All of this energy spent on determining the right platform, OS, etc. is a complete waste of time if the OP has no edge. OP, your first job should be to find a platform which can help you quickly prove/disprove your trading ideas. If you find something meaningful, then you can worry about the perfect execution platform, OS, etc.
Exactly. I always tell people who say I need to use Mac Or whatever to stop thinking this way. Follow then path of least resistance to test/get edge.
What trading platform if any would allow me to program real-time data (or historic data for that matter), in any programming language, and execute paper trades. Language/OS is not an issue, rather the robustness and scalability (to real-time, real money).
I can only speak for SigmaTrader which I use (supports C# or Python). Others in this thread have vouched for other platforms such as NinjaTrader. MotiveWave which is a sponsor on this site is Java based and can be run on Mac.
In some cases it matters, you might run into limitations later on and it's a waste of time when you've already written everything else for this certain platform.
Valid point as well. But as far as I know MAC is not typical system of choice for most traders as its software is limited.
I disagree. Most professional platforms are cloud-based thus OS is never a run time issue only a development time issue. For day-to-day use Window's reputation is so tarnished but there are 3-ways to emulate windows, one is an actual partition, the other parallel is a little buggy but elegant solution of running both systems at the same time for $70/year.
"Most professional platforms are cloud-based.."??? Professional for who? Trader, developer? IMO, if you have to ask the question, then don't bother and use Windows, the most popular and used.