When set to autoscale, some indicator windows 'flash'

[pjsmith]

Hi,

For clarity, this is using the stock VOLMA indicator, but it does happen with pretty much all indies.

The issue is that the bars will fill the window, then flash back to the correct sizing. This creates a flash effect. Here is the correct sizing. The blue bars are the VOLMA indicator set as 'Overlay' in this instance, but it happens on a regular 'right' scale etc., too.


What will occur is those blue bars will momentarily fill the window vertically, then the correct scale, per the image . This happens with entirely stock and very simple indicators like the VOLMA as well as more complex or custom ones. I am pretty sure I know what is causing this, and it's the scale of the plot not being correct before the call to OnRender, though I am not sure how this is possible! Not sure if it's possible for OnCalculateMinMax to loose sync with OnRender. Actually, it is so annoying that where I can, I have set my indicator windows to a fixed scale (So the 'F' shows, and this of course prevents the issue).

So, is/was this a known issue, and is there a workaround for it?

Thanks.

[NinjaTrader_Emily]

Hello pjsmith,

Thank you for your post.

Please answer all of the following questions:

• What version of NinjaTrader are you using? Please provide the entire version number. This can be found under Help -> About (Example: 8.?.?.?)
• Who are you connected to? This is displayed in green in the lower-left corner of the Control Center window.
• What instrument symbol (and expiry if applicable) have you selected? For example, ES 03-22, AAPL, EURUSD, etc.
• (For a chart) what interval is selected? For example, 5 minute, 1 day, 2000 volume, 4 Renko, etc.
• Do you receive an error on the screen? Are there errors on the Log tab of the Control Center? If so, what do these errors report?

Please provide a screenshot of your chart's Data Series window as well as the indicator settings for VOLMA that result in this behavior.

• To send a screenshot with Windows 10 or newer I would recommend using the Windows Snipping Tool.
  • Click here for instructions
• Alternatively to send a screenshot press Alt + PRINT SCREEN to take a screenshot of the selected window. Then go to Start--> Accessories--> Paint, and press CTRL + V to paste the image. Lastly, save it as a jpeg file and send the file as an attachment.
  • Click here for detailed instruction

Are you able to consistently reproduce this behavior by taking specific steps related to the scaling and OnRender(), or is it seemingly random? Are there certain factors that result in this occurring more frequently? If there are any steps you may provide to reproduce this behavior, please let us know. This has been discussed via a different forum thread though we have not been able to reproduce this while testing on our end yet. Several users reported this behavior via the following thread, if you'd like to read their thoughts and help us to narrow down a way to reproduce this behavior so that it may be reported to the development team accordingly:

https://forum.ninjatrader.com/forum/ninjatrader-8/indicator-development/1257850-did-something-happen-to-the-chart-rendering-calculation-between-8-0-26-1-and-8-1-1-7

I look forward to your reply.

[QuantKey_Bruce]

Rather than starting completely over, you really should think of this as being a part of https://forum.ninjatrader.com/forum/...-1-and-8-1-1-7.

[pjsmith]

Hello pjsmith,

Thank you for your post.

Please answer all of the following questions:

• What version of NinjaTrader are you using? Please provide the entire version number. This can be found under Help -> About (Example: 8.?.?.?)
• Who are you connected to? This is displayed in green in the lower-left corner of the Control Center window.
• What instrument symbol (and expiry if applicable) have you selected? For example, ES 03-22, AAPL, EURUSD, etc.
• (For a chart) what interval is selected? For example, 5 minute, 1 day, 2000 volume, 4 Renko, etc.
• Do you receive an error on the screen? Are there errors on the Log tab of the Control Center? If so, what do these errors report?

Please provide a screenshot of your chart's Data Series window as well as the indicator settings for VOLMA that result in this behavior.

• To send a screenshot with Windows 10 or newer I would recommend using the Windows Snipping Tool.
  • Click here for instructions
• Alternatively to send a screenshot press Alt + PRINT SCREEN to take a screenshot of the selected window. Then go to Start--> Accessories--> Paint, and press CTRL + V to paste the image. Lastly, save it as a jpeg file and send the file as an attachment.
  • Click here for detailed instruction

Are you able to consistently reproduce this behavior by taking specific steps related to the scaling and OnRender(), or is it seemingly random? Are there certain factors that result in this occurring more frequently? If there are any steps you may provide to reproduce this behavior, please let us know. This has been discussed via a different forum thread though we have not been able to reproduce this while testing on our end yet. Several users reported this behavior via the following thread, if you'd like to read their thoughts and help us to narrow down a way to reproduce this behavior so that it may be reported to the development team accordingly:

https://forum.ninjatrader.com/forum/ninjatrader-8/indicator-development/1257850-did-something-happen-to-the-chart-rendering-calculation-between-8-0-26-1-and-8-1-1-7

I look forward to your reply.

Hello,

8.0.28.0 64-bit
Happens on all connections I have, FXCM, Rithmic, Ninjatrader broker.
I only trade NQ, so only have observed it there. NAS100
Chart is UniRenko
There are no errors, anywhere. It is 'normal' behaviour for my NT. This is an issue that has actually been going on for a very long time indeed - I just decided to comment on it today as It is bugging me!

I cannot reproduce it on demand. It just happens, even in very quiet markets such as today. As I said, it happens even in incredible simple stock ninjatrader indies like VOLMA which do not even have a custom onrender, so, it's not indicator specific.

