Market Breaker Help Main Index
	Getting Started	A selection of Overviews about Market Breaker
	Menus & Button Bar	Detail description concerning all the functions within Market Breaker
	Downloading from Teletext	Description of how Teletext Downloading Work,  how its configured and the types of data downloaded.
	Common Questions Answered	A collections of common questions asked by users with answers.
	Hints	A few hints on how to work with market Breaker efficiently.
See DDE for information on transferring data to a spreadsheet

see Other Information for other general information.


This help file corresponds to Market Breaker 2000 (version 5.00 of Market Breaker) for the PC produced in June 1995 see Other Info for a general introduction and further information on this version and other versions of Market Breaker.

The program functions can be accessed through the Menu, Desktop or by automatic setup:

•	Menu Options

•	Desktop Options

•	Non-Interactive Share Loading

•	Hints

•	Common Questions & Problems


Dynamic Data Exchange
Dynamic Data Exchange (DDE)

(Note this facility is not provided in the demo version of the program)

Market Breaker 2000 allows other programs in Windows to extract the price history data into another running program.  This is most usefully performed with a spreadsheet.  The following example is given for Microsoft Excel.

In a Microsoft Excel cell type the following:

=mb2000|Price!'BT'

If Market Breaker 2000 is running it will immediately display the latest price for BT (British Telecom).  Note that you must use the short share name (that used by teletext).  The single quotes ' are optional in the above example but in the following example they must be used otherwise Excel reports an error:

=mb2000|Price!'BT,0'

This example will show the first price (zeroth) stored in Market Breaker for BT.  The corresponding date can be found for that point by using the keyword Date instead of the share name.  Thus below are the formulas for obtaining the first 3 prices and dates for BT from Market Breaker.

=mb2000|Price!'Date,0'	=mb2000|Price!'BT,0'
=mb2000|Price!'Date,1'	=mb2000|Price!'BT,1'
=mb2000|Price!'Date,2'	=mb2000|Price!'BT,2'

Note that date cells have to be formatted as a date for them to appear as a date rather than a number in Excel.

You can also obtain the PE ratio and Yield of a share by using the keywords PE and Yield used as follows:

=mb2000|Price!'BT,PE'

and

=mb2000|Price!'BT,Yield'

For Lotus 123 users, use the following commands

Click on a cell which is to receive the data from Market Brealer then choose Link Options from the Edit menu.  Click on Create.  Press ALT-P which takes you to the Application box, and enter mb2000.  Press ALT-T to take you to the Topic name box, and enter Price.  Press ALT-I to take you to the Item name box and enter an item name which will be the share name or Date keyword eg 'BT,0', 'BT,PE' or 'Date,0'

For Quattro Pro users:

Click on a cell which is to receive the data from Teletext and then type @DDELINK([mb2000|Price]"BT,0").


Menu Options

File Menu

Edit Menu

Input Menu

Shares Menu

Portfolio Menu

Sectors Menu

Analysis Menu

Edit Data Menu

Teletext

Help


Desktop Options

Page Buttons

Sectors Button

Analyse Button

Portfolio Button


Other Information on Market Breaker.

There are some ancillary details you should read about Market Breaker for the PC.

Introduction

Disclaimer

Copyright Notices

Other Version of Market Breaker


Introduction

Market Breaker is a share price analyser and portfolio manager package.  Unlike all the other similar packages it has been written for the a Windowing environment. and is therefore easier to use than its competition while incorporating all the standard functions normally found in such packages.  It holds data on up to 2400 shares at once - other similar share analysis programs hold a fraction of this.  For each share 250 time data points can be held.  Share portfolios can also be stored and the transactions made to the portfolios can be transferred between Market Breaker and Quicken (the home accounting program made by Intuit).

Market Breaker has also been written with the private investor in mind rather than businesses so it is not full of complicated functions and does not require updating with data on a regular and time consuming basis.   However, it does not provide share prices and results information for all shares on the FTSE as provided by Channel 4s teletext 2000 service (see also Overview of the Teletext 400 and Teletext 2000 Services).  This large quantity of information and the ease at which you can navigate through the data makes it better and certainly more comprehensive than many business orientated programs.

To use the automatic download facility you will also need to purchase the Teletext Adapter hardware.  Currently only the adapter made by Microtext is supported.

The computer can also be configured to download share prices from other teletext system on cable and satellite.  To use the automatic download facility you will also need to purchase the Teletext Adapter hardware.  Currently only the adapter made by Microtext is supported.

With over 2200 shares being held within the program is has become necessary to simplify finding shares easily.  This can be accomplished in two ways.

•	Using the sector /chooser

•	Using the Control Key and a letter to find the first page beginning with that letter.

The program is capable of taking data in on a daily basis if you wish.  However, you need not download the data every data.  It will not matter if the download data every week.

This program works on any PC which is running Microsoft Windows 3.1, Windows for Workgroups or Windows 95 and has a least 4 Mbytes of RAM.


Disclaimer
Disclaimers

Alibro Ltd makes no promises as to the accuracy of the data or the calculations in the program.   Indeed the data on Teletext itself often has errors in it.

Buying and selling shares is a risky business and any information obtained from this program should be used in addition to the knowledge of the user about the stock market.  Alibro Ltd accepts no responsibility for any losses incurred as a result of using this program.  Use this program and buy and sell shares at your own risk.

The current version of this program is heavily reliant on the Channel 4 Teletext 2000 Service.  If for any reason Channel 4 no longer makes this service unavailable or make it such that Market Breaker cannot work with it, Alibro Ltd will not be held liable for this loss.  If this were to happen the program would be likely to still continue to work with the other services provided by BBC and Channel 4 as well as other cable and satellite operations (but may download fewer shares).


Copyright Notices

Market Breaker is copyright Alibro Ltd. 1989-1995

This is Version 5.00 released in June 1995

Demo Market Breaker has its save and print features removed and may be copied freely to your friends, but it may not be sold.  Alibro Ltd. still holds full rights to this program.

