Would you collaborate with a programmer if it meant sharing your system/research?

[Laissez Faire]

Of course, if you knew what you were talking about you wouldn't need me to explain this.

What you don't want to do is put the work in.

Respectfully, you're the one who don't have the faintest clue about what you're talking about. You know virtually nothing about my system or how much work I'm putting in.

Feel free to check out of this thread and stop posting here.

 

[spy]

Respectfully, you're the one who don't have the faintest clue about what you're talking about. You know virtually nothing about my system or how much work I'm putting in.

Feel free to check out of this thread and stop posting here.

I called you out on the bull and you should thank me for that. Personally, don't care how much you lie to yourself. Don't worry... I won't post anything else on "your thread". Lol

 

[SimpleMeLike]

Well, this collaboration looked promising for a while, but ended up being a failure. Long story short, the programmer vastly underestimated the scope of the project not taking the sufficient time to set up and learn my existing system properly before he started the project of re-writing what I already have. Further, it's quite possible he overestimated his own skills and time available to work on the project in addition to having a full time job and family obligations. I expressed concerns about this early on, but he assured me it would not be a problem. Turns out I was right.

At 9 months past the agreed upon deadline I suggested that we ended the collaboration and he agreed, although he did say he would honor his obligation and complete it if I wanted it. I'd estimate we were at around 70 % of completion when ending it, but seeing how slow progress was and how unmotivated he seemed at this point, I just didn't have any interest in extending it. I don't want a collaboration with someone that's not willing to put in the same type of effort and sacrifices I'm willing to do.

I thought it would be the perfect match as he seemed skilled enough with a strong interest in finance and learning to trade. And I do think he was very motivated and inspired early on, but seemed to lose that along the way.

I think this is a common pattern for most people in life regardless of their pursuit. It's easy to be passionate and inspired early on dreaming about success, but most people seem to be idle dreamers who give up along the way. Some sooner than others.

If I ever decide to move forward with improving this application/system, I think I will have to pay it out of my own pocket just like I did with the original application that I already have in my hands.

Good Morning Laissez Faire,

Thank you for update.

You have to learn how to code and back test your own trading system ideas. This is what I did. Hiring programmers cost too much money unless you have money earned from manual trading.

If no money earned from manual trading , then best to keep manual trading and learn to code and back test trading ideas.

 

[SimpleMeLike]

Hello Laissez Faire,

And it will take a very long time too. Cause now you have to work the full time job, learn to code, and manually trade everyday and recover drawdown from manual trading. This means no fun on weekend for you.

And when you click backtest button the system may show negative profits. So all time spent programming wasted.

Easier to just manually guess and gamble the market a few hours a day.

 

[Laissez Faire]

Hello Laissez Faire,

And it will take a very long time too. Cause now you have to work the full time job, learn to code, and manually trade everyday and recover drawdown from manual trading. This means no fun on weekend for you.

Been a long while since I had any fun on the weekend anyway. LOL. Most of my free hours are are already spent on various forms of market study/development.

I don't think learning to code at this point in time is efficient use of my time to be honest. I can back-check/test historical prices/days using the model/system I've described in this thread, so I'm fortunate that I have that at hand already.

The system is already working - it's just the implementation (particularly the intraday updates) that's less efficient than it could be. I'm also unable to add new features as I'm not a programmer, but I've worked around a lot of it by implementing stuff directly in Excel.

The programmer estimates that it would take 1-2 months of full time work for a proficient programmer to re-build what I have, so if I were to learn to code and do all that myself, we'd probably be looking at years from now.

 

[NoahA]

Well, this collaboration looked promising for a while, but ended up being a failure.

Sorry to hear this. Out of curiosity, what are the chances that decided to go off on a tangent with what you showed him and do it himself with his own tweeks? Its happened in history many times in the scientific community that a scientist is working on something as part of a project, sees the value of something, but then steals it and later he is the one to publish this work and get the prize!

The likely scenario of course is as you say, he just got busy with life and whatever he does that pays the bills. But I can also picture a different reason for why he stopped working hard to complete the project for you.

 

[Laissez Faire]

Sorry to hear this. Out of curiosity, what are the chances that decided to go off on a tangent with what you showed him and do it himself with his own tweeks? Its happened in history many times in the scientific community that a scientist is working on something as part of a project, sees the value of something, but then steals it and later he is the one to publish this work and get the prize!

The likely scenario of course is as you say, he just got busy with life and whatever he does that pays the bills. But I can also picture a different reason for why he stopped working hard to complete the project for you.

That's impossible for me to know, but my gut feel and impression from working with the guy is that's not what happened. I just think he vastly underestimated the scope of the project (his fault by not spending the sufficient time first to learn my system) and got burned out along the way when he realized it would take a lot of work to complete it and also that it wouldn't be a mechanical system he could simply use out-of-the-box when completed either.

