SPECIFICATION OF ASCII FILE FORMAT-HISTORICAL DATA - RELEASE 2.54 - PAGE 1 OF 7

The data to be "imported" must be in ASCII (say "askee") format, because this
is a universal format which can be understood by most communications, spread-
sheet and database programs.  ASCII is a standard which describes the bit pat-
terns used for computer storage of individual letters, digits, puncutation and
other special characters. For example the capital letter "A" has the bit pat-
tern 01000001.  Most personal computers can recognize ASCII.  Textual informa-
tion, such as what you are reading now, is usually stored in ASCII format.

Numbers must be in a binary format before they can be used in calculations by a
computer.  The Stock Charting System stores volume, prices, dates and other in-
formation in a binary format.  Therefore, numbers in ASCII must be "translated"
to binary before they are useful for calculations.

This program looks for and processes only those individual lines on the ASCII
input file which contain valid data.  Any lines which contain column headings,
explanatory information, advertising, communications protocol and other things
will be ignored.




SPECIFICATION OF ASCII FILE FORMAT FOR HISTORICAL VOLUME/PRICES     PAGE 2 OF 7

All data in the ASCII input file MUST pertain to the SAME stock.  There is no
provision to "import" historical information for many dates for many stocks --
historical data for only one stock can be imported at a time.  To "import" data
for many stocks for just the CURRENT date, invoke the (W) or (D) function from
the Master Menu screen.

The lines in the ASCII input file can be in any order, EXCEPT when "importing"
DAILY information to be used on a WEEKLY-updated file.  In that case, lines
containing valid data MUST be in increasing order by date to insure proper com-
bination of daily volume/prices into weekly data; and volume and prices for
dates to be updated should be zeroed out first if they are not already.

The program scans each individual line from left to right and looks for valid
data items.  These include the date, volume and high, low and closing prices.
If the required data items are found, they are converted to binary format.  The
date must be present and must match a previously computed date on the price
history file.  Number values are checked for "reasonableness" and for proper
relationship, for example high or ask >= closing price >= low or bid.  (The >=
symbol means "greater than or equal to".)  Any error will cause that line to be
discarded.

SPECIFICATION OF ASCII FILE FORMAT FOR HISTORICAL VOLUME/PRICES     PAGE 3 OF 7

Data items must be separated by blank spaces or other non-numeric characters.
Either fractional or decimal values are acceptable. Fractions must be separated
from their corresponding whole numbers by one and only one blank space.

The program will ignore characters such as * to indicate ex-dividend.  It will
also ignore any quote marks or commas that may be used to separate data items.
Thus, it will accept data in the CSV, or comma-separated value, format which is
used by some database programs.  It is the responsibility of the user, in the
process of using the external communications or other program of his or her
choice, to make sure the required data items are available.

Here are some examples of acceptable data arranged by trading period date,
high, low, close and volume:

         01/29/88   *120        109 3/4    110 1/2   110375   (* ignored)
         "01/29/88",15.25,14,14.875,56259   (CSV format)
         01-29-88  31.125 29 30.5 4075   (either - or / in date is OK)

For the above data format, you would type MABCV to specify the order in which
the data items appear (see next screen page).

SPECIFICATION OF ASCII FILE FORMAT FOR HISTORICAL VOLUME/PRICES     PAGE 4 OF 7

The prompt you were responding to before these Help screens is necessary to
specify the sequence in which data items appear in the file you are "importing"
into the Stock Charting System.  This sequence may vary, depending on what
source the data comes from.  The required data items must be in the same
sequence on each line on which they appear.

Each required data item is identified by a letter of the alphabet, such as A
for ask or high, B for bid or low, etc.  The sequence in which data items
appear in the input is specified by typing those letters in a corresponding
sequence, for example MABCV for date-high-low-close-volume. If you don't know
the sequence, you can find out from the documentation for the program that
created the file, or by visual inspection after displaying the file on the
screen or printer.  Usually a program that creates a file can also display it.

Note there are many different allowable date formats.  Use M for a date in
mm/dd/yy or mm-dd-yy format (generally used in the USA).  Use D for a date in
dd/mm/yy or dd-mm-yy format; or use Y for a date in yy/mm/dd or yy-mm-dd
format.  The program will also accept dates without punctuation or with 4-digit
years, for example 112588 or 19881125.  Dates without punctuation must be
exactly six or exactly eight digits long.

SPECIFICATION OF ASCII FILE FORMAT FOR HISTORICAL VOLUME/PRICES     PAGE 5 OF 7

To skip over a data item you don't want to use, type the letter "R" if it is a
stock price (ask/bid/last/open/etc.); otherwise type the letter "S". In general
you can use "S" to skip any data item, UNLESS it may contain a number with a
fractional value such as 2 11/16.  "S" skips anything delimited by spaces or
double quotes, so it won't work on fractions.  That's why you have to use "R"
to consistently skip over numeric values that may contain fractions.  Either
"R" or "S" will work with whole numbers and decimal values.

For example, when receiving historical quotes from Dow Jones Information Ser-
vices, the data items are in date-high-low-close-volume order.  Therefore, if
you want only date and closing price, type the letters MRRC to specify the data
item order.  Note in that case you do not have to specify the volume if you
don't want; the program will ignore it.

Use S instead of R to skip a field such as the time of day or a date.

Use V for volume in hundreds (the normal case).  Otherwise use U.  Which one to
use can be determined by inspection of the data.  U means volume in UNITS of 1.



SPECIFICATION OF ASCII FILE FORMAT FOR HISTORICAL VOLUME/PRICES     PAGE 6 OF 7

Not all of the aforementioned data items must be present.  The program can use
the trading period date and the current volume, high, low and close.  However
the only items that absolutely must be available on each line are the date and
either the current closing price (or net asset value) or the ask and bid
prices.  If the ask and bid prices are present, but not the closing price, the
closing price is set to the bid price.  If only the closing price is present,
the high and low are set equal to the close.

After the "translation" process is finished, you are automatically sent back to
the Data Entry screen.  There, you can "browse" through the data and perhaps
set moving average periods and other graphics options.

The program does not indicate errors in the incoming data during the transla-
tion process; invalid data is simply ignored.  Errors will become apparent as
you "browse" through the data or graph it - where errors were found, the data
is missing from the price history file.  See the next screen for some "trouble
shooting" advice.




SPECIFICATION OF ASCII FILE FORMAT FOR HISTORICAL VOLUME/PRICES     PAGE 7 OF 7

If you got most of the data but a few lines are missing, the problem could be
"glitches" on the telephone line (when receiving data through a modem).  This
could cause some "garbage" to get into the incoming data, or perhaps a few
individual characters could have gotten lost.  You might be able to use a text
editor or word processor to edit the ASCII file and correct the problem.  Or,
you could get the missing data from an old newspaper, or try to download the
data again using your communications program.

If you didn't get any data at all, or you got only one or two lines, the most
likely cause is that the data items are not in the same order you specified.
You should visually inspect both the incoming ASCII data and the resulting
Stock Charting System data to make sure everything is reasonable and hopefully
correct.