Market Breaker is sold and is for your own use on a single computer.  However, you may not give or sell this program to other people or run a single bought copy on more than one computer.  Copy protection is often very inconvenient for purchasers of software.  There is no copy protection on this program so please respect the time and effort spent by the author writing this program.

CEEFAX  is copyright of the British Broadcasting  Corporation (BBC).  Teletext on 4 is copyright of the Independent Broadcasting Association (IBA).

Quicken is copyright Intuit Inc.


Other Versions of Market Breaker

Market Breaker was first released for the Atari ST in 1989.  In October 1992 the Market Breaker for Windows version was released.  The menus and functions provided are almost identical between the two versions.  This version contained up to 210 shares each with 225 prices.  Up to 1994 various version of Market breaker were released up to version 4.53e.  In June 1995 version 5.00 of Market Breaker was released as Market Breaker 2000.  This is really an entirely new program which can hold up to 2400 shares each with 250 time points.  Many extra features such as Alarms, Portfolio transactions, sector chooser and sector names edit, tool bar, tool help, etc. have been added to make it a much more complete program.

Demo Market Breaker 2000.  A demo version of Market Breaker 2000 is available as shareware.  This version has all the functionality of Market Breaker apart from the Save as CSV and Save as ASCII function and the Print functions.  Demo Market Breaker 2000 also has a time limit of use on it.  You are free to copy this version to all your friends.  If you have the Demo version and wish to buy Market Breaker please phone or FAX Alibro Software on 0181-208-1067.


File Menu

File Menu

Open 	Read data from specified file

Read backup 	Read old backup share data

Save data 	Save the data you have changed to the default file

Save As 	Save data to specified file

Import 	Import Data from an ASCII, or CSV file

Export 	Export Data to ASCII or CSV file

Print	Print the data in the text window

Print Setup	Print Setup

Exit	Exit the program

The File menu options allows you to either:-

If you attempt a Exit when the data has been changed then you will be prompted to quit, cancel or save & quit

Edit Menu

Input Menu

Shares Menu

Portfolio Menu

Sectors Menu

Analysis Menu

Edit Data Menu

Teletext

Help


Import

Read ASCII Data 	Read data in ASCII format

Read CSV Full Data 	Read all share data in CSV format (comma separated variables used by spreadsheets)

Read CSV Single Day Data  Read CSV data for a single date


Read CSV Single Day Data

Allows you to read in a single day's set of data.  Any date can be specified.  If the date does not already exist it will be inserted.

The import file must be called DAYDATA.CSV

The data in this file must be as follows:

First Line in the file is the date in format 	30/5/95

Subsequent lines must be   ShareName,Price eg 	B.P.,595.5

Once this option is selected the import file is read in and then a dialog appears containing two lists.  The list on the left is the import data and that on the right is the existing share data.  We recommend that you simply use the Import All option.  This will import all the data.  When the imported share is matched with an existing share the a '*' appears against it.

If you do not use the import all option you can individually add new share names to the stored list, but any new date is not inserted.


Export

Save ASCII Data 	Save data in ASCII format

Save CSV Data 	Save data in CSV format


Edit Menu

File Menu

Edit Menu

The edit menu controls cutting and pasting in the main edit window.

Undo	Un-does the last action carried out on the text window

Cut	Cuts the selected text to the paste buffer

Copy	Copies the selected text to the paste buffer

Paste	Pastes the contents of the paste buffer to the edit window

Delete	Deletes the selected text

Select All	Selects all the text in the edit window

Input Menu

Shares Menu

Portfolio Menu

Sectors Menu

Analysis Menu

Edit Data Menu

Teletext

Help


Cut

Cuts the selected text to the paste buffer


Input Menu Option

File Menu

Edit Menu

Input Menu

The Input menu option allows you to either:-

Today's Data by Hand 	Input the screens of share data

Check Latest Data 	This shows all shares that have moved more than 20%.  It is run automatically after completion of loading data from disk

Load Teletext 400	Load the Teletext400 (todays share prices)

Load Teletext 2000	Load the Teletext2000(yesterdays share prices)

Load Teletext 2000 & 400	Load both 2000 & 400

Load Results	Load Results

Once you input the data use the edit command to change the data if it needs correcting.

To use the Automatic input option you must have bought the Teletext Adapter hardware from Microtext (Tel 01705 595694) or Alibro Software (Tel 0181-208-1067) and have the file TELETEXT.INF in the SHARES directory.  Only the adapter made by Microtext will currently work with this software.

Shares Menu

Portfolio Menu

Sectors Menu

Analysis Menu

Edit Data Menu

Teletext

Help


Load Teletext 400

See Downloading for an overview

The teletext 400 option downloads todays share prices form teletext from the section of the SHARES.SEQ file beginning with *400.

Note that if its a week-end then the prices are downloaded for the date of the previous Friday.

If its before 9:00am then the prices will be downloaded for the previous day.

You should normally run this option after the Stock Market closes at 17:30.  Otherwise you will pick up prices from during the day.  If you do more than one download per day then that days prices will be overwritten.  Currently there is no way of performing more than one download per day.


Load Teletext 2000

See Downloading for an overview

The teletext 2000 option downloads yesterdays share prices form teletext from the section of the SHARES.SEQ file beginning with *400.

Note that if its a week-end or a Monday then the prices are downloaded for the date of the previous Friday.  No account of Bank Holidays is provided.


Load Teletext 2000 & 400

See Downloading for an overview.

This option downloads both the teletext 400 and teletext 2000 shares.

Note that before midnight the two sets of data will be loaded into different dates.  After Midnight but before 9:00am the two sets of data will be loaded on the same date.


Load Results

See Downloading for an overview.  See overview of Results

The load results uses the results section of the SHARES.SEQ file.  It will download the share results reported on that day.  The name of share searched for must match the full share name to be found in the List Edit share details dialog box.  There can often be no match because the full name in the program does not match the name entered by Channel 4.  You will get a list of all failed matches.

