Oanda FXTrade On Ubuntu Dell Mini 12

Okay, it's working.

I have Oanda running a single FXTrade window while I'm open in another browser typing this blog post.

Here is what I did to get this working:

1. Close down extra charts -- only the basic platform window is running.
2. Eliminate extra currency pairs -- only follow two or three active pairs
3. Shrink the window -- show everything but in as small a footprint as it practical.

With these steps I was able to launch, sync, open a trade box and watch the graph update in real time.

This means you can trade using the Mini 12. However, if you want to do serious analysis or chart work you'll probably have to use a different platform. However, once you have your chart set up, or otherwise have a trading plan to follow, you can run FXTrade.

Excellent!

UPDATE: It's several months later. I don't know if a Java update, an Ubuntu update, or if an FXTrade update made the difference, but the Mini 12 is much more capable of running this application than it was originally. I can keep multiple charts open and I no longer have only a single currency in the quote panel.

Dell Mini 12 -- Ubuntu

I recently bought the Dell Mini 12 thinking it would be noiseless, so that I could leave it on overnight while I slept. I tend to wake up from time to time so that would be an easy way to check for Forex opportunities during the night.

Unfortunately, running the Oanda FxTrade application causes the system to grind to a halt. Right now my profile automatically opens multiple charts (1 min, 15 min and 1 hr) -- which if I'm very lucky is part of the problem. On launch I see the base chart and trading platform open up but it hangs after trying to display the additional material. If I have any success with future experiments I'll let you know.

Anyway, the Ubuntu Mini 12 is great. No, I don't mean you want to do massive computing tasks, but for high availability wireless web access this thing is great. The screen is very bright. The size and quality of the display is very nice. I've added a "cookie swapping" add-on to Firefox so I can switch user profiles on the fly.

In all, even though I bought this thing hoping I'd be able to trade Forex with it, I still love it even though it seems that I won't be able to. There will surely be upgrades in the future, better processors and more memory, which might make it available. I'll probably upgrade and continue the quest for a long battery life wireless trading platform.

UPDATE: It does work. Read this post to find out what I did...

MT4 EA: Stupid Programming Mistakes

Well, I spent last evening tracking down some problems in my next foray into programming expert advisers.

It turns our that a simple logical test was using an '&' instead of an '&&' between two terms.

This little horseshoe nail caused some position closing attempts to fail with an error 138 -- meaning that the price being used to close the position was too far away from the market price.

I also ran into the example code for iHighest() again. The example shows it implemented with High[iHighest()] when you generally may want iHigh(...,...iHighest()) instead.

In all, I find programming in MT4 a bit frustrating. Sure, sure, hard core programmers may blame me for being imperfect, but it's time programmers realized that humans are imperfect. I know -- I program for a living.

MT4 EA: Moving Towards Sustainability

Yesterday's experiments with creating an expert advisor to scalp the 5 minute chart show great profits and great risk.

I've been working to reduce the level of risk without taking away the reasonable chance of making reasonable profits.

Here is the most recent chart:


This is running from 01-Feb-2009 to 25-Apr-2009 and obviously surviving any ups and downs during that period.

I'm still not happy with the relative size of the larger draw downs. I believe I can tune it but I'll want to add back aggressiveness or the growth will start to drop more than I'd like.

... continuing ...

Alright, I'm in danger of curve fitting, but I've tuned the advisor to take less risk and earn less profit. However, right now, the earnings curve is getting near ideal. The draw down is acceptable and the profits are around $4,000 per month. Of course, remember that this is all somewhat theoretical and running in a test environment.


The question on my mind is whether or not I can somehow turn up profits without creating larger draw down. It's not easy but I'll fool around some more and see where I end up.

... continuing ...

Increasing aggressiveness did not help. Various other modifications were also unsuccessful.

