What is the best platform (of brokers) for API (application program interface) in Visual C++ to write automatic trading program in your experience? I only know the API for Interactive Brokers TWS, and it sucks.
I try to look up the website http://www.assent.com. I cannot find their commission schedule. Is this the right website and how much is the commission for various stock, option, future, etc?
With a quick glance i don't see any in depth info about the company. Except their Bio's. Any pricing and API info ?
assent is a pro and retail firm. Call them up. their rates are competitive ... Also try lynx capital out of new york. they are heavy on ANVIL ....
I don't know Ben, but I have worked with the TWSAPI for a number of years, and can see why Ben would have that opinion. You run the risk of untouched code breaking everytime IB puts out a new TWS release (every month or 2). Also, in some instances you never get resolution to resolve the problems from IB, so you have to build-in code to resolve these completely unexpected problems on your own. That being said though, I have found the TWSAPI to be a solid API and extremely easy to work with. You could join the TWSAPI yahoo group and get sample programs to get started. I have also worked with many other API's from other companies and have found the TWSAPI to be one of the easiest to work with. They seem to get better with age. Don't we all? ha. Ed
I used to have an automatic trading program that worked with IB TWS API. I used the 2006 twssocketclient.dll. Now, after updating to the new DLL, nothing works, not even the econnect(). If anyone can helps me step by step how to make the downloaded sample API program (Microsoft visual C++) works, I might change my opinion. They keep on adding more functions, including callbacks, which I never used. They change the parameters of calling functions, which make older program abort due to mismatched function parameters. This is just bad software design and DLL hell. If anyone knows a broker with good and stable API interface. At the least, it should supply a sample program, which you compile with Microsoft Visual C++, and it will interface with the interface program well without any debugging. Then all the programer needs to do is to modify the sample program (cut and paste) to make his specific application works. It should be a very simple concept. IB does not provide any adequate software support. They ignore you. The person who answers your question doesn't know what he is talking about. This is a sign of bad customer support. They should have think about how much commission they can make from good API design.
FIX is perhaps the best for version stability and cross-platform stability as it's an open standard, but good luck getting it from most places unless you're doing enough volume for them to decide it's worth it.