If you have failed matches you should edit the full share name using the List Edit option and re-run the Load Results.

The results can be seen (see Displaying Results) by pressing the Results button in the List Edit dialog.

The way Market Breaker interprets the data from Teletext is described by the INI file.

This file contains the following lines

[RESULTS]

Name=7

Turnover=Turnover!Total turnover!Gross revenue

Profit=Pre-tax profit!-Pre-tax loss!Pre-tax revenue

EPS=EPS!-LPS

Div=Dividend!Final dividend

InterimDiv=Interim dividend

TotalDiv=Total dividend

Comment=16,20

YearEnd=Results for year to

Final=Results for year to

Interim=Results for six months to

Million=m

Billion=bn

The left hand side of each equals (=) sign represent an internal identifier used by market breaker.  The right hand side of the equals sign represents the Search string in the teletext page which Market Breaker will look for.  The number found to the right of the search string will be downloaded at that data corresponding to the search string.

The search string can have an number of alternatives.  The alternatives are separated by a ! symbol.  If the ! is followed by a minus - sign then the resultant number found will be multiplied by -1 to make is negative.

The comment key word has two numbers to the right of the equals sign to represent the row range from which a comment can be loaded.

The Million and Billion keywords modify the value retrieved dependent on the letter retrieved after the number.  For example £300m will be interpreted at £300,000,000.


Displaying Results

The Results Display Dialog shows results for the past few years in reverse order.  The year shown is the year the information was downloaded.  Often the results were for the previous year.

When a new result for a new year is downloaded all previous results are pushed down one line.  Currently you can see only 6 years of results.  In a later version 9 years of results will be visible and more editing facilities will be made available.

Note that if an interim result is downloaded its data is entered into the top line.  That data will be overwritten when the full result is downloaded.


Portfolio Menu

File Menu

Edit Menu

Input Menu

Shares Menu

Portfolio Menu

Portfolio Lists

Edit Portfolio Share

From the above dialog boxes a further option can be run

Portfolio Transactions

Sectors Menu

Analysis Menu

Edit Data Menu

Teletext

Help


Read backup

Note that the default for Market Breaker is now to have no backup file present.  This is because it takes about 3.5Mbytes of disk space.  However if you have sufficient space please turn this option on.  See Options to find out how to do this.

Use this if you have saved some data that is incorrect and you want to forget it.  This will load in the old data which is called SLDATA.BAK.


Save Data

Use this option before quitting to save the data if you have altered anything.  If the data is stored on a separate disk swap the disks first.  The old data will be renamed SLDATA.BAK and the new data will be called SLDATA.DAT.


Read ASCII Data

The share price data and portfolio data can be stored in ASCII format so that minor edits can be done or the using an editor such as 'WRITE.EXE'.  The format of the data is suitable for an edit.

Note that not all Market Breaker data is stored in the ASCII file so this option should not and cannot be used to restore data from a corrupted format.  Note that the CSV option can be used this way. See Read CSV data and Save CSV data.

If you want to use a spreadsheet try the CSV options.  This option will load in the ASCII data which is called SDATA.DAT.


Save Ascii
Save ASCII Data

The option stored the data in ASCII format.  If backups are turned on, the old ASCII data will be renamed SDATA.BAK and the new data will be called SDATA.DAT.  Note the first two numbers in this file are the number of shares and number of prices for each share respectively.  Market Breaker does not store all the data in this file; the CSV format is recommended more strongly.


Read CSV Data

The share price data and portfolio data can be stored in Comma Separated Variable (CSV) format which is available in most spreadsheets.  The data is organised in rows and columns with headings so that you can work out what the data is.  This option will load in the CSV data which is called SDATA.CSV.

Please note that this format should only be used to load in data for which there has only been minor editing of the data whilst within a spreadsheet.  If you have done extensive editing then it will be likely that you have made a mistake.  There is substantial error checking (with data synchronisation checking) as the data loads in but it is by no means fool proof so be careful.  The data synchronisation uses the data descriptions so do not alter the spelling of these items.  When a synchronisation error occurs the error identifies a share title - the error in the data will be before this data title.


Save CSV Data

The option stored the data in CSV format for later use in a spreadsheet.  The old CSV data will be renamed SDATA.CSB and the new data will be called SDATA.CSV.  Note the first two numbers in this file are the number of shares and number of prices for each share respectively.

If you use this option with Microsoft Excel you will not need to tell it about to load in CSV format since it will recognise the data type from the file name extension.


 Open

This option presents the File name entry common dialog box.  You can read any file that has been saved using the Save as  option.


Save as ...
Save as

This option presents the File name entry common dialog box.  You can read any file that has been saved using the Save Data as Named File option.


Quit
Exit

Use this option to leave the Market Breaker application.  If you have used the Input Menu you will be prompted with an alert box which will ask whether or not you want to:-

- NOSAVE 	- leave without saving

- CANCEL	- don't leave and don't save

- SAVE	- save data and then leave


Data Entry
Manual Data Entry

There are 80 pages of input forms, each page has two columns of 15 shares names and prices.  You enter the prices in the blank boxes next to the share name.  These blank boxes are called fields below.  This is obviously laborious to enter all the share prices.  However, it is entirely possible to add your own share/trusts etc and enter the data for these by hand on the same days as you do teletext downloads.

Once entering data on the forms the keys used as those within any Windows form.  These keys are as follows:

 - TAB or down arrow moves to the next field

 - up arrow moves to the previous field

blank then zero entered into the data - zero is always displayed as blank on these input screens).

 - Return key takes you to the next page.

Click the STOP box when you have finished entering data.  If any data has changed by more than 20% since it was last input then a warning will be given.  Use the edit share option to make further changes to the data.

