Installing and Starting AutoTrader

Windows Installation

• Double click the file "AutoTrader_windows_<version>.exe" that you downloaded.
• Follow the prompt to complete the installation. The default install location is C:\Program Files\AutoTrader.  If you do not have Java installed, the installer will give you an option to download and install Java 1.5.
  
• A shortcut will be created on your desktop by default, simply double click the AutoTrader shortcut icon to start the program.

Windows Uninstallation

• To uninstall the software on windows, simply select  AutoTrader Uninstaller from the Program menu.
• You will be prompted if you want to keep the data file or not. Select no if you want to keep the AutoTrader data.
  
• You do not need to uninstall in order to upgrade, simply run the installer of the newer version and install on top of the current installation.

MacOS X Installation

• Download the MacOS X installer archive. You need to use Stuffit expander to uncompress the sit file into an installer app.
• Double click on the "AutoTrader Installer.app" to install AutoTrader.  The default install location is in your /Applications directory.
• MacOS X comes with Java 1.4.  It is recommended you upgrade to Java 1.5. File can be downloaded here.
  
• Double click on AutoTrader.app icon in /Applications to start the program.

MacOS X Uninstallation

• To uninstall on mac, simply delete AutoTrader.app from your /Applications directory.
• To delete the AutoTrader data, simply delete the ~/AutoTrader folder in your home directory.
• You do not need to uninstall to install a newer version of AutoTrader.

Unix/Linux Installation

• Download the unix archive "AutoTrader_unix_<version>.tar.gz" to your unix system. Extract the archive by typing the command

tar xvzf AutoTrader_unix_<version>.tar.gz

• The archive will extract all the files to the AutoTrader directory. Move the AutoTrader directory to your home directory if your tar command extracted it to a different location.
• You must have Java installed and in your PATH. It is recommended that you install the latest version of Java available for your Unix platform.
  
• Go to the AutoTrader directory and type the command ./AT.sh to start the program.

Unix/Linux Uninstallation

• To uninstall on Linux and Unix systems, simply delete the AutoTrader directory where you uncompressed the archive package for AutoTrader. Use the command rm -rf AutoTrader to delete the AutoTrader folder and all subdirectories in it.
  
•  If you uncompressed AutoTrader in a location other than your home directory, you can delete the AutoTrader data folder that is located in ~/AutoTrader in your home directory.
• To install a newer version of AutoTrader, you can uncompress the archive package to the same directory as the previous version to replace the files.
  

Configure and Connect to TWS

• Start TWS.  If this is the first time you are using AutoTrader, it is recommended you login to the TWS demo account, username edemo, password demouser.
• Configure TWS. Make sure you select from the TWS menu Configure/API/Enable ActiveX and Socket Clients. Also add your local machine to trusted IP Addresses list by selecting TWS menu Configure/API/Trusted API Addresses..., then create a new entry for 127.0.0.1.
• Start AutoTrader. Click on the "Connect" button to connect to TWS. The connect button becomes the "Disconnect" button when you are connected to TWS for live data.
  

Placing a Trade Using AutoTrader

• Connect AutoTrader to TWS if it is not yet connected.
• Select a symbol. Select one of the predefined symbols. Let's use CSCO for this demo.
• Enter a long position. Click on the "Buy at Market" button to enter a long positiobn for CSCO. The display will automatically switch to Positiobn Exit mode.
• Close the position. Once you enter a position, the Target and Stop orders are automatically submitted to TWS. The position will close either when the Target or the Stop price is hit.  To manually close a position, simply click on the "Close Position" button.

Simulating a Trade Using Live Data

• Connect AutoTrader to TWS if it is not yet connected.
• Click on the "Simulate" button to switch to simulation mode. You should see "**Simulation Mode**" on the menu bar.
• Place a trade just like in live mode,  the orders will not be submitted to TWS but will just be simulated in AutoTrader.

Playing Back Data For Simulation

• Switch AutoTrader to simulation mode. You should see "**Simulation Mode**" in the menu bar.
  
• Disconnect from TWS if you are connected to TWS. You can disconnect by clicking on the "Disconnect" button.
• Click on the "Connect" button. The Simulation Setup dialog will open.
• Select "Random Number" for Data Source. You can read the full description of each Data Source type in the main documentation.  Leave the other settings as is. The default parameter values are for symbol ES.
• If you want to view a chart of the playback data, you need to have SierraChart installed. Visit  http://www.sierrachart.com to get a trial copy. Make sure "Sierra Directory" is pointing to the correct location where you installed SierraChart.  Start SierraChart now.
• Click on the "Sierra Playback" button to start playback. Select symbol ES if the currently selected symbol in AutoTrader is not ES. The default setting for Random Number data source is for ES symbol.
• As an option to using Sierra, you can use any chart program that uses TWS as a data source to display the playback data by clicking on the "TWS API Server" button. Make sure TWS is not running. AutoTrader will act as TWS and will accept the TWS API client connection from your charting program. Once your chart program connects, open a new chart using the symbol ATPB (or whatever symbol you specified as the playback symbol). Note that for user specified playback symbol, AutoTrader will append ".R" to the end of the symbol in order to avoid accidentally overwriting your charting program's database for the actual symbol with playback data.
  
• Go to SierraChart and open a new Intraday Chart. Select the file ATPB.mnd. If you do not see ATPB.mnd, then your "Sierra Directory" setting in Simulation Setup dialog may be incorrect. Make sure it points to the copy of SierraChart that you are running.
• You should now be able to place simulated trades in AutoTrader.