Thank you for the reference to the other thread. If others have reported it, at least it's not just me. I will have a read through and let you know if I see anything, but given these events happen for only 1 of the screen draws, and maybe only once every few minutes, it's pretty darn hard to do any debugging, especially when it happens on indies that do not even have their own OnRender (hence it is happening in the native NT8 OnRender code which we can't debug our side). Thanks again for the reference. I will have a read...

[pjsmith]

At first glance, I see they are trading NQ, too. But, perhaps that is not surprising!

I am convinced however it is a scaling issue. i.e., the scale is not set, the OnRender code is drawing the plots, then the scale is set, and 250ms or so later, the plot is correctly scaled. This is born out by the fact the problem COMPLETELY goes away if you fix the scale. However, it's not possible to fix the scale on an overlay plot and that is something I recently added to my chart, hence this post.

[pjsmith]

Rather than starting completely over, you really should think of this as being a part of https://forum.ninjatrader.com/forum/...-1-and-8-1-1-7.

Indeed. A wiser place to add further details. I did not find that thread in my initial search. However, apart from what I just added, I don't think I actually have anything further I can add. It's a NT issue as far as I can see (I am a developer), occurs across a wide variety of indies and completely stock NT8, so, nothing for me to debug code wise. You don;t get much simpler than VOLMA()! NT have reports from different places of the same issue and enough to go on, if they want to pursue it. I am not going to spend many hours providing them with the 'proof of concept' so they can replicate on demand and go to their developer, which is what they often ask for. Not my job, even if I thought it were possible. Sorry - This isn't a dig on your comment. Just getting rather frustrated with NT and their stance on things like this! Basically, my attitude has become, find out if its a known issue and they have a suggestion/fix, or live with it.

[QuantKey_Bruce]

You are right - this is clearly a NinjaTrader problem. I meant my comment "rather than starting completely over" for NinjaTrader. They will either take this seriously or they won't - they've already been told what has happened (in the other thread), and when it happened (it started with 8.1). And yes, it can be reproduced randomly on any bar type and with any indicators including the inbuilt ones. It isn't you.

[NinjaTrader_Emily]

Hello,

8.0.28.0 64-bit
Happens on all connections I have, FXCM, Rithmic, Ninjatrader broker.
I only trade NQ, so only have observed it there. NAS100
Chart is UniRenko
There are no errors, anywhere. It is 'normal' behaviour for my NT. This is an issue that has actually been going on for a very long time indeed - I just decided to comment on it today as It is bugging me!

I cannot reproduce it on demand. It just happens, even in very quiet markets such as today. As I said, it happens even in incredible simple stock ninjatrader indies like VOLMA which do not even have a custom onrender, so, it's not indicator specific.

Thank you for the reference to the other thread. If others have reported it, at least it's not just me. I will have a read through and let you know if I see anything, but given these events happen for only 1 of the screen draws, and maybe only once every few minutes, it's pretty darn hard to do any debugging, especially when it happens on indies that do not even have their own OnRender (hence it is happening in the native NT8 OnRender code which we can't debug our side). Thanks again for the reference. I will have a read...

You mentioned the chart is UniRenko - have you seen this occur with other bar types as well or only on UniRenko charts? Please provide the requested screenshots so I may open a similar chart with the same indicator settings applied on my end and see if I am able to observe this behavior at some point throughout the day:

Please provide a screenshot of your chart's Data Series window as well as the indicator settings for VOLMA that result in this behavior.

• To send a screenshot with Windows 10 or newer I would recommend using the Windows Snipping Tool.
  • Click here for instructions
• Alternatively to send a screenshot press Alt + PRINT SCREEN to take a screenshot of the selected window. Then go to Start--> Accessories--> Paint, and press CTRL + V to paste the image. Lastly, save it as a jpeg file and send the file as an attachment.
  • Click here for detailed instruction

I would be glad to test this out on a clean installation of NinjaTrader 8.0.28.0 to see if the behavior occurs on my end as well. I have tried the steps provided by other users in the other thread and still have not observed this behavior on my end. We have been trying to narrow down the environment and conditions that result in this behavior so we have something to report to the development team that is testable in some capacity, though we do not have enough details narrowed down yet in order to report this behavior.

I look forward to your reply.

[pjsmith]

@QuantKey_Bruce, fwiw - This got so bad today, with the flashing, and my platform quit twice! So, I just rewrote the VOLMA indie. I know, it's so simple, that you would not think it would matter, but I re-wrote it without the separate call to EMA, calculating the average internally. Hell, it probably should be like that anyway. I like efficiency! But, guess what - That flashing is gone. Instantly - And I'd gotten so used to it the charts now just seem rock solid! Wohoo! Put stock VOLMA back in its place - Charts flashing all over. Take it off and replace it with mine - No problem! I cannot tell you the exact cause and I am not going to try to find it as I am running an older ver of NT that they will not fix/take bugs from anyway, but, it 100% fixes the problem for me. Weird. So, I wonder if your indies also have calls to other similar indies, perhaps? I leave it with you. Just wanted to follow up, as whatever has changed in that indie for me, has solved the issue.

[pjsmith]

Just going to quick add - Since doing this - It has made a remarkable difference to my platform. Even over just the last 30 minutes of use, seems far more solid and more responsive. Whatever NT8 was doing under the hood to process that VOLMA indie and causing the flashing must have been having quite an impact. Honestly - As someone who trades on this platform pretty much all day, every day - I can say it is chalk and cheese!