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AmiBroker 5.60.2 Release Candidate 2

Stability: Rank 4 - Release Candidate, stable

This is a Release Candidate (RC) version. Make a backup first

A new RC version (5.60.2) of AmiBroker has just been released.

32-bit version:
http://www.amibroker.com/bin/AmiBroker5602.exe
(8 608 720 bytes)

64-bit version:
http://www.amibroker.com/bin/AmiBroker5602x64.exe
(9 083 760 bytes)

These are universal setup files. They can be installed on fresh windows without need to install any previous versions. They can also be used to upgrade existing installations.

ATTENTION: This version is free only for users who registered after April 12, 2011. See Upgrade Policy and Pricing section below for more details.

IMPORTANT: This version is available to general public, not only members

CHANGES FOR VERSION 5.60.2 (as compared to 5.60.1)

  1. Setup: GICS.txt file had 50102010 category incorrectly entered (without new line). Fixed.
  2. Setup: Formats\aqgi.format file added
  3. Scale in/out column could have thousand separator added in incorrect place. Fixed.
  4. New Analysis: when there was no selected formula filey a number of empty items were added to the combo box. Fixed.
  5. New Analysis: Walk-forward summary report name and from date was not reset in second and subsequent runs in the same Analysis window. Fixed.
  6. New Analysis: if symbol did not have any quotes at all, "wait for backfill" did not wait. Fixed.
  7. New Analysis: Exploration - a little speed up by decreased number of string reallocations in CAnalysisExploreJob::Run
  8. Inactive Web research window did not sync with selected symbol when "sync always" was turned on. Fixed. MG #113
  9. Filter dialog background change did not look nice on Windows XP and earlier. Turned this off in pre-Vista OSes.
  10. eSignal: in "EOD" mode when started outside trading session a last bar could be duplicate of previous day bar. Fixed
  11. eSignal: 64-bit plugin now correctly downloads daily (EOD) history (so mixed mode works fine too).
  12. eSignal plugin: added support for extended intraday (to enable it use Configure: "Use extended intraday history data request")
  13. Due to Windows "feature" dotted lines with width of 1 were printed as solid lines on a printer. Workaround (forcing width to 0) for printer implemented.
  14. Default black chart theme is only set when no preferences file is found. If broker.prefs exists but it is stored in pre-5.52 version then white scheme is applied by default.
  15. Charts: when loading multiple chart layout the invisible/obscured windows were not always scrolled to the end (most recent quote). Fixed.
  16. Auto-hidden Analysis windows sometimes did not repaint properly. Fixed.
  17. Sharpe ratio now uses floating point trade length/qty ratio instead of integer to prevent rounding.
  18. AFL: Now OLE strings passed by reference (VT_BSTR|VT_BYREF) are accepted too.

CHANGES FOR VERSION 5.60.1 (as compared to 5.60.0)

  1. SETUP: Sample database contains data in Shares now, not in hundreds of shares as previously. Also, removed ^DJI
  2. New Analysis: when OoS test was turned OFF in advanced Walk Forward mode, it would crash at the end attempting to create summary out of non-existing out-of-sample tests. Fixed.
  3. New Analysis: Walk-forward combined OoS equity is just concatenation of OoS steps and no scaling is applied anymore. This it little faster and prevents some boundary/roundoff conditions.
  4. Inactive tab text color is now fixed RGB (#656565) instead of querying system COLOR_GRAYTEXT as it is too light on XP. If you want inactive tab text to be completely black, then create registry key HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\TJP\Broker\Settings\InactiveTabTextColor with DWORD value of 0 (zero)
  5. In 5.58 and above Study() only worked in indicators, and always referred to current chart ID. It did not work in Analysis. Fixed.
  6. ASCII import: ASCII characters above code 127 are not trimmed from the end of strings anymore.

