationOfAverage study to the Analysis >> Studies >> Add Custom Study list.
- Various small issues resolved.
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1261 Release Date: 2015-06-04
- Added a Moving Average - Simple Skip Zeros study.
- Corrected a problem when using the CQG Trading service where during times when the market is closed, there could be price bars created when there is no actual trading activity.
- Changes to Market Depth data handling for the CQG Trading service.
- Enabling Limit Chase orders is now done through the Trade Window Menu/M button. The command is Use Limit Chase Orders.
- Added sc.CloseChart(int ChartNumber) and SC.CloseChartbook(const SCString& ChartbookFileName) ACSIL functions.
- Corrected a problem the CQG FIX Trading service account balance processing and added support for a new FIX report through CQG FIX to access account balance data through this report. However, feedback indicates that this report needs to be enabled on the server side. Update (2015-06-05): According to CQG, account balance support has now been added and now should work properly.
- Added the Relative Volume study.
- Added new ACSIL SC_BID_PRICE and SC_ASK_PRICE arrays for sc.BasedDataIn[] and added the Bid and Ask Prices study.
- Various other small issues resolved.
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1257 Release Date: 2015-05-23
- The Fix Row and Fix Column functionality has been added to New Spreadsheets.
- Added formula function WEEKNUM to New Spreadsheets.
- In the formula details window on the New Spreadsheets, double-clicking or pressing the Enter/Return key on an item that is either a reference or returns a reference will now immediately jump to the referenced cell.
- Corrected a problem from a recent release where Trailing Stop orders, including Move to Breakeven Stops, were not functioning when using server side bracket orders with Interactive Brokers.
- Continuing improvements with New Spreadsheets.
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1256 Release Date: 2015-05-19
- Improved the Move to Breakeven (BE) button on the Trade Window. An offset can now be specified controlling a positive or negative offset to the parent order fill price that the Stop Attached Order is moved to. This offset is set through Trade >> Open Trade Window for Chart >> Set >> Move to BE Offset (Ticks).
- Corrected some issues from recent releases causing an abnormal shutdown when using complex formulas in spreadsheets.
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1255 Release Date: 2015-05-14
- The Trade Service Average Price is always used for the Position Average Price displayed on a chart or Trade DOM when using Interactive Brokers.
- Added the "Minimum Width For Volume Profile in Bars" Input to the TPO Profile Chart study. This controls the minimum number of bars that a Volume Profile for a TPO Profile will occupy in the chart.
- Added a Move to Breakeven (BE) button to the Trade Window. This will move the nearest Stop Attached Order to the fill price of its parent order. Additional enhancements will be added later on.
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1253 Release Date: 2015-05-09
- Effective with this version, there is no longer support to connect to Ninja Trader Brokerage using Rithmic on or after June 1, 2015.
- When using the Days to Load Chart Linking option, this now also includes loading data based on date range. So those date range settings are applied across linked charts as well.
- Corrected a small problem when there are repeating timestamps in the chart and when using the Volume by Price study where volume profiles are based on a specified number of bars, the number of bars the profiles cover may not always be correct.
- In the case of when server side bracket orders are supported with a Trading service, Sierra Chart will not attempt to modify the prices of the Attached Orders on a parent order fill to maintain the offsets the Attached Orders originally had to the parent order based upon the fill price of the parent order. In the past this would occur if Global Settings >> General Trade Settings >> Adjust Attached Orders to Maintain Same Offset on Parent Fill.
- Changes to the Value Area calculation method when counting 2 levels at a time, to make the calculation method similar to other programs.
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1252 Release Date: 2015-05-02
- Added a new input to the TPO Profile chart study named Highlight Sub Period Midpoint Letter/Block , and a subgraph for the color and line width named Sub Period Midpoint Letter/Block Highlight.
- Corrected a problem where an unsupported order type for some trading services was being set as a market order type rather than being internally rejected.
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1251 Release Date: 2015-04-28
- Added a Hollow attribute for non-line based Marker drawing tool types.
- Corrected small problem when compiling ACSIL source code which would generate compiler errors.
- Corrected a problem when using the Draw Volume Profile tool, where the Volume by Price profile does not appear immediately.
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1249 Release Date: 2015-04-22
- Added the following new ACSIL members: sc.IsChartDataLoadingInChartbook() and sc.DataTradeServiceName().
