Finally, a stripped down TWS made possible with new build 854?

[nononsense]

Quote from jimrockford:

I think that what many ET members want is for IB to shift its priorities, so that not only the existing bells and whistles, but also the core functions, for example, optimal order routing and execution, will work correctly and reliably. IB instead neglects quality, and keeps adding more and more bells and whistles, even though so many of the old ones don't work or don't work reliably, and other far more important core problems are just ignored. The feature for excluding non-electronic quotes from SMART, for example, is not just another bell or whistle, it is critical for optimizing execution prices for electronically liquid, exchange-traded U.S. equities, yet it has never actually worked.

Jim,
You sum it up rather well. A top heavy eyecandy TWS is certainly useless and by Murphy's law can only attract trouble.
Much more important is what goes on in IB's backyard in order to support all this non-essential -- read detrimental -- for trading hullabaloo. SIMPLICITY = RELIABILITY.

I have not looked at the new release yet as the stand alone version isn't out yet. I would love to see IB do some more effort on a no-nonsense JAVA FREE FIX solution. They did a lot of work on it already I think, but we badly need some worked out examples and let's hope we'll get some kind of a test or demo version. Going by the problems many people seem to be having with FIX at other places, except perhaps those big 100+ programmer outfits, a lot of business must be waiting for IB.

I must say though that IB must have been doing its uttermost recently to avoid those ugly interruptions and/or failures of a few months back. I am only talking about essentials here: no charting or backfill.

 

[gr8stock]

Execution reliability is the most important feature for REAL traders.
All others need the bells and whistles to play with.

Every time IB added new "bells" it caused troubles.

My suggestion for the next TWS (after 854) is version 754.
No, this is not typo, version 754 is the best. LOL

 

[jficquette]

Quote from DAV:

I should add that the feature selector was developed to make the TWS more friendly to new users, who will start with basic features and then have the ability to add tools as they become more comfortable.

All I need is an order button and my fills complete. I miss at least one trade a day because of missed fills.

I suspect that IB is churning constantly in the background doing useless stuff and not paying attention to my order.

Looks like to me a verify button for orders is not available because you wish to generate more commissions through errors.
Why else not have that??

John

 

[j_medved]

Quote from jficquette:

I suspect that IB is churning constantly in the background doing useless stuff and not paying attention to my order.

thats a good one.

 

[maxpi]

So now IB has a modular TWS just in time for the death of Dynaorder. I hope the API does not change and break Dynaorder any time soon, I don't want to learn to write DLL's, I don't, I don't!! Ok, I am a little spoiled maybe, where is that copy of Power Basic.... Geez it's not enough that systems backtest way better than they work we also have to use all this software which, personally, I think is like driving a Model T. It breaks in the middle of what you are doing and requires more attention then all the rest of your life put together.

 

[isaac000]

Quote from local_crusher:

I had a quick look. I did not notice any decrease in memory useage. Looks it has no effect on the class loader and garbage collector.
That's garbage, indeed.

Just ran some tests. When I start TWS with all features selected, javaw uses 68M of RAM. Then I de-selected all features, javaw RAM usages doesn't decrease. But if I close TWS and let it start with all features disabled, it uses 65M of RAM. it saves only 3M, not much, but it shows something isn't loaded when all features disabled, which is a step toward the right direction.

I hope someday we will see a true modular TWS.

 

[rcj]

Quote from isaac000:

Just ran some tests. When I start TWS with all features selected, javaw uses 68M of RAM. Then I de-selected all features, javaw RAM usages doesn't decrease. But if I close TWS and let it start with all features disabled, it uses 65M of RAM. it saves only 3M, not much, but it shows something isn't loaded when all features disabled, which is a step toward the right direction.

I hope someday we will see a true modular TWS.

I run Tws from the IB server.

HP Pavilion box....AMD XP3200+...512meg mem...WinXP(Home)
with SP2.

I shut dwn all the options stuff, market scanner, alerts,alarms, complex order types and Book. After clking the "apply" button
javaw.exe reduces its mem footprint to about 20meg.

However, the mem footprint slowly begins to creep upward
by a few k every minute or so. Seemed to stop that at about
28megs of mem usage. After a few more min it may
start increasing again.

If I minimize the workspace the mem footprint of javaw goes
dwn to about 3 or 4 megs and starts to slowly increase as
noted above.

BTW .... as i finish this note mem usage is up to 48megs where
TWS is running as an inactive window...not minimized.

rj

 

[stock777]

50 MEG is not a problem. It seems like a lot , and I wish it were 5 or 10 meg, but as a practical matter its pretty irrelevant.

You should have a GIG of ram at least, but 512 Meg is plenty, and 50 meg is not going to do any damage or kill your performance.

I've seen no performance hits even when TWS takes 90 meg. I run tons of stuff simultaneously , using avg 500 meg out of my 1 gig.

I think people are just getting anal about the memory usage without reason.

 

[rcj]

Quote from stock777:

50 MEG is not a problem. It seems like a lot , and I wish it were 5 or 10 meg, but as a practical matter its pretty irrelevant.

You should have a GIG of ram at least, but 512 Meg is plenty, and 50 meg is not going to do any damage or kill your performance.

I've seen no performance hits even when TWS takes 90 meg. I run tons of stuff simultaneously , using avg 500 meg out of my 1 gig.

I think people are just getting anal about the memory usage without reason.

I agree.

Really, ive had no problems with any of the builds since
i started trading last April. But...i only do simple equity trades.
Nothing fancy.....yet. I just have too much to learn and get
more screen time just watching. I run several apps with TWS and
i never seem to go below 60megs of available mem.

............ rj

 

[Bob111]

i'm using 856.5 standalone and right now on one account memory usage is 110K and on another-21K. settings are absolutely identical and set to minimum stuff enabled. how is this possible? and what should i do to decrease TWS memory usage?
Thank you!