I've run this starting 01-Nov-2008 and it dies a horrible death. This is not surprising, but it does imply you'd need to know when things were going horribly and stop it. If you are able to manually ascertain that the market should only be moving upwards then this EA should do okay. It only opens long positions.


Is it (ea 2009-04-m5-6.mq4) worth a try?

MT4 EA: Aggressive 5 Minute Scalper

Well, it's the weekend, what else is a grown man to do?

I had an inspiration for an (overly) aggressive expert advisor today. Basically, it's a simple buy low and sell high machine using oscillators.

Scope out the chart. It does fairly well for a period of time and then when the market finds it's achilles heel it is undone.


All is not lost. I have some ideas for improving the aggression factor as well as tinkering with it's currently abysmal "take a loss" strategy.

... continuing ...

Theoretically, you could take out $1,000 per day and end up with more money than you started with. It ran for 20 days (01-Apr to 20-Apr) before it's massive death spiral.

... continuing ...

Check this out. By adding a pending purchase system to delay early purchases until the price is a bit better as well as turning off loss sales (a bad strategy to be fixed up soon) we get the following.


The balance, actually I mean equity, is over $77,800 by the 16th in this run. Certainly more profitable than last time around. If we can get an intelligent way to cut losses we might be able to reduce the risk of catastrophe.

... continuing ...

I'm also running on various different time periods to make sure I'm not just optimizing for a certain month. That would not be good.

... continuing ...

Okay, after some tinkering, the system is living through a three month period, but obviously there is a tradeoff involved:


This is 01-Feb-2009 through 25-Apr-2009. There are a couple of scary draw down events and a final equity of around $56,000. So, again, in theory, at about $15,000 of profit per month you could withdraw about $500 every day and calculate the likelihood of scarfing away more than $10,000 before the system has a fatal event.

Unfortunately, removing equity will make it more likely to crash during a draw down situation. Perhaps withdraw at a slower pace? More realistically, I'd like to find a predictor for the draw down events and reduce them. This would reduce overall profit but perhaps the system could trade more aggressively if the draw down situations could be avoided.

Time to look at the reports to find the important dates and then look at the historic data in various time frames.

GBPUSD: A Drunken Sailor

The cable, as the GBPUSD is called, looks like drunken sailor.

The chart is all over the map, with massive daily swings lined up one after the other all over the place.

There are some pips to be made in there!

I'm not generally trading the GBPUSD, but I'm going to put a few moments into figuring out whether my AUDJPY chart set up seems applicable.

It's hard to resist all that volatility.

AUDJPY: Tweezer Top?

The market has about 6 minutes to change it's mind.

If it doesn't, this is going to look like a tweezer top on the 1 hour.

Now, that would be something I'd consider bearish (I originally typed bullish).

If you read my last post... you know I'd like that to happen!


Now about 4 minutes left.

Zzzz. No market reaction on the hour.

Maybe the tails weren't long enough -- or I'm too impatient?

... continuing ...

I am finally seeing some downward movement though it is much later and much slower than I'd have expected:


Hurray... I guess.

AUDJPY: Short On Failure?

It might be time to think about shorting the AUDJPY.

It's coming up to a recent high and might not have a lot of legs left.

If we get a decent failure there could be a shorting opportunity for some part of this evening.

See (on the 1 hour)?


Let's keep an eye on this...

... continuing ...

Down on the 1 minute chart we seem to have some resistance to get through before we have the ability to drop:


... continuing ...

Still on the 1 minute:


It's working the support and resistance (for now).

... continuing ...

This might, and I stress might, constitute a break of support in the 1 minute. The reason I'd consider it significant is that the 15 minute and 1 hour have strong stochastic and RSI values which may be ready to reverse soon.


Still watching.

... continuing ...

If I haven't messed up the lines we are definitely drawing outside of them on the 1 minute at this point:


Will it fire? The bollinger collapse is generally indicative that it will decide on a direction before too long. Don't forget, this is the 1 minute, so a move may not be all that huge unless it's the start of a move in a higher time frame.