CHANGES FOR VERSION 5.60.0 (as compared to 5.59.0)

  1. AFL: GetFnData() now supports "Country" field
  2. AFL: SetChartOptions did not write chart flags in 5.5x. Fixed
  3. AFL: when array was passed as "amount" argument to DateTimeAdd, the results could be incorrect. Fixed.
  4. ApplyStop( stopTypeNBar, ... ) in backtestRegularRaw / backtestRegularRawMulti/Rotational - N-bar stop exited 1 bar later than in regular mode. Fixed.
  5. aqh.format, aqd.format, aqg.format changed - removed $VOLFACTOR 0.01 previously used so volume is reported in shares not in hundreds of shares
  6. ASCII import: sector names beginning with "Sector" and industry names beginning with "Industry" were not imported properly. Fixed.
  7. Background of built-in dark grey theme made slightly lighter than black
  8. Blank chart panes now use defined chart background color instead of white
  9. Changed all price formulas shipped in setup to use colorDefault instead of colorBlack
  10. Changed Bollinger band filled default color to ColorBlend( Color, GetChartBkColor(), 0.8 )
  11. Changed default appearance to VS2010 / pane tabs on bottom
  12. Changed default chart layout for clean installation
  13. Changed default colors for charts to "Black" scheme and outline mode to "One color for entire handle and hollow up candle body"
  14. Changed default Price all in one volume to color to ColorBlend( ColorRGB( 128, 128, 192 ), GetChartBkColor(), 0.5 )),
  15. Charts: In 5.59 chart could stop refreshing when it had odd number of Plot() calls combined with a couple of PlotForeign() calls and total number of items to display in tooltip/data window exceeded 20. Fixed.
  16. Charts: Print Preview and printout had incorrect colors due to the fact that SetDCPenColor/SetDCBrushColor APIs do not work with metafiles/printers. Fixed.
  17. colorDefault is now user- definable in the preferences (Colors tab) and selectable from Parameters window and associated with chart theme
  18. In 5.58 View->Intraday->Tick turned incorrect "0-tick" interval which resulted in effective 1-second compression. Fixed.
  19. In colorCycle sequence colorRed is replaced with colorLightOrange for better visibility when displayed with red candles
  20. New Analysis: error message bar text is now trimmed to 110 characters to ensure there is a place for the "Details" button
  21. New Analysis: In 5.58 and 5.59 smart optimizer engine was not finalized properly when user pressed "Cancel" during optimize run. Fixed.
  22. New Analysis: In 5.59 3D optimization chart - wrong 2nd axis legend was wrong (duplicate of 1st axis). Fixed.
  23. New Analysis: Specifying ReEntryDelay > 0 in ApplyStop rotational and raw modes caused incorrect results in second and subsequent backtests (MG#79). Fixed.
  24. New Analysis: the message "No symbols matched apply to / filtering criteria" shows up in the message bar instead of dialog, so one does not need to click OK
  25. On attempt to close Analysis window that is currently running scan/exploration/backtest an appropriate error message is displayed.
  26. UI: cosmetic color changes (chart sheet tabs)
  27. UI: Crash could occur if the user customized Tools menu by moving "Update US stock list..." item from the very last position in the menu elsewhere. Fixed.
  28. UI: Filter settings dialog is resizable now (and static fields use proper background color)
  29. UI: Floating panes use themed frames now
  30. UI: importing custom icon image using Tools->Customize, button RMB -> Edit Image -> Import image caused change of current working directory. Now CWD is saved and restored after customization.
  31. UI: In 5.59 ticker box was not in sync with currently selected symbol on loading single-chart layout. Fixed
  32. UI: removed unused options from Prefs/Miscelleneous page

CHANGES FOR VERSION 5.59.0 (as compared to 5.58.0)

  1. New Analysis: loading previously stored APX files into 5.58 resulted in ICB filter being set (instead of cleared). Fixed.
  2. New Analysis: 3D optimization chart can also be displayed from single-parameter optimization now, without need to add dummy Optimize()
  3. IB data plugin: CMDTY historical requests use MIDPRICE instead of TRADES
  4. IB data plugin: Max. number of symbols increased to 1000
  5. UI: Tools->Preferences/Charting: added setting to show (or hide) the bar number in the crosshair's X label, by default the bar number is NOT shown now (previously it was ON by default)
  6. UI: Tools->Preferences/Charting removed setting for "'New look' charts" - now 'New look' is used always
  7. UI: For PlotOHLC and Plot with styleCandle/styleBar tooltip and data window display OHLC data in this order (instead COHL in previous versions)
  8. UI: Data window now displays values for all panes at once (you can turn the display of single pane back using right click menu option)
  9. ASCII importer: added $COUNTRY command and COUNTRY field to $FORMAT command
  10. AFL: in ROC, RSI, RSIa, TRIX, CCI, MFI, MA, EMA, Hold, BBandBottom, BBandTop, PDI, MDI, ADX, ATR, Correlation, Wilders functions 'range' parameter is now checked for > 0 and error is displayed when it is negative
  11. Interval-locked layers did not work correctly for N-tick/volume/range intervals. Fixed.

