Is NTv6.5 supported on Windows Server?

[ScoobyStoo]

OK, giving nothing away then.

I await the release details...

[sefstrat]

I faced the same situation as you and I agree with you 100% that OQ has better architecture than NT, but I think you will find there are things that are missing from both platforms (or if not missing just harder to accomplish than it should be). At least on NT you stand a chance of finding someone else who has tackled the problem..

Also there is one other thing that sets NT apart from all other platforms... ZenFire datafeed. If you have not tried it yet go to Mirus futures and get a demo account

I am stuck in a real dilemma now.

I'm evaluating both NinjaTrader and OpenQuant, which are the only 2 serious .NET platform contenders as far as I can tell in the retail market.

I have downloaded a demo version of OQ and on face value it looks like a good product. It's obviously geared far more to the professional programmer than NT, but the documentation is hopeless and the forums are so dead they are starting to develop gangrene. Doesn't matter how good a product is...without support it is next to useless.

I love NinjaTrader as a company. They have responsive support and comprehensive documentation. I just have some serious concerns about the robustness and scalability of the underlying platform. It's really a platform for discretionary traders or quant traders with limited programming ability who want to configure a strategy using wizards.

What I really need is a platform which handles all the boilerplate stuff such as connectivity, order execution, position monitoring, data feeds etc and leaves me free to develop the custom strategy logic independently in a proper development environment.

I like NT and want to use them, but my spidey sense is tingling and telling me that I'm going to get 4 weeks into developing my strategy and come up against a showstopper technical problem which will mean I have to shift to OQ.

The one thing that would stop me buying OQ from the beginning is if someone from NT would outline what improvements v7.0 will bring to true quant developers such as us.

If anyone from NT would be able to comment on this...or even confirm if providing better support to quant developers is on the product roadmap?

[ScoobyStoo]

I faced the same situation as you and I agree with you 100% that OQ has better architecture than NT, but I think you will find there are things that are missing from both platforms (or if not missing just harder to accomplish than it should be). At least on NT you stand a chance of finding someone else who has tackled the problem..

Also there is one other thing that sets NT apart from all other platforms... ZenFire datafeed. If you have not tried it yet go to Mirus futures and get a demo account

Totally. I have been in this game long enough now to know that all which glistens is not gold and a weak developer community (there are more posts over on http://www.smartquant.com/forums/ asking "Is anyone there!?" than asking serious questions) is a sure sign that a product is going nowhere. Having seen various software markets come to maturity over the years it's fairly obvious to me that NT is close to reaching critical mass in this one and will eventually be the overall winner in the retail marketplace. They have enough momentum behind them now to pretty much steamroller most of the competition. Of course, a few of the Java kids will always bang on about the open source projects, but I don't have much time for those guys as I don't take any real pleasure in spending an evening debugging someone else's sloppy code when I could be in the pub instead.

Have been trialing the ZenFire feed for a month via the demo on their website. Love it. Unfiltered low latency tick data stream. That alone opens up so many more possibilities for retail guys like us. The playing field is getting more level all the time...

[r2kTrader]

Scooby,

Let's look at 7 and make a judgement then. I share your frustration, but let's look at what is available today as opposed to 5 years ago? TradeStation is not even an option. Who wants to be locked into a brokerage (Especially that one!)

NT is very powerful and will only get better.

I am hearing good things about NT that will really put it at the front of the line. The strategy management (syncing) and MSDE (using SQL for data access/storage) alone will be a huge boost. As they get the boost, more traders will come over. It is a self fulfilling agenda.

Keeping fingers crossed for 7. Please add me to beta ;-)

[ScoobyStoo]

TS is a bad joke these days. As they say, every dog has its day...and I think that manky old mutt has definitely seen the sun set on its day!

Roll on NTv7, like yourself I have great hopes.

+1 to the beta list please Dierk.

[NinjaTrader_Dierk]

Guys, beta of NT7 will be available publicly. There is no need to subscribe to a list.