- Added support which was previously removed due to some other changes, for longer-term Historical Daily charts for trading services that use a single digit year in the symbols. This change may require the data in a Daily or Intraday chart to be re-downloaded if the price values are incorrect at some points in the chart. For further information, refer to this Support Board posting.
- Various enhancements to the new File Open/Save dialog window.
- Corrected a problem from a recent release with the Rithmic bridge program used for connecting to Rithmic. Due to the fact that the Rithmic bridge uses an API component with a proprietary and not well understood design method, a problem arose where when an order is submitted, this sometimes could cause the bridge program to freeze. This is now solved.
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1247 Release Date: 2015-04-14
- Added the ability to make a line parallel to a Pitchfork, Regression and other Chart Drawings when using the Make Line Parallel Chart Drawing shortcut menu command.
- The Bar Time Duration study now properly considers the session ending times to calculate the bar duration correctly.
- Enhancements to the Volume by Price study to properly control the Draw Styles for the Point of Control and Value Area Subgraphs when those are set to be drawn on the chart.
- Added flat edge option in s_UseTool for Chart Drawings from ACSIL For Drawing Tools, renamed ValuePerPoint to ValueIncrementPerBar.
- A new mode for Gann Fan and Gann Grid drawing tools which sets price square with second drawing point. The new mode is the default, and the old mode is still supported. In the Drawing Tool Configuration window you can now specify how the Value Increment Per Bar is specified (used to be called Value Per Point). The options are to set the value from the second pointer click, use the value from the Drawing tool configuration, or use the Chart Settings value. If you need to use both new and old behavior, then you can configure multiple Drawing Tool configurations and switch between them.
- The Gann Fan and Fibonacci Fan can also now be cut at a specific bar. All lines are cut at same point.
- There is a new Yes/No input added to the TPO Profile Chart and TPO Value Area Lines studies, to count 2 levels at a time when calculating the Value Area.
- Corrected a problem from a recent release with the transition from one futures contract to the next during a replay would result in an error and the chart would stop replaying.
- Support for changing the chart Bar Period Type and period to any of the supported Bar Period Types from the chart through the keyboard, has been added. Updated documentation.
- Corrected a problem with Chart >> Show Rollover Dates where it would not work in all cases.
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1245 Release Date: 2015-04-08
- Added ACSIL functions sc.GetIndexOfHighestValue and sc.GetIndexOfLowestValue.
- Chart linking has been changed where the linking options in each chart are independent from each other. It is the Chart Linking option in the chart itself which affects whether a particular link option is applied to that chart. In Chart >> Chart Settings >> Linking >> Chart Linking, there is a new button named Apply to Linked Charts. When this button is pressed, then any other charts within the same Chartbook that have the same Link Number, will get the same Chart Linking settings which are currently set on the chart.
- Continued work on the DTC Protocol. Added support for binary encoding with variable length strings and JSON encoding. Documentation is in the process of being updated.
- Corrected a problem with the Volume by Price study when there is a hand drawn profile, where the point of control and volume value area lines would not clear as the profile is moved around the chart.
- Added the ability to cancel working orders when using the Flatten button on the Orders and Positions window. To do this enable Position >>Cancel Orders for Symbol When Flatten on the Orders and Positions window menu.
- Corrected a problem with the downloading of historical data when using the CTS FIX Trading service.
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1243 Release Date: 2015-04-01
- Corrected a Volume by Price study scaling problem when using Constant Range scaling with the TPO Profile Chart study.
- The Study/Price Overlay study properly overlays Initial Balance and Daily OHLC during real-time chart updating now.
- Corrected a problem from a recent release where when Intraday data is exported to a text file and the times do not contain milliseconds, the outputted text format was incorrect. This is now resolved.
- Enhancements to the new File Open/Save window. The folder can now be changed when opening a Chartbook. It cannot be changed when opening a Historical or Intraday chart data file. Search capability will be added next.
- Low-level changes to IB market depth processing.
- Continued performance improvements with New Spreadsheets.
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1242 Release Date: 2015-03-24
- Corrected a problem from a recent release where the Show Rollover Dates feature was not displaying the vertical lines at the rollover dates for Intraday charts.
- Working on underlying support for futures spreads from the Sierra Chart Exchange Data Feed.
