IB Front Ends? ButtonTrader RIP.

[SteveH]

I don't use these programs but you might want to take a look at either ZeroLine Trader or Bracket Trader. ZLT is showing a screenshot of a price ladder and I know years ago BT did have a price ladder but their website isn't showing one now. They're both cheap to trade with per year at $100-$120 and have been around for over a decade so I imagine the bug level is very low.

Both have free demo editions to where you can connect to IB's demo account to see what they can do.

 

[MattZ]

BT no longer works after IB encrypted the log files, and negotiations for a workaround collapsed. To work around the encryption was not practical. The product was disabled on short notice, unfortunately.

The first questions are:

• What is the best DOM for IB?
• What is the best DOM irrespective of broker?

Focus is on equity indices only, mostly intraday. "Best" means a combination of UI intuitiveness, features, and affordability.

Another question is this: is the impact of log-encryption known for trading front ends built into charting programs?

Why would they not develop this product for another API? I am sure some of their customers will follow them. Maybe they did consider it, but there was an obstacle(?).

 

[heywally]

I had an on-again off-again relationship with Buttontrader for a long time and it miffs me a bit that they didn't do what was needed to fix their code, since the software was pretty important to a core group of people who bought and used it for a very long time, supporting their business. It's gone with little warning. OTOH, they've been doing this for a long time.

There is no other interface that even comes close to what it did, since it provided a very close-in view and graphical representation of the short-term heartbeat of trading along with the quickest way available anywhere to alter and initiate orders via their buttoned screen, with all of its options. OTOH, you could argue that that heartbeat is too magnified (though you could effectively alter that magnification) to make good decisions regarding entries and exits to a trade. Woe-be to you if you traded via BT without having some other bar charts up to help make decisions but that goes without saying.

For me, it tended to "make me" trade too actively (on both entries and exits) which is not what you want to do over the long run, in most market conditions. But, it was some of the most impressive software I've ever used for any purpose and it was really really ---- fun. rip

ps - The TOS platform comes the closest to mimicking BT for me but it's not the same. You at least get the chart right there on the screen with the price ladder and you can do tick charts.

 

[tommcginnis]

I had an on-again off-again relationship with Buttontrader for a long time and it miffs me a bit that they didn't do what was needed to fix their code, since the software was pretty important to a core group of people who bought and used it for a very long time, supporting their business. It's gone with little warning. OTOH, they've been doing this for a long time.

I've built a pretty involved options analysis set-up that takes data from TWS. In March of 2017, IB changed this data from by strike {calls + puts} to {calls} by strike and then {puts} by strike. This *completely* blew up my platform, and it took, essentially, a complete re-write to respond to this seemingly simple re-ordering of input data.

Could I have written an intro? One that would take the new data form "as presented" and re-order it to fit the prior form, keeping the original platform structure intact? Yes, except it would've added another 20%-25% to the spreadsheet in logic-heavy and performance-lagging dead weight, and the thing is *nearly* too big now. With an eye towards keeping it usable in even the smallest of laptops, having this behemoth grow even more was not acceptable. Hence, 're-write.'

I relay this story because it's really a daunting task to see an architecture you've constructed with such exacting patience and attention-to-detail, become unhinged and disabled by a front-end "Boom!" of a problem. Performance was a priority for BT, too, and having put so much into it, Han might've looked at the idea of a ground-up rewrite and thought, "Nope!"
(Which is *also* to say, Don't be surprised if, in the next 6-months or year or so, if a new+and+improved ButtonTrader doesn't make an entrance, once the guy gets his feet back under him. I never used the product, but I have kept track of it for about 10 years, so: YMMV.

 

[tommcginnis]

A little more perspective from the TWS API g-list:

3a.
TWS/Gateway logfile encryption
From: Richard L King
Date: Tue, 14 Aug 2018 06:58:42 PDT
It seems that IBKR have decided to start encrypting the log files produced by TWS and the Gateway (at least for live and paper accounts, though seemingly not for demo accounts). (Thanks to Charlie Cooper for alerting me to this.)

So if you have ever looked in a logfile to check that your API requests and responses are what you expected, or for any other reason, you’ll now be out of luck because you can’t read the logfiles any more!

I think this is an utter disaster. I frequently look at the logfiles for a variety of different purposes, and I’ve leant a lot over the years from the information they contain.

This appears to be a knee-jerk reaction on IBKR’s part to scare stories on the internet to the effect that ‘GDPR requires log files to be encrypted’.

Now I’m no lawyer, but this seems to me to be total rubbish. GDPR, quite rightly, demands that personal information be protected from unauthorised access (amongst many other things) but I’m not aware that GDPR anywhere mandates encryption as THE solution to data protection (it is certainly A solution in appropriate cases, but TWS/Gateway logfiles is not one of these).

For a start, the log files arguably contain no personal information. They do contain the account id, but as far as I’m aware not the user id and certainly not the password: the account id cannot be used to gain access to an account or to identify an individual. And of course they do (at least if the log level is set high enough) contain information about order requests and responses. So if some malicious person gained access to my computer, sure they could assume that my TWS log files relate to my account and therefore the logs would reveal details of my trades etc. But so what: if a malicious person gains unauthorised access to my computer, I have much bigger problems to worry about than them being able to deduce what trades I’ve made today.

Second, IBKR are of course responsible for protecting any personal data they hold about me, but they are not responsible for data on my computer – how can they possibly be? That’s my responsibility alone.

Third, anyone who is concerned about protecting the contents of their log files can easily make proper arrangements using operating system facilities, without making the log files inaccessible to themselves.

Fourth, we know nothing about how IBKR are doing this encryption, what strength it has etc.

I’d be happy for IBKR to provide an option somewhere in the settings for logfile encryption, but to simply make the logfiles unreadable by anyone is unutterably stupid. I presume they will be able to decrypt them themselves, but if we can’t take extracts from them and include them in bug reports etc, then a major part of the value of logfiles is lost.

I’d be interested to hear if anyone else has a view on all this.

Richard

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3b.
Re: TWS/Gateway logfile encryption
From: Jimmy
Date: Tue, 14 Aug 2018 07:05:53 PDT
I also use TWS & API log files for figuring stuff out.
If they are going to be encrypted, IB should provide a means for us to decrypt - an app, or sample code, that can decrypt log files (presumably by supplying a TWS username & password).

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3c.
Re: TWS/Gateway logfile encryption
From: Josh
Date: Tue, 14 Aug 2018 12:09:10 PDT
The logs can be decrypted by TWS and IB Gateway. In TWS, navigate to:

Classic TWS -> Account -> Diagnostics -> TWS Logs

Then logs can be viewed or decrypted and saved to disk. In Gateway,

File -> Gateway Logs

Unfortunately I can't comment on the legal ramifications of GDPR in particular, but please note the encryption is for other situations in additional to using a secure computer, such as uploading/storing logs at IB, or if a user decides to log into a public computer (where they may not be aware the logs are created). Encryption is not a decision which would be taken lightly.

Josh (IBKR)