If you get a share giving a warning of more than 20% change it may be that you have typed in the price incorrectly.  However, often it can be because there has been a Rights or Scrip Issue etc.  You will see this on the day of the issue with an XR or XC against the price on CEEFAX.  More often than not if you are typing the prices in once a week you may well miss such an issue.  Unless you have access to a paper you will not know the change in number of shares so the best way of correcting the data is to just work out the factor by which the share price has changed (this is usually that the current price 2,3 or 4 times less than the previous price).  Then use the Multiplier option .  If the price was previously twice the current price use the multiplying factor of 0.5 on shares prices for all dates before the current day.


Teletext
Automatic Data Entry 	See also Non Interactive Loading of data

To use this option you must have the Teletext Adapter connected and also have a good TV signal into the hardware.  The only adapter that works with this software is made by Microtext (Tel 0705-595694).  See Downloading for a description of the downloading process.

If ever the format of a teletext page changes edit the format details in MB2000.INIfile see Changing Teletext Format

The file called SHARES.SEQ in the SHARES directory comes setup for the Teletext 2000 and Teletext 400 services found on channel 4.  Also present are the relevant command for the BBC service but they are commented out (ie disabled from use using a ! character at the beginning of the file). This file is edited from within market breaker using the Teletext, Edit Sequence File menu option.  See Example File

The data in this file is supplied as follows:

*2000  Indicates Teletext 2000 service               Teletext 2000

4,532,43,Adjust

4,533,46,Adjust

! Note Group all the shares from the same channel together

*400  Indicates Standard Teletext Service        Teletext 400

! BBC1 share pages (note these lines are commented out)

!1,221,4

!1,222,4

!1,223,3

!1,224,1

! Channel Four share pages

! Load indices

@,Indices,4,500,-1    see Pag Files

4,511,5

4,512,3

4,513,3

4,514,4

4,516,1

#

[Results]7,20               Results

%,4,521

%,4,522

!

You should group all together all references to the same channel to make the download as fast as possible.

The file has three sections corresponding to the 3 types of information download

1.	Teletext 2000

2.	Teletext 400

3.	Results

There are three possible formats of a line within the Teletext 2000 and Teletext 400 sections.

Standard Format

Single Item from Single Page Format

Multiple Items from Single Page Format


Comments

Lines in SHARES.SEQ file which begin with the ! character are ignored by the software and can be left in the file for personal reminder or temporary removal from the system.  In the file provided the CEEFAX pages are no longer used by the current download and are commented out.


Teletext 2000

The Teletext 2000 section starts with:

*2000

The *2000 refers to the beginning of the Teletext 2000 pages.  The significance of this is that the data refers to the previous day and is not todays data.


Teletext 400

The Teletext 400 section starts with:

*400

The *400 refers to the beginning of the Teletext 400 pages.  This can be used for any service as well as the Channel 4 teletext 400 pages.  For example it can be used for the BBC or satellite/cable teletext reception.


Results

Results information pages start in the section marked with:

[Results]

The format within the results section is as follows:

c is the channel (in the first section 4 for channel 4)

p is the 3 figure Teletext page number (in the first section specifying pages 521, and 523)

There is no specification of the number of sub-pages because the number varies every day as the number of company results varies.

See Overview of Results


Standard Format

The standard format is c,p,n where

c is the channel (in the first section 4 for channel 4)

p is the 3 figure Teletext page number (in the first section specifying pages 532,  534)

n is the number of sub-pages in each page (in this case page 532 has 40 sub-pages).

Optionally you can add the word Adjust at the end of the line.  This will adjust the value of n automatically based on the number being transmitted.  The Adjust method is NOT fool proof.  Even though it currently works it may not work in future dependent on what the TV companies do.  If for some reason downloads stop working properly try removing this parameter.

Note that the Microtext Teletext Adapter is capable of downloading 4 pages at the same time so the software is able to request 4 sets of pages at once to be downloaded.

For the standard format, the following applies.  On channel 4 some of the subpages are adverts.  These will be ignored so long as you specify the number of subpages correctly (eg page 511 has subpage 1 to 4 as valid subpages with data, subpage 5 is an advert - so if you only ask for 4 subpages you will only get subpages 1 to 4).


Single Item from Single Page Format

The second format is in the final line which begins with the special character $ as follows:

$,s,c,p,sp,m,k where:

s is the share name which need to be filled in.  In this case it is FTSE. Alternatively it could be the gold price or £ versus $ rate.

c is the channel

p is the teletext page

sp is the teletext sub-page number

m is the number of characters after the key word at which the value to be read starts

k is the keyword or words on the screen after which the value is to be read.  It the key occurs more than once the first one is used.


Downloading

What is Downloading

Non-Interactive Share Loading

What Happens when I start Downloading


What is Downloading

Along side the television picture and sound, teletext data is also broadcast as a usually invisible part of the picture.  In fact if your TV is badly adjusted you can sometimes see coloured dots flashing across the top of the screen.  These dots are the digital information contained in teletext.  Many TVs have teletext chips inside which enable you to view the data being broadcast.  These chips can also be placed on a teletext card inside a computer and with the appropriate software you can view the same teletext data on the screen of your computer.  Once the data is inside a computer very many things can be done with it.

The data we are interested in is mostly share prices, although we can also download Results.  These prices are broadcast on a number of pages and many pages have subpages (see Page & Subpages).  On the BBC and Channel 4 the prices are currently presented in two pairs of two columns.  Each pair of columns consists of a share name on the left and a share price on the right.  Additional price movement information is sometimes broadcast but this is of no interest to the computer since historical data is always stored.  A teletext page is only 40 characters wide and 24 lines deep.  Because of the lack of space the share name is abbreviated into either 8 or 9 characters.  Market Breaker uses these same abbreviations to help you find shares but additionally has a longer name to help make is clear what the share is.  The longer name is also used by the Results download process.

Because the data is being broadcast over the noisy airwaves errors can sometimes occur and you sometimes see a missing or unusual character on the screen.  This type of corruption is unacceptable for a computer system particularly when dealing with prices, therefore Market Breaker performs a CRC check on very page.  Note that some computer software systems do not perform CRC checking.

