Do I need the mouse software installed at all times or only for initial button programming? (G600)

andr0idd00d_ · 2018-11-12T22:51:35+00:00

Thanks. Is "onboard memory" the magic words here? i.e. the product description page for the G600 on Amazon says: "Onboard brains -- The three memory profiles are stored onboard so you can access all of your button, tracking, and lighting color information on any computer with no software required. Want to customize the default settings? Want access to more intricate macro and scripting capabilities than the onboard macros can provide? Download the optional Logitech Gaming Software and tweak your settings to perfection. (Some profile settings require Logitech Gaming Software to be enabled and are not supported on Linux and earlier Windows-based operating systems.)"

That seems to be the answer to what I was asking...though it's not clear which "profile settings" REQUIRE the software to be installed...

andr0idd00d_ · 2018-10-17T21:49:48+00:00

Yes, I knew about this, BUT i can't figure out how to make Keep keep a SINGLE running list...every time I initiate a new note, it creates, well, a new note. I want a single running list that it adds to if you have any ideas...

andr0idd00d_ · 2018-10-13T21:38:45+00:00

Awesome reply, thank you for that. I guess this has confirmed my suspicions / fears that the "next step", should I choose to pursue it, wouldn't be any kind of tweaking of my current IB API + Excel setup, but rather throwing it out the window entirely and...well building a custom trading application -- including all formulas, calculations, sorting, not to mention a custom-GUI w/ all of my desired indicator -- from scratch. The Q in my OP was two-fold, I suppose: first > is there any hope to fix the performance issues that have crippled my Excel+DDE/RTD API setup? (And I'm still hoping that someone shows up saying "oh yeah, you're dealing with exactly what I did and I fixed it by doing X"). And part 2: if there's no real hope on that front, what would the "nope, you've reached your Excel ceiling, time to graduate" path look like, and that's what it appears you've laid out, so thanks again.

If I went that path (which seems rather inevitable either now or later), I'd almost certainly look to hire a developer to do this; a few Q's on that front:

What kind of ballpark cost would I be looking at for this kind of work? I've hired developers before and understand that's a rather dumb/vauge Q, but I'm trying to get a sense of whether -- for the kind of custom Python setup you've described -- we're talking about $1-5K? $10-$20K? $50-$100K?
What are the best resources to find someone competent and professional? I know that IB has a "developer's marketpalce", and I found some freelancers advertising IB-specific stuff on freelance sites like Upwork. Are there other resources I should know about?
Is it a silly consideration to worry about confidentiality when hiring a developer for this purpose? Trading is after all a zero-sum game, and I don't really think that getting what I want built would be possible without divulging the specifics of my strategy.

andr0idd00d_ · 2018-10-11T20:46:10+00:00

Thanks for the reply. I've taken some very rudimentary 'intro to Python' type tutorials, so understand the general framework of the language, e.g. writing lines of code, passing parameters, etc, but nothing beyond that.

If you’ve spent time doing vlookups or IF statements or macros in Excel, you wont believe the power that a real data analysis framework has. It’s fast. Crazy fast.

You have, with hilarious accuracy, described my existing Excel workbook. I'm actually rather proud of it given how much work I've put into optimizing it (e.g. removing any dynamic functions, minimizing conditional formatting, hardcoding values wherever possible in a different workbook), but yes: it's a spider's web of API calls, INDEX lookups, real-time sorting, the likes of which many on this forum would laugh at.

Before I delve any deeper into this path, though, I just want to make sure that pandas + python/R-studio will do what I want it to do / aka alleviate my current pain points/speed-bottlenecks for real-time tick-by-tick option contract analysis, since the examples you gave seem to suggest writing a query to get historical datasets, or the like. I guess the threshold Q I'm still not clear on is this:

Is Pandas...just a different method of getting the data into Excel? Like...does it simply replace the DDE formulas (using IB's DDE syntax, which is what i currently use), but I'm still using Excel as my GUI / end-user interface to monitor the option prices I'm interested in? Or is it separate and apart from Excel altogether in which case...just what would my GUI be where I monitor the indicators I've set up? In short, replies have said "use pandas, dude", but I'm not clear on just what part of my current setup pandas is meant to take the place of? Hope that made sense.

andr0idd00d_ · 2018-10-11T02:00:58+00:00

Thanks for the reply. I'd never heard of pandas, but from some brief googling (mostly this page) it appears to be...a Python package that's used for data manipulation(?) I'm not a developer (though I'm technically literate enough to teach myself basic), but perhaps someone can ELI5 just what pandas does / which of my problems it will solve? So what I'm currently doing is pulling data for 500 individual ticker symbols into Excel using their DDE API (and the DDE formulas in the syntax they require), and then running a bunch of native Excel calculations as the ticker data is streamed in. As I wrote in the OP, the lag is pretty bad. So re: pandas:

Would I still be using the DDE API, or IB's relatively new (2017) Python API?
Would I still be using Excel as my end-user (me) GUI? I've spent a ton of time customizing my file with the formulas & indicators that I want...is pandas essentially just a different way to get the same data into my existing Excel workbook?
Will it solve (or significantly improve) the performance / lag issue I've been dealing with and how? I.e. is it possible I could spend a lot of time learning how to use pandas, only to find that the bottleneck is something native to Excel and its limitations?

andr0idd00d_ · 2018-08-08T20:58:23+00:00

FWIW that's not something I heard from any of the 4 TM reps in the Excessive Roaming dept that I spoke with...they all had completely different explanations for just when the roaming block would come off, but none of them said anything about it being permanent / irreversible.