I don't have kids, but I have a full time job and it's difficult enough to find time and energy outside work hours. With 2 small kids, a dog and a wife that's probably more demanding than my girlfriend, I can't imagine he have much time for such pursuits.

We did have a contract stating that I own the IP I bring into the project, but I do of course have no guarantee that he'll honor that or create something similar or based on the ideas himself later at some point. I'm not sure it matters anyway.

But it does suck that I spent a great deal of time on this and have nothing left, while he potentially have something that could be very valuable for him. But I knew that risk before starting this.

I did protect myself as best as I could by not revealing any secrets I have discovered using this data. I did intend on sharing everything eventually upon completion and further co-operation, but I didn't share more than I needed early on.

 

[SimpleMeLike]

Been a long while since I had any fun on the weekend anyway. LOL. Most of my free hours are are already spent on various forms of market study/development.

I don't think learning to code at this point in time is efficient use of my time to be honest. I can back-check/test historical prices/days using the model/system I've described in this thread, so I'm fortunate that I have that at hand already.

The system is already working - it's just the implementation (particularly the intraday updates) that's less efficient than it could be. I'm also unable to add new features as I'm not a programmer, but I've worked around a lot of it by implementing stuff directly in Excel.

The programmer estimates that it would take 1-2 months of full time work for a proficient programmer to re-build what I have, so if I were to learn to code and do all that myself, we'd probably be looking at years from now.

Hello Laissez Faire,

Yes, you will waste time. And you can do all that work and spend all that time and click back test and 10 times out of 10 the idea will show negative profits the past 10 years of testing.

Many traders think they have good trading strategy, pay programmer, click back test, failed.

Leave the algo stuff for the people who can afford to hire 10 programmers working full time.

Us regular traders is best to manual gamble day trade the future market everyday in peace and enjoy weekend and get rich very quickly.

 

[Nine_Ender]

Well, this collaboration looked promising for a while, but ended up being a failure. Long story short, the programmer vastly underestimated the scope of the project not taking the sufficient time to set up and learn my existing system properly before he started the project of re-writing what I already have. Further, it's quite possible he overestimated his own skills and time available to work on the project in addition to having a full time job and family obligations. I expressed concerns about this early on, but he assured me it would not be a problem. Turns out I was right.

At 9 months past the agreed upon deadline I suggested that we ended the collaboration and he agreed, although he did say he would honor his obligation and complete it if I wanted it. I'd estimate we were at around 70 % of completion when ending it, but seeing how slow progress was and how unmotivated he seemed at this point, I just didn't have any interest in extending it. I don't want a collaboration with someone that's not willing to put in the same type of effort and sacrifices I'm willing to do.

I thought it would be the perfect match as he seemed skilled enough with a strong interest in finance and learning to trade. And I do think he was very motivated and inspired early on, but seemed to lose that along the way.

I think this is a common pattern for most people in life regardless of their pursuit. It's easy to be passionate and inspired early on dreaming about success, but most people seem to be idle dreamers who give up along the way. Some sooner than others.

If I ever decide to move forward with improving this application/system, I think I will have to pay it out of my own pocket just like I did with the original application that I already have in my hands.

This is not surprising to me because you had hints of being a difficult client for an IT guy. Most likely you underestimated the scope involved and he wasn't experienced enough to advise you of this and set doable deadlines. It could be that he was in over his head but quality depends somewhat on the budget and how much you are willing to pay for good work.

I have a lot of experience taking prototypes that junior programmers and/or non-IT resources created that needed to be dealt with more professionally. I'm not doing this work at the moment but I would have determined how doable the project is up front and that it would be worthwhile for me and my client. Fixed rate contracts were often the worst because client requirement creep was always very likely even for good clients. In my later years as a consultant I managed this well and everyone was happy.

That being said, in this environment, good IT people are expensive at the moment.

 

[SimpleMeLike]

But it does suck that I spent a great deal of time on this and have nothing left, while he potentially have something that could be very valuable for him. But I knew that risk before starting this.

Hello Laissez Faire,

Exactly, exactly. You can not give your hard earn money to anyone in this Trading Business, not even programmers cause it is not worth it, unless you have a $1 million earned from Manual trading the markets sir.

Forget this algo trading systems stuff for Edge. Forget about it.

We have to manual trade the markets first, make a million, THEN we can go pay a programmer to do what we think will make us another million.

This is why it is so important to manual guess and gamble the future markets. Looking for a trading edge is a waste of time. Takes too much work and we do not have time because of family life and full time and job.

Gamble for 1-2 hours and be done.