Many modern teletext chips including those in the Microtext adapter can perform simultaneous downloads of 4 separate teletext pages.  This hardware feature is provided for implement Fastext.  Market Breaker uses this feature to the full which means that downloads speeds can be increased by a factor of 4 over other systems which do not use this feature.  Please note that other cards which are sold do not always implement this feature.  Even though they contain the chips to load 4 pages simultaneously, they do not provide the low level software drivers to make the chip perform in this manner.


Pages & SubPages

Teletext consists of two types of page:

•	Pages

•	SubPages

Pages are the 3 figure number to call up the information.  For example Page 100 on BBC1 is the main index for CEEFAX.  Often pages have subpages;  the existence of a subpage is often visible on the screen because on the top right under the date it will say 1/6 indicating subpage 1 of 6 subpages.  Note that a page can have subpages irrespective or whether or not the display indicates their existence.


Teletext Card

Market Breaker currently only works with one teletext card or adapter.  This card is made by Microtext  (Tel 0705-595694).  It is also re-badged and sold under different names by various other companies.

To use this option you must have the Teletext Adapter connected and also have a good TV signal into the hardware.  See Downloading for a description of the downloading process.


What Happens when I start Downloading

Upon clicking one of the download option, the  program first checks that the Teletext Adapter is present and then read in the SHARES.SEQ file.

The date used for the download depends on the type of data (Teletext 2000 or Teletext 400O) and the time of day.  If the time is before 9:00 am then the share data is given the date of yesterdays date for both Teletext 2000 and Teletext 400.  If the time is after 9:00am the date chosen is that of the previous day for Teletext 2000 and the current day for Teletext 400.  Alternatively if its a week-end the last Friday is used as the download date.  If its a Monday and the Teletext 2000 shares are being downloaded again the previous Friday is used as the download date.  The system does not know about Bank Holidays.

Note that it is the internal computer clock which is used for calculating todays date and time so it is important that you have the correct date and time set.

Downloading is then performed in the order specified in the SHARES.SEQ file.

At this point a dialog box is displayed when it is searching for a groups of up to 4 pages at once.  There are corresponding 4 boxes showing the Page Status as each page is loaded in.   The teletext top line is shown and underneath any errors are reported (see Page Status for a list of possible errors). .  At any time clicking the Stop Teletext button will stop the download.  You must hold the mouse button down several seconds on the button to make it stop.  When a page is found it will be interpreted and displayed.  All shares and data are displayed.  The names in the programs store are searched through to find a match.  There has to be an exact match of upper and lower case so if CEEFAX or ORACLE rename a shares you must change the name in the program store (see Edit Shares or the Teletext , Change Stored Shares menu option).  If you do not have a perfect signal then sometimes characters can be lost in the name or price information.  If a character in the name is missing, then the share will not be recognised.

On completion of downloading all the specified pages a form will be displayed showing all the shares in the store for which the teletext downloaded did not provide data.  Any missing data can be typed in by hand or the download repeated.  If an attempt is made to download data more than once on the same day you are warned and asked if you want to continue.  If you do continue then the existing data will be overwritten.

If the download is in the evening before Midnight and a teletext 400 download was included then the teletext 400 shares will be set to today, but the Teletext 2000 shares will be set to the previous day.  After the download a message will be put in the information Window saying that Teletext 400 shares are present and that you should select the Teletext 400 group in the Sector/Chooser.  If you dont do this you just see alot of shares which have no prices.

Market Breaker 2000 will wait to receive all requested pages and subpages.  If for some reason a requested page is not being broadcast then the program will show a dot in tthe status for that page and wait for it to arrive.  However, after about 25 minutes the program carry out and analysis of the download.  It wll then displays a dialog to help solve the problem:

After a completed download the data is checked for large movements in the price.  If a share has moved by more than 20% in either direction then you are warned and advised to check the price.


Multiple Items from Single Page Format

It is possible to choose to download multiple items from a Single Page where the position on the page is specified rather than specifying it by a name.  This is necessary for example to download the FTSE 100 price off page 500 of Channel 4 because the text describing the item is above and not to the left of the number.

This is achieved as follows:

In the SHARES.SEQ file a line beginning with a @ character is specified as follows:

@,File,c,p,sp

File the name of a file specifying a further format list. This filename will be called FILE.PAG if the name is file as shown above.

c is the channel

p is the teletext page

sp is the teletext sub-page number.  This should normally be set to -1 in this case.  This means that any subpage will do.

The format of the file specified will be as follows:

! This is a comment

Share1,row,column

Share2,row,column

Share3,row,column

!

where Share1 is a share name and row and column number represent the start of the number required.  Note you can specify a space to the left of the number if you wish.  Please also note that sometimes prices can have a comma in them to represent a thousand.  These commas are treated correctly.  This latter effect occurs with the Nikkei price.


Last Error
Page Status

It is important that you understand the symbols in this dialog because it tells you how far the download has got and can indicate problems.  The top line contains the Teletext header.  The 4 boxes below it contain the status of the 4 download circuits (only two shown above).  In the box is the page number being retrieved followed by subpage numbers retrieved.  If the subpage number is greater than 10 a vertical line is shown.  If a page has not been retrieved a dot is shown.  The number of dots shown will be the number of subpages requested in the SHARES.SEQ file.

Errors are shown in the lower box to the left of Cancel button:

No Aerial	if a teletext signal is not received within a time-out period this error can occur.  Please note that the system can recover from this error so allow it to be show for a few seconds.  If this occurs you probably have a weak signal in which case you may wish to turn off CRC checking.

CRC Fail	by default the system checks every page for complete correctness.  If a sub-page check fails this checking a CRC Error is shown.  The system will try again.  If the CRC error persists then turn the CRC checking off or improve your aerial signal

Out of Range	in the SHARES.SEQ file the final parameter is the number of sub pages to download; if this number is 4 then the system will only download pages 1 to 4.  Any subpage received out of this range will give this status.  This status does occur on channel 4 for some advert pages.  It can also occur if you have requested too few sub-pages.