CHANGES FOR VERSION 5.58.0 (as compared to 5.57.1)

  1. Automatic setup and update of stock symbol listing, together with sectors, industries, markets and groups (Tools->Update US symbol list and categories). This is implemented using new #import command (see below for the details). IMPORTANT: Using this function will wipe existing sector/industry structure and generate new one.
  2. UI: custom tools menu - added special internal command #import that allows to import ASCII files from local disk or even from remote (web) sources
  3. UI: custom tools menu - when an error occurs during launching of external command appropriate error message is displayed (instead of nothing like in old versions)
  4. The support for Industry Classification Benchmark (ICB) category system added
  5. OLE: Stock object has new property (string): ICB (read/write)
  6. Interval combo box was not updated after changing preferences / intraday / custom interval settings. Fixed.
  7. ASCII importer: support for importing sector/industry scheme and assignments by name (new SECTORNAME and INDUSTRYNAME fields in $FORMAT command) and $CLEARSECTORS 1 / $SORTSECTORS 1 command to clean up / sort existing sector/industry structure
  8. ASCII importer: crash could occur if required numeric arguments for some commands were missing. Fixed.
  9. ASCII importer: added support for ICB import: ICB field added to $FORMAT command and added $ICB command
  10. ASCII importer: numeric field data may be enclosed in double quotation marks and still properly interpreted as numbers now.
  11. Analysis: when optimization is stopped, Optimize() returned NON-default value when Status("action")==actionPortfolio in subsequent backtest. Fixed
  12. AFL: SetChartOptions did not allow to overwrite miny/maxy in 5.51-5.57. Fixed.
  13. AFL: CategoryGetSymbols, CategoryGetName, CategorySetName, CategoryAddSymbol, CategoryRemoveSymbol, CategoryFind updated to support categoryICB (new constant = 8)
  14. AFL: added InIcb() and IcbID() functions
  15. Added Status("lastbartimeleftrt") - it works like "lastbartimeleft" but uses the most recent RT stream update time instead of Now(). Added Status("lastrtupdate") - time of last RT stream update

CHANGES FOR VERSION 5.57.1 (as compared to 5.57.0)

  1. When real-time quotes were streaming interval combo refreshed too often making it hard to enter new interval. Fixed.
  2. Entering custom interval in the combo did not always work correctly for floating windows in 5.57.0. Fixed.

CHANGES FOR VERSION 5.57.0 (as compared to 5.56.0)

  1. Charts/UI: now there is a new chart interval combo box that allows to either select predefined interval OR simply type ANY interval you want without the need to define it in the preferences

    Supported interval codes are:
    Y - yearly, Q - quarterly, M - monthly, W - weekly, D - daily, N - day/night,
    h - hourly, m -minute (note lowercase m), s - second, T - tick, R - range, V - volume.
    D, h, m, s, T, R, V intervals can be preceded by a number. So if you type 15m it means 15 minute chart, if you type 13T it means 13 tick chart, if you type 200R it means 200R (range) chart. If you type just a number (x) without the following letter it will treat it as x-minute chart.

  2. Tools->Auto update quotes is now native command (not a 'custom tool' as it was)
  3. Default "X grid spacing" changed to 50 (from original 60) pixels
  4. 12 hour X grid spacing replaced by 6 hour

CHANGES FOR VERSION 5.56.0 (as compared to 5.55.1)

  1. New Analysis: A new walk-forward summary report that covers all out-of-sample steps
  2. New Analysis: walk forward procedure now produces detailed reports for every out-of-sample step
  3. Enhanced backtest report: color-coding 'good' and 'bad' values in backtest report
  4. Report: a note added to tooltips for Sharpe ratio and UPI metrics telling where user can change risk-free rates for those metrics
  5. Report Explorer 1.0.2 - added alternate row background color
  6. Removed "00:00:00" time in the "date from" in the backtest report / settings page
  7. Param window: clicking on category that had exactly same name as parameter resulted in changing parameter value. Fixed.
  8. Analysis: all custom metrics were treated as numbers (for example got formatted with thousand separator). Now AmiBroker custom metrics of string type are treated as strings and do not get any extra formatting for the display.
  9. Added recommendation to activate multithreading to the performance warning tooltip when multithreading is currently turned OFF.