- When using the data feed provided by the FXCM FIX Trading service, there is now the Global Settings >> Data/Trade Service Settings >> Use Data Feed 2 setting, which uses a different data feed with different Bid Ask spreads. So if the Bid Ask spreads do not match what your account should be providing, then set this option to True and reconnect to the data feed.
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1241 Release Date: 2015-03-18
- Added a new combining option for Time and Type for the Time and Sales window.
- Corrected a problem that arose in a recent release where when using the TransAct trading service, orders that are externally entered from Sierra Chart would map into the same order in the order list. So not all orders would be visible in Sierra Chart and the single order would only indicate the most recently order received.
- Corrected a problem that arose in a recent release with back adjustment calculations for continuous futures contract charts when using the CTS T4 trading service.
- Corrected a problem where when the Volume by Price study is referencing prior periods, the most recent Volume Profile, would not be correct during chart updating.
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1235 Release Date: 2015-02-26
- Fixed issue with the Volume by Price study when basing volume profiles on a number of bars and bars in the chart have the same timestamp.
- There is now only one CQG service which uses the FIX protocol for trading. The others have been removed. When Sierra Chart is set to use one of the CQG services, it will be automatically set to use CQG FIX Trading upon an update.
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1234 Release Date: 2015-02-24
- Low-level improvements to the Study/Price Overlay study to better work with studies that are displaced and studies that recalculate at bars earlier than the last bar in the source chart, like the Zig Zag study.
- The Study/Price Overlay study and the Spreadsheet studies now properly output data from the study like the Zig Zag study that change at bars earlier than the last bar in the chart.
- The Volume Weighted Average Price (VWAP) study was split into two different studies. The original VWAP study no longer has the continuous non-resetting mode input, but maintains the recurring period based nature of the study. The new study is named Volume Weighted Average Price - Rolling (similar to the continuous non-resetting option in the original study). The new study allows rolling periods to be specified in minutes or days, and the day version will correctly roll across weekends.
- Corrected a problem with the Save As dialog for the Trade Activity Log.
- Added new Chart >> Chart Settings option named Include Saturday-Sunday Bars for Daily Charts which will include Saturday and Sunday bars when Include Columns with No Data is enabled.
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1232 Release Date: 2015-02-14
- The change to calculate real-time volume for TD Ameritrade index symbols has been removed because it did not work properly. There are no plans to add this capability because it cannot work reliably with TD Ameritrade.
- Sierra Chart no longer uses a different symbol for Historical Daily charts when a Trading service does not provide historical Daily data. The symbol mapping is now handled at a lower level. When updating to this version, the symbols for historical charts will be changed to the standard symbol used by the particular Trading service you are using. New historical Daily data files will be created and downloaded.
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1230 Release Date: 2015-02-10
- Additional Chart Linking options added. However, we are still working on an abnormal shutdown issue when linking Studies when using the Spreadsheet study that needs to be solved.
- Additional improvements with the Volume by Price study. Documentation updates to follow shortly.
- With the TD Ameritrade trading service, real-time volume is now calculated in real-time for index symbols which do not normally provide real-time volume.
- Corrected a problem with the evaluation of Simple Alert Formulas.
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1228 Release Date: 2015-02-03
- New fast simple and reliable File Open and Save windows have been developed for New/Open Historical Chart, New/open Intraday Chart, Save As.
- Added new export command for chart bars: Edit >> Export Bar Data to Text File.
- Corrected a problem with the Volume by Price study arising in the previous prerelease relating to adjusting drawn volume profiles on the chart.
- Support for the : operator in spreadsheet formulas where formula results which return a cell reference can be used with the : operator.
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1226 Release Date: 2015-01-28
- Corrected a problem from the prior release where the Bid and Ask prices would be the same when using a Data or Trading service in Sierra Chart which uses DTC Protocol.
- Renamed sc.GetChartDrawing to sc.GetUserDrawnChartDrawing in ACSIL. Renamed sc.DeleteLineOrText to sc.DeleteACSChartDrawing.
- The Point and Figure XO Graph Draw Type is now supported with Reversal bars. This can be selected through Chart >> Chart Settings >> Graph Draw Type.
- Added the ability to include weekend bars with the Include Columns with No Data option for historical Daily charts. Currently this is implemented as when Include Columns with No Data is enabled for the chart, Saturday and Sunday bars are included in the chart. A separate option will be added.
- Corrected a problem with the completion processing when getting trade orders from OEC. This was due to a change from OEC.
