Thanks Gringinho. I'm not trading right now but I was able to log in to IB after I saw your post. I guess I still have my cached DNS lookup.
I can tell you that IB systems are very robust. I don't even remember when it was last time I had problems.
This is something related to how the Internet works with using something called IP addresses which the networking hardware of your machine can use to contact other machines and hardware on the Internet. Something like www.elitetrader.com is translated into a numerical address which is then used at lower level hardware addressing. DNS servers holds tables of this information and typically serve a domain like ibllc.com or elitetrader.com. This information is cached in "short time memory" by Windows and other DNS servers used by your computer (e.g your ISP's nameserver/DNS). This information of the IP address might be invalidated by the short term memory when you stop being logged into the TWS application. This problem could be because someone administering the DNS tables or configuration f...ed up ... It's not something that IB caused, and could happen to any Internet domain like elitetrader.com as well. It's just very irritating that it happen to the domain of something like a stockbroker - but not IB's fault. It could also be because of a malignant attack from hackers etc. - attacking the DNS servers of IB when most vulnerable - the midnight shutdown - when most clients login/logout and would likely request DNS information in the process. The IB servers themselves are very stable like chinook mentioned - and I have only praise for their service as well. They're the best I've used so far (of 10+ brokers I've used). Also remember that since IB is very widely used, many users will have ISP problems, PC problems etc. contributing to difficulties using any software - including IB TWS. Therefore seeing a lot of reports about problems needs to be evaluated with the knowledge of what could have caused the problem - to decide if IB, the user or someone in between was to blame. edit: The login problems also made a experimental trailing stop I was fiddling with get activated and stop out the trade I had. I guess I can get in lower now anyways, but I'll take the 9 pip profits to be a little more on the safe side. I experience quite a lot of problems from Brazil like power-outages, ISP problems almost every week with downtimes and other ambiental problems. Need some getting used to the fact that many electrical and other human-related functions stop working when it rains etc. :eek: I have a 8h PSU standing by, so I won't have any problems there - but some of the 2.5TB diskspace I got frequently gets into problems because of heat etc. I'm taking better care of that though - as I'm running all my systems 24-7-365.
Sorry to hear about your trailing stop. This is why I'm reluctant to automate my trading (the exit part). By the way, you have immense amount of storage 2.5TB! Why do you need that much storage? Are you saving tick data from many different products?
I'm a computer science major and do a lot of stuff. I also do DV-editing at home with a nice 3-ccd camera. I have so many computer-related interests that it takes a lot of time and space - and I keep most of all of the data I've ever produced. I'm actually running out of space again soon.
I had two shorts this morning. The first one got stopped out with 5-6 ticks. The second one currently is open. Bonds are heading slightly south, I'm expecting EurUsd to follow them. EIA Petroleum Status Report is coming out at 10:30 am EST. This might also have an effect on EurUsd. I'm not very familiar with this report and how much effect it might have...
Nice short in the bonds! The weekly EIA Petroleum Status can have a huge impact on oil prices. This is last week's report. 9/22 http://www.eia.doe.gov/neic/press/press239.html http://www.eia.doe.gov/
Thanks Ebo. I closed my short. EurUsd seems to be happy with where it's right now. I can't see any edges right now. It's time to suppress trading urges and do some Internet surfing...