CHANGES FOR VERSION 5.55.1 (as compared to 5.54.0)

  1. Random characters could appear in list view clipboard copy in 5.55.0. Fixed in 5.55.1.
  2. _SECTION_BEGIN/_SECTION_END/_PARAM_VALUES appeared twice in auto-complete listbox. Fixed.
  3. SetOption("PortfolioReportMode", x ) changed exploration columns too. Fixed. (bmg#92)
  4. AFL: new function GetAsyncKeyState( vkey )
  5. AFL: Status() function supports new fields "lastbarend", "lastbartimeleft", "timeshift"
  6. List view clipboard copy now uses regional settings decimal separator.
  7. Charting: added left- and right extend option to the rectagle drawing tool
  8. List view date column sort was incorrect when regional settings time format was set to: H:mm:ss. Fixed.
  9. When multithreading in charts was turned OFF, drawing tools did not work properly in 5.53-5.54. Fixed.
  10. XYChartAddPoint does not generate error anymore when Null values are passed as X, Y co-ords. Instead it silently ignores such points (they are not plotted) and XYChartAddPoint returns FALSE (0)
  11. AFL: new function StaticVarInfo( "varname", "field" )

CHANGES FOR VERSION 5.54.0 (as compared to 5.53.1)

  1. New Analysis: "Sync chart on select" did not respect linked charts and symbol lock. Fixed.
  2. AFL: new function XYChartSetAxis( "chartname", "x-axis name", "y-axis name" )
  3. AFL: new function XYChartAddPoint( "chartname", "text", x, y, color )
  4. New Analysis: Implemented XY (scatter) charts in Explorations (see Read Me for the details)
  5. {{INTERVAL}} gave incorrect (unstable) results in custom n-tick/n-range/n-volume charts when used with multithreading. Fixed.
  6. Interval(2) returned incorrect (unstable) results in custom n-tick/n-range/n-volume charts when used with multithreading. Fixed.
  7. Preferences: Currency page was not working properly. Fixed.
  8. Status bar look matches now appearance settings (esp. visible in VS2012 style)
  9. Parameter window now allows to select combined styles (like styleHidden) as well as their components styleNoRescale+styleNoDraw independently
  10. User setting for minimum pixel spacing in X grid (Tools->Preferences, "Axes / Grids") - it is recommended to keep it at default value (60 pixels), for denser grid use less spacing (minimum 30 pixels), for wider grid use more x spacing (maximum 120 pixels)
  11. Sometimes panes did not refresh to final size when chart sheets are switched (for example - one tab has only one pane second tab has two panes). Fixed.

CHANGES FOR VERSION 5.53.1 (as compared to 5.53.0)

  1. Trend lines and other drawing tools sometimes were blinking or disappeared in 5.53.0. Fixed
  2. Plots with styleDashed mixed with plots using other styles could cause continuous growth of rendering time in 5.52/5.53. Fixed.

CHANGES FOR VERSION 5.53.0 (as compared to 5.52.0)

  1. Triangle drawing tool now supports filled interiors
  2. Vertical selector line was flicerking with RT update when more than one chart window was open. Fixed
  3. SetChartGradientFill renamed to SetGradientFill
  4. SetGradientFill now has 2 more arguments: baseline and baselinecolor. Allows reverse gradient chart (such as underwater equity) and 3 color gradients top->baseline->bottom
  5. Added 2-year and 5-year x grid spacing
  6. Gradient chart sometimes disappeared when null values were in the data set and chart was zoomed out to the maximum. Fixed.
  7. GUI: Preferences dialog adjustments (moved "bold" checkbox in color page, removed obsolete "show vertical line" boxes in charting page, moved candlestick outline color settings from charting to color page )
  8. styleClipMinMax interferred with styleGradient in 5.52.0. Fixed (both styles can now be used independently as well as combined together)

CHANGES FOR VERSION 5.52.0 (as compared to 5.51.1)