P.0 Ignored	this status occurs if sub-page 0 is found and you have asked for more than 1 sub page.  This can be an advert on channel 4.  Thus sub-page 0 is ignored; if you want to download sub-page 0 see Advert

P.x Repeated	where x is a sub page number; this indicates that sub page has already been download.  This occurs often on channel 4 because each sub page is currently transmitted twice before the next sub-page is sent..  It also occurs if because of an error on  previous page the system has to wait for all the page to be re-transmitted to get a missing sub-page.


Check Latest Data

After new data is entered or when this menu option is chosen a check of between the latest two share prices entered for each share is performed.  If a share has moved by more than 20% in either direction then you are warned and advised to check the price.


Changing Teletext Page Format

From time to time Channel 4 or the BBC change the format of teletext pages.  This has caused many problems in the passed.  It is now hoped that there is a solution to this problem by storing the format details for each channel in the MB2000.INI file.

DO NOT ALTER ANY OF THE OTHER DATA IN THIS FILE; IT CONTAINS YOUR NAME AND ADDRESS.  IF YOU ALTER THOSE DETAILS YOU WILL GET AN INSTALLATION IS CORRUPT MESSAGE.

You should not normally alter this file.  However, if you alter only the lines at the bottom of the file which look like this.

**** The following lines is configuration data for teletext download

**** channel, topline, botline,shcol1,shcol2,prcol1,prcol2,namelength

1,6,22,2,22,11,31,7

2,6,22,2,22,11,31,7

3,7,21,2,22,11,31,9

4,6,20,2,22,12,32,9

5,6,20,2,-1,12,-1,9

[2000]

4,6,20,2,22,12,32,9

(the channel 5 setting in the above example works with Sky News pages)

You can only put four channels in.  In the following row 1 is the top of the screen and column 1 is the left of the screen,

Channel	is the channel for which the data is valid.

Topline	is the row number of the first row of data.

Shcol1	is the column at which the left hand column share name 1st letter occurs.

Shcol2	is the column at which the right hand column share name 1st letter occurs. (if this number is -1 then there is no second column - this format is currently used by Sky News and some German channels)

Prcol1	is the column at which the left hand column price first character occurs

Note that 4 figure numbers start to the left of the more common 3 figure numbers

Prcol2	is the column at which the right-hand column price first character occurs. (if this numner is -1 then there is no second column)

Namelength	is the maximum length of a share name on the screen.


Non Interactive
Non-Interactive Data Update using Adapter

If you have the teletext adapter then you can update the share data without any human input.  This will allow some people to boot their machine using a time switch (say every week) and then load and save teletext data without an menu input.  To run this put the following line in the AUTOEXEC.BAT file:

WIN [path]MB2000.EXE load

where [path] is the directory path of the MB2000.EXE program.

The program will go into this non-interactive mode because of the 'load' parameter.  A file called AUTOREAD.LOG will be created or appended to record any warnings or messages.  Thus if the program is run in this way several times all the warning messages from each run will be found consecutively in the AUTOREAD.LOG file.

If you wish to perform the load with CRC checking turned off,  then the command line should be changed to the following:

WIN [path]MB2000.EXE load_crc_off

You could also have an automatic icon in program manager to run the auto download whilst you are doing something else in Windows.

There are 4 additional options:

WIN [path]MB2000.EXE daily

WIN [path]MB2000.EXE daily_crc_on

WIN [path]MB2000.EXE daily_crc_off

WIN [path]MB2000.EXE T2000

The 'daily' option automatically has CRC off.  All will download shares every week day if the time is between 19:00 and 24:00 hrs.  In this way the machine can be left on all the time but still works with a time-switch.  This difference between this option and the others is that Saturday and Sunday are ignored and the machine can be left on all the time.  Thus you don't necessary need a time-switch.

The T2000 option is similar to daily but only downloads the Teletext2000 shares and does so only after Midnight and before Midday rather than between 19:00 and 24:00 hrs.

If ever the format of a teletext page changes edit the format details in MB2000.INI file see Changing Teletext Format


Shares Menu
Shares Menu Option

File Menu

Edit Menu

Input Menu

Shares Menu

The Shares menu option allows you to either:-

Draw Graphs 	5 different types of graph can be drawn

Screen List	shows the 80 pages of share data

Portfolio	show one of 4 personal portfolios

Draw Graphs option and Screen List are apparently very similar since both initially display the 80 shares list forms.  However if you then click a share then you will get the graph options immediately if you had selected Draw Graphs.  Alternatively you get an extra form of textural data if on the share if you had selected Screen List.

Portfolio Menu

Sectors Menu

Analysis Menu

Edit Data Menu

Teletext

Help


List Shares

 This option can be selected from the shares menu or from the desktop 80 pages buttons.  It allows the user to show the shares on the current page (initially page 1).  On each page 30 shares are shown.  Buy and Sell indicators are calculated using a 30 day moving average.  These indicators are surprisingly useful see moving average graphs for further discussion

You will notice that the prices will be called red, blue or black.  Red means the value has fallen since the last data entry; blue means the price has increased and black means its the same.

Other pages can be selected using the change page option at the bottom right hand side.

If a share name is clicked a List/Edit box is shown for this share.


List Edit
List Edit Box

This box displays the following information:
• share name • full share name • maximum price • minimum price • PE ratio • yield • market sector name for that share • five prices and the corresponding dates which can be scrolled through for all dates. • Alarm High setting (at which you will told is price threshold is crossed) • Alarm Low setting (at which you will told is price threshold is crossed) • No of Shares • Value of the Company (display only)

NOTE that maximum and minimum prices are calculated automatically by the program. Additionally, the PE ratio and yield are calculated using the the latest results.  Many of the values are zero because the dividend is not always available.