... continuing ...

The 15 minute chart doesn't offer much encouragement:


We definitely have to see something conclusive to know what's going to happen. You could always straddle it -- though you'd risk a whipsaw.

... continuing ...

A quick spike, shown on the 15 minute chart, will tempt you to decide:


No failure here yet. Doesn't look promising does it?

I'm not giving up on the potential for this opportunity yet as each of my charts, the 1 minute, the 15 minute and the 1 hour, are all sitting around overbought levels. If the price doesn't get above it's recent high we could see a pullback.

And, yes, of course it could decide to blow right through resistance and throw the short idea to the scrap heap.

... continuing ...

Only 15 minutes left before the hourly chart moves to a new candlestick. This would be a good time for the market to decide what to do. If we hold at this price, but don't go much higher, then the stochastic and RSI would be in a real good position to roll over.


Still watching.

... continuing ...

Gah, no movement at all makes me paranoid! Here's the look of the 1 hour chart at the moment:


We have a touch... similar to an earlier touch that lead to a decline. This touch happens to be lower. We could get some movement. No promises, but we could.

... continuing ...

I'm not the only person thinking this. Here, on the 1 minute, you can see the downward drift as we near the turn of the hour:


Still no promises... maybe it's a feint.

... continuing ...

This, on the 1 hour chart, looks bearish to me. If it is, it could still take a hours to be clear:


Maybe I'll develop more patience through trading?

Perhaps the real move is based on a possible upside down head and shoulders pattern?

Nobody can really say.

Why am I following this idea? Well, if it's right, and it works out as good as might possibly be expected, it could end up being worth about 100 pips. That's worth a little bit of work. If I'm wrong, well, I lose a few pips if I'm tricked into thinking I'm right.

... continuing ...

It's looking a bit robust on the 1 hour:


Did I mention I love my new screen clipping tool?

... continuing ...

You know, if we continue to sit around and do nothing, except maybe fall just a little, we could end up with a tweezer top on the 1 hour:


Now, that I'd find bearish!

... continuing ...

The latest 1 hour looks a bit more promising -- not sure how long it will stay that way of course:


I'm going to buy myself a beer if I end up having read the short on failure action correctly.

... continuing ...

Well, shoot, a shiny new tweezer top type setup and no reaction. The tails must not be long enough. Stupid market, trix are for kids!

.. continuing ...

Just to finish off this post -- I have finally seen movement:


The lack of immediate gratification, and the lack of robust response, has taken some of the joy out of being somewhat correct.

AUDJPY: Morning Peek

Well, first, I can't believe I'm awake this early after such a long night. I need to hone my craft and trade for a living -- I'd be able to keep better hours.

Anyway, this morning we have the follow up to last nights analysis.

We're looking at what appears to be a double bottom with no idea whether or not we'll reap the technical rewards that they can offer.



Since I slept through the last several hours I don't yet have a handle on what I want to do as of yet. Maybe waking up will help.

AUDJPY: Look Who's Consolidating

Well, I should be sleeping, but since I'm not I thought I'd take another look at the charts.

Guess what -- it's the same chart but I see something new!

Okay, sure, a bit more time has passed. However, with the added points I clearly see that we seem to be consolidating.


There should be some money to be made while we bounce around... and then some money to be made when a direction is chosen.

As ever, things can change anytime... ;)

... continuing ...

Speaking of change:

AUDJPY: Did We Bounce?

My last blog post, audjpy decision point, talked about an upcoming decision point. At the moment it looks like we are going to begin an upward leg.

I'm feeling particularly cautious at the moment, especially since this is only on the 15 minute chart, but I thought I'd post it.

Notice the last candlestick:


As I'm long term bullish on AUDJPY let's hope this is the beginning, or perhaps resumption, of an upward trend. However, I must point out that the 1 day chart is not very promising.