  1. Chart themes implemented, featuring new look, new grid settings, new background gradient fills, predefined themes for more details see: http://www.amibroker.com/guide/h_themes.html
  2. Charts: X-axis algorithm rewritten (now it is clearer and prevents overcrowded/unreadable X labels)
  3. Charts: added native gradient area charts. Gradient chart is obtained using styleGradient. Upper gradient color is specified by color parameter in Plot() function, bottom gradient color is either background color or can be defined using SetChartGradientFill function. styleGradient can be combined with styleLine
  4. Charts: Plot/PlotForeign/PlotOHLC now adds extra parameter "width" that controls the width of the line. Positive values specify PIXEL width, negative values specify width in percent of current bar width.
  5. Eliminated build-up of rendering times caused by growing of MFC temporary GDI object maps in non-UI threads. Now rendering engine uses direct WINAPI calls without MFC
  6. View->Filtering menu was disabled in 5.51.x. Fixed
  7. Data window was not working in 5.51.x. Fixed
  8. " Show middle lines" = "NO" causes date axis to be moved down outside visible area. Fixed.
  9. Selector line was not working correctly in 5.51. Fixed.
  10. Bold dotted trendline did not work in 5.51 BETA. Fixed
  11. AFL: LinearReg/LinRegSlope/LinRegIntercept/TSF/StdError display proper error message when user passes negative (wrong) parameter
  12. Study tooltip information now includes also number of bars between start and end of the trendline
  13. New Analysis: saving last column layout works better
  14. Account manager: Edit->Undo menu was missing. Fixed.
  15. GetFnData() now supports retrieving "Address" field too
  16. On Win98 and above drawing engine uses DC_PEN/DC_BRUSH for speed
  17. Optimize() reduced possibility of IEEE floating point accumulation errors with steps PlotShapes() does not plot multiple times in same x/y pos anymore - it results in faster rendering when shapes overlap (large zoom outs)

CHANGES FOR VERSION 5.51.2 (as compared to 5.51.1)

  1. PlotShapes() rendering was slower in 5.51 than in 5.50. Fixed.
  2. Interpretation was blank with new rendering engine. Fixed.
  3. Charts: Quick AFL was disabled in new rendering engine causing slowdowns with > 100K bars. Fixed

CHANGES FOR VERSION 5.51.1 (as compared to 5.51.0)

  1. fix for low-level Gfx* functions causing crash when multithreaded GDI was enabled

CHANGES FOR VERSION 5.51.0 (as compared to 5.50.5)

  1. Charts: Multithreaded GDI chart rendering implemented for super-smooth UI response and preventing GDI-intensive charts from detoriating entire UI responsiveness
  2. Maximum rendering time limit increased to 1000ms (1sec) when multithreaded charts + GDI are enabled (allowing 2 times more complex plots without Warning 901)
  3. 64-bit only: brand new eSignal 64-bit plugin (3.0.0BETA)

KNOWN ISSUES:

  1. None

UPGRADE POLICY AND PRICING

  1. The upgrade is FREE for all users who purchased AmiBroker after April 12, 2011
  2. The users who purchased AmiBroker before April 13, 2011 would need to buy upgrade if they want to use this newest version ($99 - Standard Edition, $139 - Professional). If you don't want to pay - you may continue using previous version(s) infinitely.
  3. To find out when you have purchased AmiBroker and how long your free upgrade period is, use "Account Information" page in the members area at: http://www.amibroker.com/members/info.php
  4. To purchase new license or upgrade please use our ordering page at: http://www.amibroker.com/order.php

For more details, instructions and examples how to use new features see the Users' Manual, ReleaseNotes.html file (in AmiBroker folder) and What's new page

eSignal plugin 3.1.0 (BETA) released

A new version of eSignal plugin (3.1.0 BETA) is available for download from:

UPDATE: Download links removed - eSignal plugin 3.1 (official) is included in the AmiBroker 5.60.2 setup program.

INSTALLATION:

  1. Just install AmiBroker 5.60.2 or higher - it includes updated eSignal plugin.

V3.1.0 CHANGES (as compared to version 3.0.0)

  • added (experimental) support for EXTENDED Intraday data (upto 14 years of intraday data)

To be able to use EXTENDED intraday data you need to:

  1. (required) subscribe to "EXTENDED Intraday data" add-on (using eSignal Account maintenance) - cost is $10 monthly
  2. (required) go to File->Database Settings, "Configure" dialog and check "Use Extended intraday data request" box
  3. (optional) increase "Number of bars" setting to make room for more data
  4. (optional) use "Force backfill" on already existing symbols to get full history or create new fresh database

If you turn on "Extended data request" in the configure screen but do not subscribe to extended data then backfills may not work or work slower than usual.

The default is the old method ("Extended data" turned OFF), so if you don't change anything, the old method is used and plugin operates as previous versions and does not require any extra subscriptions.