How bad is IB?

[NinjaTrader_Dierk]

Sorry I don't know how TWS works internally, you would need to contact IB for details. The only thing I know is that NT will report "connection loss" only (!) as TWS decides to indicate a connection loss to NT.

[ctrlbrk]

Sorry I don't know how TWS works internally, you would need to contact IB for details. The only thing I know is that NT will report "connection loss" only (!) as TWS decides to indicate a connection loss to NT.

So it is your belief that even though TWS appears to be 100% functional, that this is a TWS problem and not a NT problem.

I believe contacting IB to be a waste of time. I imagine the first thing they would say is upgrade to the latest TWS, which NT doesn't support.

[ctrlbrk]

Perhaps NT can contact IB regarding this, since NT would have much more pull than me, and your technical team can speak to their technical team.

[NinjaTrader_Dierk]

Not sure how you can control that is the API logic of TWS is "functional". TWS only indicates the connection status to their servers (goes pink/violet) which is different than the communication between TWS and NT.

Unfortunately we are unable to amend NT code in the frequency as IB publishes new releases. However we will update the recommended TWS version every few weeks/months.

[ctrlbrk]

Dierk,

Just FYI, the color-coded changes do take place and seem fine (indicating server farm problems in TWS, and showing that in NT on status bar).

But for TWS to be working, receiving updates, showing new tick info, no errors, etc, and NT to suddenly pop up and said TWS forced connection close --- only after submitting a new order --- would seem to be a problem with the communication between NT and TWS.

You do at least agree, I assume, that it is technically possible for NT to have an option that says "Auto-reconnect to IB" enabled yes/no. Basically, if client manually chooses "Connect: IB" and sometime before client manually chooses "Disconnect: IB" the connection drops, NT certainly has the ability to do a re-connect.

[NinjaTrader_Dierk]

Sorry I don't know since we never observed your described behavior nor had we been able to analyze.

To clarify: You are *not* talking about a connection status change indicated in the control center status bar, but about a notification box poping up which also would result in an entry in the log tab? Could you please post the exact log entry? Thanks

[ctrlbrk]

Sorry I don't know since we never observed your described behavior nor had we been able to analyze.

To clarify: You are *not* talking about a connection status change indicated in the control center status bar, but about a notification box poping up which also would result in an entry in the log tab? Could you please post the exact log entry? Thanks

Correct, not status change, but a "TWS forced your connection closed" pop-up. The status changes have never occurred in a pop-up. The message is identical to if I have NT connected to TWS, and then I close the TWS application myself before closing it within NT.

I do wish you guys would at least add the re-connect option, many people have asked for it, and regardless of being able to reproduce what we're seeing in your lab, this option could save us a bunch of money.

if (client-clicks-on-connect-to-ib && client-has-not-clicked-on-disconnect-from-ib)
{
if (!connected-to-ib) reconnect();
}

In other words, I simply ask that if I told NT to connect to IB, and I haven't told NT to disconnect from IB yet it is disconnected -- for whatever reason -- have NT auto-reconnect. Same as me manually clicking File->Connect->IB.

[ctrlbrk]

BTW,

Thank you for your quick replies, as always.

Should this happen again and I am not throwing my computer across the room because of it, I will endeavor to remember to grab the log entry from NT.

[NinjaTrader_Dierk]

Since none of our many IB customers observed/reported this behavior it must be related to your actual machine/setup.

One potential cause of your trouble could be a virus scanner, port monitor, firewall etc. software which probably "messes" with local socket connections. I suggest turning off any of these to isolate the cause of trouble.

[ctrlbrk]

Since none of our many IB customers observed/reported this behavior it must be related to your actual machine/setup.

One potential cause of your trouble could be a virus scanner, port monitor, firewall etc. software which probably "messes" with local socket connections. I suggest turning off any of these to isolate the cause of trouble.

Ok, I don't believe I can run my PC without anti-virus software or a firewall and be mentally sane. I do run VM's this way, but not my core OS which is where my actual live trading takes place.

But, I will try to find out if I am the only person that has experienced this, and if not, what the commonalities are.

Please see this thread for the poll:

http://www.ninjatrader-support2.com/vb/showthread.php?p=69523

[ctrlbrk]

I did find another post that seems to have the same issue as me:

http://www.ninjatrader-support2.com/vb/showthread.php?t=11260&highlight=tws+forced

[NinjaTrader_Dierk]

Sorry what is VM? are you running NT in a virtual machine? This might be another potential cause of trouble which you should eliminate to isolate your problem.

[NinjaTrader_Dierk]

I did find another post that seems to have the same issue as me:
http://www.ninjatrader-support2.com/...ght=tws+forced

This is the regular TWS auto disconnect, which can be scheduled and is not the problem you're experiencing.

[ctrlbrk]

Sorry what is VM? are you running NT in a virtual machine? This might be another potential cause of trouble which you should eliminate to isolate your problem.

VM = virtual machine as you guessed

Nothing I have described is related to NT running in a VM. I do that only for backtesting, not live trading. Everything discussed above is on a live trading production system, not a VM.

I was making an observation that I cannot stop running anti-virus software or a firewall and see if this problem continues or not on a production machine, as I cannot force the reproducing of the issue on a whim and am not leaving my core OS vulnerable.

Thanks,
Mike

[ctrlbrk]

This is the regular TWS auto disconnect, which can be scheduled and is not the problem you're experiencing.

Hmm, are you certain?

I am using TWSStart to keep IB's TWS from auto-shutting down and it works as it should by delaying the auto-shutdown time by swaping the AM/PM, thereby delaying the process indefinately.

This is from the log. Note the times of log off times. Also, TWS never actually closes, it is always open.