- Corrected a problem where when opening a saved Chartbook, the last active chart at the time the Chartbook was saved, may not be set as the active chart.
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1225 Release Date: 2015-01-22
- s_UseTool::Tool is no longer supported. Use of this member has been out of date for more than a year at least. Use s_UseTool::DrawingType instead.
- Completely new implementation of persistent variables for ACSIL. There are now functions for getting and setting persistent variables. There are 4000 persistent variables supported for each datatype (32-bit integer, 64-bit integer, float, double, SCDateTime). Refer to sc.GetPersistentInt. Documentation is still in the process of being written.
- Corrected problem with multistage downloads for IQ Feed and Barchart Data Services where when less than 5 to 15 days of data is downloaded, it would be multistage and a reload of the chart would occur when the historical data download is done. The reload no longer occurs and only a single stage download is done when the less than 5 to 15 days of data needs to be downloaded.
- Removed all "Unused" members from the ACSIL SC structure. The result of this is that any study that depends upon the ACSIL trading functions needs to be compiled for version 1225 or higher. A notice will be given in the Message Log indicating this. Studies that do not use the ACSIL trading functions will not be affected but they are recommended to be recompiled at some point in the future.
- Fixed issue with chart keyboard shortcuts not always being processed based upon which window had the focus.
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1224 Release Date: 2015-01-14
- Increased the number of OCO Groups for Attached Orders to 8.
- Corrected problem with the bar starting time under certain conditions when using the Include Columns with No Data option and Chart >> Chart Settings.
- When Global Settings >> Chart Trade Settings >> Show Limit/Stop in Trade Mode Box is enabled, then the order type, whether Stop or Limit, is displayed at the top left of the chart or Trade DOM when Trade >> Trading Chart DOM On is enabled and hovering over the one of the Buy or Sell columns. This indicates the order type that will be submitted when left clicking.
- Added Global Settings >> General Settings >> Sort CW Menu by Chart Number to sort the windows on the CW menu by chart number.
- Added Window >> Goto Chart Number.
- The System Notification Window is now smaller and the complete message can be viewed in your web browser.
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1222 Release Date: 2015-01-07
- Corrected a problem which arose in the prior version when connecting to Rithmic where the connection would be disconnected when a market data request is made. This is now resolved.
- Added support for the Continuous Futures Contract feature with the TeleTrader Data Service. To use the Continuous Futures Contract Feature requires that rollover rule settings have been defined for a particular futures symbol. We have done this for the Eurex DAX. For additional symbols, contact Sierra Chart Support on the Support Board. There is no support for TeleTrader continuous futures contracts symbols themselves.
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1221 Release Date: 2015-01-01
- When using the Reverse command on the Trade Window or the equivalent menu command from the Chart Trading shortcut menu, the order quantity of the market order will be equal to the amount to flatten the existing Trade Position plus the amount of the current Order Quantity setting on the Trade Window. For example, if the current Position is -3 and the Order Quantity setting on the Trade Window is 2, a Buy market order will be sent with a quantity of 5. When it is filled, the Position will be +2. Previously, when using Reverse, the Order Quantity will be equal to 2 times the quantity of the existing Trade Position. This change makes Reverse the same as the functioning of SupportReversals in Automated trading.
- With an automated trading system, when the SupportReversals automated trading management variable is set to TRUE/Yes, then when a reversal occurs, a market order will always be used to flatten the existing position. A new position will be established to the order quantity specified by the BuyEntry or SellEntry order action.
- Continued improvements with New Spreadsheets.
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1220 Release Date: 2014-12-24
- Server-side OCO for Rithmic is supported for all broker/trading services now.
- Added a new Labels option to Chart Calculator tool named ABDiff Volume. This calculates the difference between the total Ask Volume and Bid Volume across the number of bars that the Chart Calculator line spans.
- Corrected a problem with recent changes to the Parallel Rays tool.
- When connecting to FXCM Trading, there is a separate connection for market data and a separate connection for trading. The market data is now provided by the Sierra Chart FXCM data feed. In most cases this will improve market data feed performance and eliminate any delays with trading related messages.
- A new Text Coloring Method option has been added to Numbers Bars: "Based on Dominant Side Volume Percentage".