Market Sector allows any of the pre-defined 60 sectors  to be entered or changed for a share.  The sector names can be edited using the Edit Sector Name Click on the drop down button to see the scrolling list of 60 sector names.  Note that currently only 41 of these names are used.  These are basically those used in the Financial Time in February 1995.  The remainder are set to Unknown.  You may change these to additional sector names at any stage.

Also from this Edit/List option a graph box can be clicked to select one of 5 different graphs for that share .

The Recalc button starts the recalculation of  the maximum and minimum price for current share over the time range specified in the analysis formula option.

This is an option rather than the maximum and minimum being calculated automatically so that you can enter your own maximums and minimum (for example from a newspaper which have values for the last 12 months only).


Edit Sector Names

 This dialog box allows the editing of the sectors names.  There are 60 possible sector names.  Currently only 41 of these are used.  The remainder are set to UNKNOWN.  The current settings correspond to the sectors listed in the Financial Times in February 1995.  You will notice that some groups (eg South Africans) have now shares listed in them because the these shares are not downloadable from Teletext.


Edit Share Groups

You can define your own share groupings for use with the Sector/Chooser.  Note these groups are found at the bottom of the chooser list after seeing all the UNKNOWNS.

This dialog allows the creating and editing of your own user defined grouping of shares.  The concept is that 2200 shares is too much to see at once but defining your own view of the stock market you can look at the shares which are of interest to you, but still leaving the remaining shares within the program for the inevitable event of you wanting to look at something which is in not you usual list of shares.

The dialog consists of 3 areas:

•	The top left list box allows the addition or editing the name of the a grouping

•	The right hand list box shows all possible share (ie a listing of the 2200 shares held in the program).

•	The bottom left hand box shows the shares currently in the group selected in the group name list box (in the above example we are listing all shares in the Teletext400 group).

The Teletext400 is a special group because it is defined by the Market Breaker every time you do a teletext400 download.  You should not edit this group and you should not delete it. If you do edit it the changes will be lost after the next download.  If you do delete the name Teletext400 by mistake you should add it again with the spelling and upper and lower case exactly as above.


Sectors

You can have up to sixty sector names in the program.  These can be edited using the edit sector names option.

Currently the default set of data is the 41 sectors used in the February 1995 Financial Times.

In the List/Edit Box by selecting in the drop down list box.


Graphs
Draw Graphs

On selecting Graph from either the Menu "Shares", the desktop or from one of the Edit/List Boxes you will be confronted with a popup menu with the following options:

Line Graph

Point & Figure

Moving Average	Comparisons

Stop Loss

For all graphs the full time range for non-zero share prices will be shown.  The time range can be reduced from either end using the start and finish date selections or by clicking the 'Zoom In' box on the Graph.  If you click the 'Zoom In' box you get a Cross Hair cursor.  Press the mouse button and hold the button down and draw a box round the area of the graph to be zoomed in.  You can zoom in as many times as you want so long as there are a least two data points on the graph.  Finer adjustment of the dates can be done by clicking on the increase and decrease start and end dates buttons at the top of the graph.  To see the whole graph again click on the 'Zoom Out' box.

Most of the graph type additionally allow the data to be plotted to a Log scale instead of to the default linear scale.  You do this by clicking the 'Log' or 'Lin' boxes on the graph form.  You only see a major difference between a Logarithmic scale and Linear scale if the have been major changes in the prices of the shares.


Line Graphs

A Line graph will show the share as a solid line with the average for that share's market sector as a broken line and the average for the all shares as a dotted line.  The averages are shown normalised to the first date being used.


Point & Figure Graph
 Point & Figure Graphs

A Point & Figure graph is a way of showing the significant share movements with no fixed time scale being shown.  Although the horizontal axis represents time the graph only moves right when there is a significant change in direction in the movement of the share.  The word 'significant' is used here to explain that the noise (quick up and down) in the share movement has been removed.  It is removed by adding coarseness to the data.  The coarseness can be adjusted.  The coarseness is the price change, in pence, that causes a change in direction of movement to be registered.  An upward movement is shown by an 'X' and a downward movement is shown by an 'O'.  When a number is shown this corresponds to the beginning of a new month, where 1 is January, 2 is February etc..  There is no Zoom In option for this graph.


Moving Average
Moving Average Graphs

A Moving Average graph is a way of showing the trend a share price has.  When the share price and the two moving averages are all increasing then you can be fairly sure the trend is upwards.  One way of looking at it is that the share has upward momentum.  The moving average is the average of the share price over the last x days.  Initially you are shown two curves where x is 30 days for the first curve and 60 days for the second.  You can adjust these by changing the 30 day figure say to 29 in which cause the 60 day figure is changed to 58 days.  Also shown on the graph are the Buy and Sell points which occur when the 30 day moving average is crossed by the share price line.  This analysis method works amazingly well and its validity can be easily checked by looking at the graphs and seeing that the buy points are nearly always below the sell points (indicating profit could be made following this method - remember to allow for buying & selling costs).

It can be seen from the graph that the program has noticed that the upward turn in Consolidated Gold for the June 1989 point is considered a significant upward trend and a Buy is recommended.  The reader may realise that the reason for this upturn was a renewed bid for Consolidated Gold - so it should be remembered that reading newspapers can sometimes give clues for buying a share earlier than the program (or at least clarify what is really happening).


Comparison Graphs

The Comparison graph is a way of comparing the chosen share with other selected shares.  If this option is chosen then initially the line graph of that share is shown.  If then the 'COMPARE' box is clicked you are allowed to select any graph from the 80 pages of shares.  The compared share is normalised to the start date of the graph.  Up to 9 shares can be compared on the same graph.


Stop Loss

The Stop Loss graph shows the share price as a solid line with a Stop Loss at a specified percentage as a dotted line.  If the Stop Loss is set to 10%, then a dotted line will be shown 10% below the maximum values of the share prices.  If the share price is rising the Stop Loss line will also be rising.  If the share price falls then the Stop Loss line will go horizontal.  When the falling share price crosses the horizontal Stop Loss line a 10% stop loss selling point is reached.  This means that if sold you have only lost 10% on the best possible price you could have got.  The is another method of measuring falling momentum.