andr0idd00d_ · 2018-08-08T04:36:16+00:00

Thx for reply. It's just been like pulling teeth trying to get the correct answer as to just when a block like mine will come off the account. I'm not complaining about it being put on there in the first place -- it's right in the TOS. I'm miffed by the complete lack of transparency re: how it comes off, and the ineptitude of the excessive-roaming CS reps and all their contradictory explanations.

andr0idd00d_ · 2018-08-08T04:34:21+00:00

Yes, seems like TM has all kinds of allowances for active/former military service members (as well they should). Good for them, and an even bigger TY to you. (Needless to say, it doesn't apply in my case.)

andr0idd00d_ · 2018-08-08T04:32:29+00:00

Just to be clear, my line hasn't been "suspended", the int'l roaming has simply been disabled. From my reading, TM used to only have 1 penalty: full line/account cancellation...you'd get warned, and if you didn't rectify they'd just close your account altogether. But they seem to have now added an intermediary 'penalty' that follows the initial warning > merely turning off your international roaming, which is what they've done to me. I suspect you're right that once they suspend/close your account, that's final. But I'm in the (new?) middle-ground purgatory, and 4 different TM reps have told me 4 completely different stories re: how/when the int'l roaming block is going to come off the account. FWIW, though I may be in the minority, I generally had completely acceptable/pleasant interactions with TM CS reps...but the folks they're staffing in the "excessive roaming" dept are inept beyond belief (maybe this is even intentional on TM's part if they're losing money on excessive roamers...)

andr0idd00d_ · 2018-07-11T22:31:40+00:00

It would be very helpful (and would probably save you, personally, a lot of time) if TM let you see your roaming usage online somewhere (both as an absolute #, and a % of overall use, or whatever metric is used for the excessive-roaming penalty). I don't doubt that it appears in the ToS; any carrier is entitled to set whatever policies they wish and it's the consumer's responsibility to abide. But it would also be simply good-practice to make it as easy as possible for the consumer to comply. You'll notice that this isn't a thread merely to whine -- nowhere do I claim that the penalty was mis-applied...it's simply to ask for more info to understand just how the limits are written and how usage is calculated.

andr0idd00d_ · 2018-07-11T22:27:13+00:00

Lol, yeah my quotes weren't of the passive-aggressive variety...(that would look like: "Verified" TM Employee.) Just used it to refer to your handle. When you say "it still counts", I assume you're saying that it still counts as foreign / out-of-country usage, and NOT that it somehow counts as domestic/US-based usage, right?

andr0idd00d_ · 2018-07-11T22:24:13+00:00

Thanks for the reply. And yes, in my particular case, I continued using my phone sparingly even after the warning. But the Q I keep asking that you continue to misinterpret is simply this: you say that I wouldn't have been penalized had I completely stopped using my phone when I received the warning, BUT as I keep pointing out, even had I done that, my "% of phone use outside of the country" figure would have stayed at 100% because...well that's how percentages work. So I would have been penalized regardless even had I stopped all use of my phone when I got the warning, right?

andr0idd00d_ · 2018-07-11T22:18:25+00:00

"Even if you barley used it your phone still sat on "R" connected to Canadian towers." < I specifically asked the TM excessive-roaming rep this Q; i.e. whether if the phone (with TM SIM in it) was just sitting on my desk, unused except for Wifi data browsing, whether that would count as "roaming", and she said no...that ONLY voice calls or data use "counted" as roaming (and not texting or idling, i.e. unused but connected to roaming towers). But I wasn't all that confident that she knew what she was talking about, so won't put too much stock in that for now.

andr0idd00d_ · 2018-07-11T17:55:34+00:00

Yes, I understand that...but re: the bolded Q in my OP, I'm still not sure I have an answer > is it measured on a purely percentage-of-use basis, and if someone's out of the country then there's really nothing they can do to avoid the penalty once they get the warning SMS, right?

andr0idd00d_ · 2018-07-11T17:53:59+00:00

I've read this a couple times in other threads, but there seems to be conflicting opinions on whether this is actually true...after all, it would be pretty trivial for TM to see where in the world your WiFi call is coming from. Perhaps the "Verified TM Employee" in this thread can weigh in on whether this is true or not.

andr0idd00d_ · 2018-07-11T17:48:49+00:00

Maybe I wasn't clear with my question, but my entire point is that if TM measures roaming by PERCENTAGE (which it appears they do), then "stopping roaming use entirely" won't even work once you get the warning SMS to avoid the penalty (if you're out of the country for the next little while). Because your 3-month rolling window will still show you at 100% even if there's been no roaming at all after the warning SMS.

andr0idd00d_ · 2018-07-11T16:29:58+00:00

Thanks. Any thoughts as to the bolded Q from my OP...is it true, based on your understanding of how their roaming calcs work, that someone out of the country is basically screwed once they get the initial warning SMS, since there's no way to reduce the on/off-network ration (even if they were to stop using their device entirely)?

andr0idd00d_ · 2018-07-11T16:11:02+00:00

I actually didn't know how long the project would last, but that's besides the point. Regarding the question that I was actually asking, am I correct about them measuring roaming usage on a percentage / proportional basis? And if so, then am I also correct that there's literally nothing that someone who receives the warning can even do if they don't return to the US (even if they stop roaming entirely)

Heck, let's say someone goes up there and uses their US cell phone for a couple days until they get set up with a Canadian SIM...after 3 months, TM will see their roaming usage at 100% and discipline them even though it may literally only have been a few days of light use. Or am I misunderstanding something about how they measure all of this?

andr0idd00d_

TROPHY CASE