- With studies that change at earlier bars other than the last bar, like the Zig Zag and Swing High/Low studies, when using the Spreadsheet studies, the latest and correct values from the study are now fully outputted to the Spreadsheet. Previously this was not happening with the New Spreadsheets and also to some extent with Old Spreadsheets. The result of this is that the data on the Spreadsheet for a particular study would not match up with the actual values during chart updating. This is now resolved.
- Added the spreadsheet function: TEXT(Value, Format).
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1217 Release Date: 2014-12-12
- The Parallel Rays drawing tool has been modified so that all line extensions are done using the chart coordinate system rather than integer pixel coordinates. This ensures that the lines remain stable with changes with chart scaling. However, this tool and Rays cannot work properly on logarithmic scales because a straight linear line does not fit properly into a logarithmic scale.
- Corrected a printing issue with Chart Drawings where the drawing may not appear due to a coordinate limitation that was implemented many years ago to prevent triggering stability issues in the underlying operating system.
- Corrected a problem where there could be conditions where when a historical daily data download is performed, it may stop an Intraday chart from updating for the same symbol. Although you would continue to see the price box on the right side of the chart move. This was a very rare issue and in most cases when you notice this kind of problem, it was not the result of this problem but for another reason. For example, OEC users will notice a problem just like this but for the reason that the OEC symbol limit has been exceeded.
- The DTC Protocol version number has been increased 5. All the DTC messages and field names have been reviewed and changes were made to make them as logical, consistent, and compact as possible. The DTC documentation will be updated as soon as possible. Any existing Server or Client using DTC will continue to work with this version but a recompile will require naming changes to comply with the changes made.
- All brokers specific CQG connections now support FIX for trading because it has proven to be more reliable than the new CQG Web API for trading.
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1216 Release Date: 2014-12-09
- Small change to CQG Web API interface where if the iinitial trade order snapshot data is not fully received, order entry is still possible.
- Corrected trade order rounding issue in CQG Web API interface.
- With the recent changes to the CQG trading platform service integration, one area that has been inconsistent and the source of some issues is the Fill Execution Service ID field for orders fills. In some cases it was not being set correctly or inconsistently between FIX and the Web API. This affects the fills in the Trade Activity Log. The most noticeable effect of this is duplicate order fills which affects Profit/Loss calculations. This has now been resolved going forward. It will not affect existing order fills already logged. There is now a common unique Fill Execution Service ID which works for both CQG FIX and the Web API. The result of these changes is you can have duplicate fills on the day of updating to this version or higher.
- Various low-level improvements and issues resolved with New Spreadsheets.
- Added support for Apply button on the Study Settings window when opened from the Chart Studies window.
- Corrected a problem with the writing of historical Daily data to the data file, arising in a recent version, where numbers that contain a zero immediately to the right of a decimal point would not be properly formatted and instead be formatted as integers. This is now resolved. If you notice any data errors in a Historical Daily chart, it is possible it could be due to this particular problem. To correct the data, select Edit >> Delete All Data and Download.
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1213 Release Date: 2014-11-18
- Changed CQG WebAPI interface to resubscribe to Trade Orders and Positions when data is re-requested for better reliability.
- Change to both FIX and web API CQG interfaces clients to use same unique identifier for order fills.
- No longer using a 1 minute backup timer to identify Trade Orders as Canceled and instead always rely upon a definite notification from all of the connected Trading services upon the completion of receiving all Open orders to know that received all Open orders. The backup timer could be a problem in the case where a Trading service takes more than a minute to send Open orders.
- Corrected problem which occurs under certain conditions with Profit/Loss calculations within chart when converted to a common currency. This issue arose from a recent release.
- Corrected an issue where there would be a file error when using sc.SaveChartImageToFile in the ACSIL.
- When copying horizontal parallel lines from a short timeframe per bar chart to a higher timeframe per bar, the mapping is managed better, so that the drawings will appear even if they only normally span one bar in the destination chart.
- The list of Services and Data/Trade Service Settings window is now in alphabetical order.
- New Spreadsheet function added: AVERAGE_IGNOREZEROS.
- Added the ability to flip Lines, Fans and Parallel Lines Chart Drawings horizontally or vertically. This can be done from the Chart Drawing shortcut menu or from the Anchor tab of the Chart Drawing Properties window.
- Corrected a problem with the conversion of TRUE and 1 values from the Buy/Sell columns to the correct values for placement of arrows on the chart when using the Spreadsheet System studies.
*Last modified Thursday, 25th April, 2024.