I want to do some coding work such as custom indicators, back testing, and ultimately automate trading in the future. I did some basic search, Sierra Chart, Ninja Trader and TradeStation look good. Can anyone please give me some ideas of these tools? Which one is most powerful for manual trading? Which one has most users? Which one has the biggest developer base? etc.Thanks!
NinjaTrader without a question. It has full power of c# to code anything you want. The other 2 do not have full fledged computer languages.
Had no idea Sierra supports c++. I used something similar to easylanguage on it. easylanguage Is a scripting language and has many limitations.
As stated, SierraChart uses C/C++ language. It is called ACSIL, and code can be compiled through 3rd party programming platforms including MS Visual Studio Community Edition which is free, and also has full debugging features. I have used SC for years, including programming a library of indicators, auto-trades, and general utility-type tools. Just as important, maybe moreso, is the fact SC is stable as it gets... it just always works (for me). All that said, SC is "old school". Compared to programming in C# or another modern language, where things are exposed as "objects", and objects have events, those modern traits may have to be created in C/C++. What may seem trivial in one language, may be a project in another. It works both ways though... if an object does not expose what you want, you are basically out of luck. With C/C++ you can twiddle and use even use brute force if you want. Not so true in other languages. Anyway, with all it's warts and quirks (all platforms have warts and quirks btw), if I had to start fresh, I would still choose SierraChart. The price, the support board, the capabilities, the acceptance of use at many brokers, choice of data feeds, the stability. It all works (for me).
Please check out MotiveWave as well. You can program custom studies/indicators/strategies using our Java SDK. We have full strategy backtesting, optimization, walkforward testing, etc. We are also larger than anyone realizes, and have been around for 10 years.
Hi Leigh. Perhaps you can list some specific features/reasons why MotiveWave is a better choice than the platforms listed by the OP.
In the context of this particular thread, I'm not sure what else would be relevant to mention without making this thread about something else. Java is a solid, stable, 'full fledged' language. MotiveWave is a very stable platform. With regards to our Strategy Backtesting, MotiveWave enables you to test and optimize your strategies using historical data. Our wizard-based interface guides you through the process. Testing may be performed using actual tick data provided by your data service. If this data is not available, MotiveWave can generate ticks using historical bars and even minute-based bars. MotiveWave backtesting allows you to use any bar size and test over any number of instruments. We offer exhaustive and genetic optimization, as well as walk-forward testing and reporting. Some people tend to also group Replay Mode into the Strategy Backtesting umbrella of features. I talk about our Replay Mode in this thread: https://www.elitetrader.com/et/threads/market-play-back-service.327266/#post-4764328 If you have other specific MotiveWave questions, please let me know (or post in our Q&A section).
It has its own flavor of C++ called ACSIL. It was really few years ago and then all of sudden nothing that I programmed worked and support was extremely rude and refused to support me so I gave up. So Sierra Charts is a hit & miss. If it works for you, it works great but when it doesn't, you won't get any support. The support would just tell you to read their documentation. I have caught their documentation falling short several times of providing complete instructions but they still don't care. Their customer support really leaves much to be desired. Ninja Trader is great but ONLY for backtesting and indicator alarms (even that is unreliable) and if you use IB data, be aware of huge price spikes that can still happen from time to time that can completely skew your indicator data which Ninja Trader would absolutely refuse to acknowledge that it's their problem and fix it; the only solution that they gave you is to spend another $100+ to buy their 3rd-party data which they take a cut. And plus do NOT ever never EVER use Ninja Trader for live trading. Their live trading server is just not up to par, they will NOT execute your indicator signals in a timely manner and sometimes not all. This was several years ago. Unless they have improved since then but that was my experience.
Sorry JSOP, you know I love you, but... I use Ninjatrader exclusively for my live trades, and never had a problem with executions. Granted, I use a different broker for trading so am speaking about their software platform, not NinjaBroker trading servers, so cannot speak on that front. Raymond Doodoo has really confused the industry when he went rogue 4 years ago and decided to go into the brokerage business.