Very minor bug with z-order not being retrieved on templates

[JS999]

If you set up a template with a few indicators on a chart, and then change the z-order so that the candlesticks are on top, then save the template, NT 7 does not seem to remember this z-order. In other words, the next time you load the template, the candles appear on the bottom again.

Is the z-order being saved as part of a template? If not, being able to change the z-order is not really all that useful since you will have to manually change it every time you load up a different template... I assume this is probably a bug?

[NinjaTrader_Ray]

Thanks for reporting.

It will work as expected if you load the template on initial chart creation --> I can reproduce what you are seing as I load the template after chart creation. We will look into this.

[JS999]

Thanks for reporting.

It will work as expected if you load the template on initial chart creation --> I can reproduce what you are seing as I load the template after chart creation. We will look into this.

Thanks, much appreciated...

[NinjaTrader_Ray]

This is not a bug but expected behaviour. Z order is not persisted in a template. This is since there are a lot of conflicts that are no resolvable. One example is:

- Chart has Data Series and one line (line has a z order of 2)
- Load a template that has one indicator which has a z order of 2 --> Conflict

[JS999]

This is not a bug but expected behaviour. Z order is not persisted in a template. This is since there are a lot of conflicts that are no resolvable. One example is:

- Chart has Data Series and one line (line has a z order of 2)
- Load a template that has one indicator which has a z order of 2 --> Conflict

I'm assuming that you are referring to a line which in this case is a drawing object on the chart, correct? The problem here is obviously that drawing objects are separate from indicators and data series, and persist across template changes.

You could make it work as follows:

On template load, you simply apply the z-order of whatever is saved in the template (indicators/data series), and then if there are any drawing objects on the chart, just "shift" their z-order to start at the very bottom (or top) of whatever the new order is after the template is loaded.

So for example:

You have a chart with just bars on it, and 2 lines drawn. In this case, it is set to line #1 = z-order 1, bars = z-order 2, line #2 = z-order 3 (the bars are in between the lines).

You now load a new template which has bars + two moving averages on it (bars set to z-order 1, MA #1 set to z-order 2, MA #2 set to z-order 3 and this ordering is saved as part of the template).

Perhaps there could even be a setting that says "keep drawing objects always on top" or "keep drawing objects always on the bottom" after a template load.

Let's say that you choose to keep drawing objects "on top" after a new template load.

What the code would do is go through and set the z-order for the 2 previously drawn lines to 1 and 2 (basically ignore the bars and any existing indicators), and then apply that offset value (2) to the saved z-order of the newly loaded template. So the new chart would now look like this:

previously drawn line #1 = z-order 1
previously drawn line #2 = z-order 2
bars = z-order 3
MA #1 = z-order 4
MA #2 = z-order 5

If the user has selected "keep drawing objects on the bottom" for a template load, you would instead simply add the z-order value of the last object in the template to the lines z-order. So that would go as follows:

bars = z-order 1
MA #1 = z-order 2
MA #2 = z-order 3
previously drawn line #1 = z-order 4
previously drawn line #2 = z-order 5

So basically, every time you loaded a new template, it would essentially "extract" all the current drawing objects by going through a loop of the currently existing z-order, group them all together in a new order, and then apply them either "below" or "above" the grouped z-order of everything from the newly loaded template by adding an offset value to either the drawing objects z-order, or the z-order of the objects from the new template.

This could all be done programatically on template load with a few simple loops.

If instead you choose to leave it as-is, then z-order as a feature is going to be relatively useless if it doesn't persist across template loads. The only thing that will be useful about it is if you never change templates on your charts, but for those of us that have multiple templates defined and that choose to rapidly switch between them as the markets are moving, we won't be able to manually change z-order every time we do that so we'll never use that feature.

Would this be possible as I have described?

P.S. I understand that this is a relatively minor problem in comparison to show-stopping bugs that you will have to eliminate first for product launch, but it's just good to know if this is something that you can do, and would choose to do after some of the more critical issues are resolved...

[NinjaTrader_Ray]

My developers informed me that there are more area of conflict as it relates to Data Series and Indicators. We use the same approach that Windows uses for managing z-order values and its not based on increments of 1. In short, they told me there are many implications. I will add your suggestion for further review but at this time we are going to leave the current behaviour as is.

[JS999]

My developers informed me that there are more area of conflict as it relates to Data Series and Indicators. We use the same approach that Windows uses for managing z-order values and its not based on increments of 1. In short, they told me there are many implications. I will add your suggestion for further review but at this time we are going to leave the current behaviour as is.

Ok, well... keep it in mind. I am sure that you will be releasing updates to NT 7 once it is officially in prodution, so perhaps this could be something on your "to-do" list once you find yourselves with a bit more time... thanks!