Python Programmers

WallstYouth · Apr 11, 2006

Anyone here using python and know if anyone brokers are supporting it?

I really hate C/C++ and would perfer using something higher up the stack like python on a unix system.

osorico · Apr 11, 2006

Quote from WallstYouth:

Anyone here using python and know if anyone brokers are supporting it?

I really hate C/C++ and would perfer using something higher up the stack like python on a unix system.

Doubtful for customer purposes/connections. Maybe used internally by some brokerages though.

compiled vs interpreted.

Good luck

nononsense · Apr 12, 2006

Quote from WallstYouth:

Anyone here using python and know if anyone brokers are supporting it?

I really hate C/C++ and would perfer using something higher up the stack like python on a unix system.

For IB exists IbPy:
http://www.python.org/pypi/IbPy/0.5

IbPy runs very well on both linux and windoz. I exclusively run linux now with IbPy.

nononsense
PS:
Don't pay attention to that compiled/interpreted nonsense. For most cases of intelligent Python usage this is totally irrelevant.

mg_mg · Apr 12, 2006

A very nice Python application with IB API:

http://profitpy.sourceforge.net/

nononsense · Apr 12, 2006

Quote from mg_mg:

A very nice Python application with IB API:

http://profitpy.sourceforge.net/

Let me add that profitpy is by the same author as IbPy: Troy Melhase. In fact, having never used profitpy, I believe that it relies on IbPy for connecting to IB.

I also seems that profitpy has not been updated since 2004, whereas a rather recent IbPy version is available (v0.5).

Both are nice examples of Python code usage. It is worthwhile to also take a look at Qt by Trolltech, in fact PyQt for Python. It comes with most (all?) linux distro's and installs automatically with KDE. PyQt (Qt) gives you a tremendous framework, truly portable to any environment, including windoz. Hard to find anything coming close to it, certainly not Java!

HLB · Apr 12, 2006

I used Tcl/Tk in the past. I was under impression , that Tk is a standard GUI toolkit for Python. Can you compare it with Qt?
thanks

nononsense · Apr 12, 2006

Quote from HLB:

I used Tcl/Tk in the past. I was under impression , that Tk is a standard GUI toolkit for Python. Can you compare it with Qt?
thanks

There are many toolkits available under Python (Tkinter, PyGTK, ...). Tcl/Tk is, I believe, included with Python.
Like others, many limitations exist.
The best (most complete), IMHO are Qt (PyQt) and wxPython. 2-3 years ago, I used wxPython under windoz. I then switched to PyQt which I found much superior.
Qt (Trolltech) is an industrial grade framework/toolkit perfectly portable and freely available for private use, now also under windows (Qt4). It is available for C++ (Qt) as well as for Python (via PyQt)
A good place to get 'quality opinion' is the python user's group:
http://groups.google.com/group/comp.lang.python?lnk=li&hl=en

nononsense

orenmnero · Apr 12, 2006

If FIX connectivity is an option for you, QuickFIX has a python API. You will have to build the QuickFIX C++ project first, but once you get that out of the way you can work purely out of python.

osorico · Apr 12, 2006

Quote from nononsense:

PS:
Don't pay attention to that compiled/interpreted nonsense. For most cases of intelligent Python usage this is totally irrelevant.

Python (and the other scripting languages too) are fine and indeed quite capable. But the fact is these languages require additional overhead to execute. Sometimes "intelligent" usage means using the best language given a specific project. IMO, C/C++ is a superior choice for actual trading software. Python would be a logical choice for requesting, parsing, and analyzing daily reports.

Just because you can, doesn't mean you should.

Osorico

segv · Apr 12, 2006

Quote from WallstYouth:

Anyone here using python and know if anyone brokers are supporting it?

I really hate C/C++ and would perfer using something higher up the stack like python on a unix system.

So, I take it Java is out of the question?

-segv