MT4 Strategy Tester & Historical Data – Clarification
Many of my charts have points where days, sometimes MONTHS, of data are simply missing. I have also wasted hours trying to figure how the MT4 history centre works. Hopefully some more experienced users can answer some of my questions.
Q1) Are the chart data and the strategy tester historical data from the same source? Or are there two sets of data, one from Metaquotes and one from the broker? If so can you use the broker data for backtesting?
Q2) What exactly does double clicking on the symbol-period buttons in the history centre do? What causes the symbol-period buttons to turn from orange to grey? What is this supposed to mean?
Q3) In the terminal – TOOLS>OPTIONS dialogue, what exactly does the DATA CENTRE AUTO CONFIGUATION tick box do? Does the KEEP PERSONAL SETTINGS AND DATA AT STARTUP tick box relate to the strategy tester/historical data? What does it do?
Q4) What exactly does clicking on the DOWNLOAD button in the history centre do? Why does it say that there are no new data, and then when clicked again activate seemingly meaningless movements on the progress bar?
Q5) What software/data do professionals use for backtesting? Links to any discussions/info about this would be ace.
Q6) Is the MT4 history centre/strategy tester a bizarrely malfunctional, time wasting piece of junk – or am I an ignorant, impatient crank? (or both?). Is there official documentation about these issues somewhere? Links to any comprehensive discussions/info about this would be ++ace.
In the interim you may find these two links helpful:
(a) http://global.fxdd.com/en/mt1m-data.html
(b) http://alansforexblog.com/2010/02/10/how-to-set-up-metatrader-history-data-and-get-90-backtesting-quality/
You may also want to take a look at:
(c) http://eareview.net/tick-data
Good Luck... (Hope the links are functional)
Many of my charts have points where days, sometimes MONTHS, of data are simply missing. I have also wasted hours trying to figure how the MT4 history centre works. Hopefully some more experienced users can answer some of my questions.
Q1) Are the chart data and the strategy tester historical data from the same source? Or are there two sets of data, one from Metaquotes and one from the broker? If so can you use the broker data for backtesting?
Q2) What exactly does double clicking on the symbol-period buttons in the history centre do? What causes the symbol-period buttons to turn from orange to grey? What is this supposed to mean?
Q3) In the terminal – TOOLS>OPTIONS dialogue, what exactly does the DATA CENTRE AUTO CONFIGUATION tick box do? Does the KEEP PERSONAL SETTINGS AND DATA AT STARTUP tick box relate to the strategy tester/historical data? What does it do?
Q4) What exactly does clicking on the DOWNLOAD button in the history centre do? Why does it say that there are no new data, and then when clicked again activate seemingly meaningless movements on the progress bar?
Q5) What software/data do professionals use for backtesting? Links to any discussions/info about this would be ace.
Q6) Is the MT4 history centre/strategy tester a bizarrely malfunctional, time wasting piece of junk – or am I an ignorant, impatient crank? (or both?). Is there official documentation about these issues somewhere? Links to any comprehensive discussions/info about this would be ++ace.
It cannot be emphasized enough that using the "download" button is simply the worst thing you could do to yourself. It is an utter disservice to MT4 users that the button even exists, you would be better off if when you clicked that button it just formatted your hard-drive because what you do instead is spend the next 2 months trying to get your EA's to work with the crap data you unwittingly downloaded and you completely waste your time and effort until you realize this. It would be so easy for the MT4 programmers to make that download button actually result in downloading data from the current broker rather than metaquotes...but it doesn't work that way.
In history center, clicking on anything other than the "Download" button will result in data being pulled from the broker's server. If you click once on a symbol/timeframe that is gray then nothing happens. If you double click on that symbol/timeframe then it loads the data from the hard-drive if a pre-existing hst file is present. If it is not present then the history center downloads data from the broker's server.
Backtesting in strategy tester uses the data that you have in your hst files as well as memory resident...if you have NOT used the "download" button then that means it is using data from the broker's server. If you have used the "download" button then the data will be a hybrid of sorts, a mish-mash of metaquotes data and your broker's server.
MT4 history center and strategy tester are functional but people misunderstand what they actually do, what they don't do, and how to use them effectively. There are a lot of misconceptions out there. Chances are that whatever you thinking strategy tester is going to do for you is wrong. Strategy tester enables you to generate answers to only a few questions. Most people seem to approach strategy tester thinking it is going to optimize their EA and that the results it generates are somehow going to be indicative of future results.
The question to ask is not "what software do pro's use for backtesting" but rather the question to ask is "what do pro's look for when they are backesting? why do pro's backtest? what value do the pro's find in backtesting?".
There are a number of good articles to read through:
https://book.mql4.com//
https://www.mql5.com/en/articles/mt4/
https://www.mql5.com/en/articles/1486
https://www.mql5.com/en/articles/1492
https://www.mql5.com/go?link=http://www.futuresmag.com/Issues/2009/August2009/Pages/Minimizing-your-risk-of-ruin.aspx
https://www.mql5.com/go?link=http://www.futuresmag.com/Issues/2010/June-2010/Pages/Money-management-Understanding-the-game.aspx
https://www.mql4.com/go?https://www.forex-tsd.com/lessons/?pp=20&daysprune=-1
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Many of my charts have points where days, sometimes MONTHS, of data are simply missing. I have also wasted hours trying to figure how the MT4 history centre works. Hopefully some more experienced users can answer some of my questions.
Q1) Are the chart data and the strategy tester historical data from the same source? Or are there two sets of data, one from Metaquotes and one from the broker? If so can you use the broker data for backtesting?
Q2) What exactly does double clicking on the symbol-period buttons in the history centre do? What causes the symbol-period buttons to turn from orange to grey? What is this supposed to mean?
Q3) In the terminal – TOOLS>OPTIONS dialogue, what exactly does the DATA CENTRE AUTO CONFIGUATION tick box do? Does the KEEP PERSONAL SETTINGS AND DATA AT STARTUP tick box relate to the strategy tester/historical data? What does it do?
Q4) What exactly does clicking on the DOWNLOAD button in the history centre do? Why does it say that there are no new data, and then when clicked again activate seemingly meaningless movements on the progress bar?
Q5) What software/data do professionals use for backtesting? Links to any discussions/info about this would be ace.
Q6) Is the MT4 history centre/strategy tester a bizarrely malfunctional, time wasting piece of junk – or am I an ignorant, impatient crank? (or both?). Is there official documentation about these issues somewhere? Links to any comprehensive discussions/info about this would be ++ace.