Up to now I have been a discretionary Trader. I want to start programming with the view to add Auto Trading to my Trading. Is Easy Language a good place to start?
I'd just start looking at examples of something like a simple moving average crossover system in multiple languages. -Matlab -Python - R - c# - Easy Language - AFL ( Amibroker Formula Language) And compare. Maybe think of ideas you want to backtest/model and see what work is out there. I myself have been using Amibroker and it meets my needs so far. Benefits of proprietary languages are to me is that I'm using the same software as many other users and it's easier for myself to find examples of a problem I'm trying to solve. The basic backtester is almost dummy proof and is very easy to understand with the documentation. Many great built in functions and simple options make things easier too. It also allows with the custom backtester and the multiple backtest modes for advanced ideas to be done. Issues that I've had is that it's not easy to learn past very simple ideas.(no language does though). Programming takes a lot of precision I guess you could say. For instance for myself one of my first ideas was to try to backtest entering a pullback/consolidation in a trend with some sort of momentum in the previous swing. Not an easy concept for myself anyways to program since computers only understand math basically. Theirs just way too many if,and, nots to capture what you expect to and to exclude what you think is obvious. I myself have grown an interest in perhaps learning some Python as it has a lot of interesting material out there and seems to be gaining a lot of ground in the financial world. One issue I can see from someone that hasn't really dug into it is that it is open source, it has a large amount of libraries and material is really scattered all over the place. The other issue is that say I'm having issues with Amibroker and can't understand what's wrong I can go to the Yahoo group or e-mail support and they know the software inside out and can quickly go, oh this function was used incorrectly, try this instead, where as with Python, it's free and open source and nobody really has to be accountable for any bugs or issues and could take some effort to resolve. But there are huge communities so perhaps it is easy. Here's a video I watched recently with Ernest Chan with his comparison/opinion on Matlab,R and Python. It is one mans opinion and he does seem very leaned toward Matlab which I wouldn't consider easy from example codes I've seen but I do believe it's popular in the academic/university world so some people already have some knowledge which makes it a time saver. Oh thought I'd add this think as I fooled around with it one night. Get an idea of Python in a simple way(not related to financial time series analysis). May be others as I did try one with C so perhaps theirs a learn c# or R learn website with the interactive editor built in. http://www.learnpython.org
I would definitely recommend Python. I used to be a programmer and I have 20 years of IT experience. I think I have a good feeling for which direction things are going. Python is the way forward and has been for a few years now.
C# is for Windows mostly somebody correct me if I am wrong. But take Interactive Brokers for example. They have a slew of programming languages that you can use with their API some of them pretty exotic and others hard to get into such as C++ and C#. You can also use Python though, by using other people's Python to C++ code or conversion library. What I am trying to say is.. everything that is popular at all and not too niche has people using it with Python lately. I would not call the Interactive Brokers API very user friendly, quite the opposite. But it is powerful and you can use it reliably with Python in such a way by using tools others have made available. That is why I would recommend Python over C# (or Java or C++ or R) if you were learning a new language. Python can run on Windows but not C# on Linux unless I am very wrong. Hang on.. I re-read your post and I now see that with Auto Trading you are referring to some specific website or product, it looks like this one: https://www.tradeking.com/faqs/trading/autotrade It looks like they use REST API calls which are based on web requests that get JSON files (the format of the input/output). Yes I think that can definitely be written in Python and it would work well. I found some Python projects for Trade King Auto Trading using Google, not sure how actively they are being developed but it looks like that is not necessary if you learn how to properly use those REST calls. Learning how REST and JSON work would likely be something you have to do no matter which programming language you chose, if you wanted to use their Auto Trading.
This makes no sense, if they Google C# Linux the first thing they come across is this question and someone pointing them to Mono!!! Going back to the language, Easy Language is fine it you are happy with a higher level pseudo language which is directly integrated. With custom code such as C# etc. you normally need to create connectors to your trade platform. Some platforms have those connectors built in but then you need to find the combination that suits your personal circumstances: do you want more control over easier management; are you fixed to a specific broker; do you need cross platform; what language do you want to use. If they don't have the connectors then you need to monitor those as well, with certain strategies you can eliminate your profitability by missing only one trade. As this is your first automated strategy start with the simplest, which as it appears you already have TS try there. Once you take all the factors in to the mix, data gathering, backtesting, monitoring, remote servers, it's not something you do unless you have some experience of those environments. Alternatively, why don't you just get something to develop it for you and you concentrate on the business side of making it profitable.
Ninjatrader, like many other programms, uses C#, so no connectors necessary. And they don't understand Easy Language. Easy Language does not work on any program except from Tradestation and Multicharts. So you are limited to these two. But I agree that Easy Language is eaiser to use then C# if you don't know anything about programming. Yeah do that and they will run their business with a copie of your system. It is like Coca Cola that asks external people to work for them and Coke gives the original formula to them. Very smart.