Any benefit to learning one over the other? Using IB as broker and Esignal as data provider. Building trading systems and interfacing with multiple programs.
The biggest benefit of one over the other is the learning curve. C++ is not a good language with which to learn programming. Even if you are good with programming, C++ is not easy when using it to program under Windows. On the other hand, VBA allows some very bad programming habits. but if you're just writing stuff for your own use that only you will maintain, VBA would likely be fine. Let me know if you have any further questions.
VBA is a toy. If you wanna go for something serious get into vc++ or c#. Especially C# is really easy to learn once you get the basic idea about classes etc. Additionaly the CrystalReports support and direct accessing any kind of databases makes it really easy to start out with for beginners
C++ is the best choice in the long run. multithreading is the best approach for financial real-time applications. I prefer C++ over C# because I have more control over the generated object, also because C++ is truly multiplatform, forget windows MFC, MFC source code is ugly and unreadable. I am instead a big fan of QT www.trolltech.com
************************************ VBA is a toy. ************************************ MS Access and Excel are small-scale "toys", but VBA itself is quite powerful for individual use. So unless you're trolling for thousands of arbitrage opportunities or doing massive computational algorithms (or heavy object oriented/windows business) programming, VBA (and Visual Basic) are imo great! VBA can give you alerts and backtesting capabilites that can give you a leg up on many people who are still doing things entirely manually...
guys.......common.......did not see a single right word so far....... C++ is core language, on which applications such windows OS (i think)Word, Access,Excel and more complicated things are written. VBA-visual basic for application. that mean-you can write a code in applications such-MSWord, Excel, Access. That it. Good language for starters is VB-visual basic 5-6. this thing is a part of VISUAL STUDIO app. VB give you ability to write stand alone app with .exe extention. simple example-is notepad or calculator on every computer. after you learn VB -you can write such app in minutes. it more than enough, if you want to play with IB. you can create charts,alerts, whatever you need. go to yahoo->group, find TWSAPI group, sign up, read my posts there, and you will find-where and how to get it for free. also, great examples for starters and other stuff. on other hand-you dont have to spend nights, try to learn it. just tell me, how to make money on stock market, and i will programm for you till rest of my life )))))))))))))))))))) Good Luck!