Portfolio Lists

Selecting portfolio result in a popup menu giving the choice of 4 different portfolios.

You click on the portfolio number required and obtain the portfolio list form:

 This form shows all shares in the selected portfolio with various totals for that portfolio.  Total money invested, total profit, total profit taken from previous sales and average CAR received from all shares if they were sold at the time of running.

To add a share to the portfolio click "No data".  When you do this you will enter the transaction dialog for your new portfolio item - a buy is assumed (see Portfolio Transactions)

If you click on an existing share then a popup menu will allow you to select one of the 4 following options:-

Draws a graph of that share

Adds another share to the Portfolio

Deletes the clicked share from the portfolio

Portfolio List/Edit edits the portfolio share data

Note that the "Date Bought" need not be one of the dates in the database; you can type in any date here instead of using the left/right button.  If you do type a date not in the database then you are allowed to put in any buy price - this is particularly relevant to people that have obtained shares free of charge who will put in a buy price of 0.  If you do use a buy price of 0 then %CAR  would be infinity -the program sets it to 0 to indicate this meaningless value.  The "Sale Date" and the "Price Sold" are fixed and cannot be changed ie.  you expected to enter the sale into the database the day you sell them - a way of altering the sell price would be to alter the recorded price using Edit Shares in the Edit menu.


Edit Portfolio Share

Once editing a portfolio share you can change the number of shares owned.

You can sell shares and take profit, the profit is added into the profit total.  You sell by clicking the sell button above and you get:

If you don't sell all the shares the full buy commission will be assumed so subsequent sells will not use up any buy commission.

  You can also alter the date the shares were bought.  This forms also show the Cumulative Annual Rate (CAR) for that share taking into account the commission.  If you compare this CAR rate with the rates you get from other investments then you can compare how your expertise in the stock exchange can compete with safer investments such as building societies.

You can alter the commission rates

The Transaction button executes the Transaction dialog.

The recalc button recalculated the data displayed on the dialog.  For example if you have clicked automatic calculation of commission, then the new commission rates will be now included.


Cumulative Annual Rate
CAR

The Cumulative Annual Rate is the percentage rate used by building societies and banks.  The user guide talks about APR at this point.  APR is a borrowing rate and was not the right percentage to use for comparisons with investments.

The formula to calculate APR is as follows:

CAR=10 power(log10(current/paid)/(buy date-today)*365.00)-1)

where current is todays value of shares

and paid is the amount paid for shares.


Sectors Menu

File Menu

Edit Menu

Input Menu

Shares Menu

Portfolio Menu

Sectors Menu

The Sector menu or desk option shows a bar chart which either:-

PE Ratio 	- shows average yield for the sectors

Yield 	- shows average PE Ratio for the sectors

Analysis Menu

Edit Data Menu

Teletext

Help


Sectors Bar Graph

The sectors bar graph show the average PE Ratio or the Yield for all 60 possible sectors.

You can alternate between yield and PE Ratio by clicking the Yield or PE Ratio boxes.  If you click a particular sector bar then individual shares for that sector are shown.


Selected Sector Bar Graph

This graph shows the PE Ratio or Yield for all shares in the selected sector.  It is this way you can compare yields or PE Ratios in a sector.

Clicking a share bar will allow the graph options to be shown for that share.


Analysis Menu
Analysis Menu & Desktop Option

File Menu

Edit Menu

Input Menu

Shares Menu

Portfolio Menu

Sectors Menu

Analysis Menu

The Analyse menu or desk option allows you to either:-

Change analysis parameters 	define your own conditions.

Best/Worst Ten Movers	List best and worst ten movers between the last two collected time points

Run analysis (current)	shows current performance

Run analysis (prediction)	shows a predicted performance

Setup Alarms

Check Alarms

Calculate Max/Min all shares	calculates max & min price for all shares based on values define in analysis parameters

Run Market Indicators	Display in the information window some market indicators as a result of the last download

Edit Data Menu

Teletext

Help


Run Market Indicators

The Run Market Indicators performs an analysis of the latest downloaded data.  This option is run automatically after a Teletext 2000 download.

The following is a typical display after running this option:

Market Indicators

229  (10%) shares have gone up

2038 (89%) shares have gone down

137  ( 6%) shares have a new maximum

319  (14%) shares have a new minimum

These statistic give some indication of the state of the total London Stock Exchange.


Setup Alarms

These dialog give a number of options which can be selected and de-selected.

There are three sections:

•	Where to run section

•	Portfolio section

•	Any Share section


When to run section
Where to run section

One of the following options can be selected:

•	Run Alarms to Window after Teletext Download

•	Run Alarms to Dialog after Teletext download

When a download complete the alarm output will either run to the Window or a dialog will appear.  The advantage of the dialog is that the shares can be clicked to get further information.


Portfolio section

Either or both of the following options can be selected:

•	Falls below buy price

•	Fall below stop loss of    x percent

The alarms are run on all shares in all 4 portfolios.


Any Share section

Any of the following options can be selected:

•	Increases by more than	x percent

•	Falls by more than	x percent

in last    	y days

•	Is highest recorded

•	is highest since	a date

•	exceeds high alarm

•	falls below low alarm

•	is below stop loss of	x percent

•	latest price is zero

If any of the 2200 shares stored in the program meet the selected criteria an alarm will be printed to the window or dialog.

The exceed high alarm and falls below low alarm values for each share are set in the List Edit dialog box.


Check Alarms

  This option is run automatically after every download.  It can also be run from the menu.  The settings setup in the Setup Alarms option are run at this stage.  The output is displayed to either the Window or a dialog box dependent on the Where to run section setting.


Analysis Parameters
Analysis Formulae

The Change Parameters of Analysis shows a formula for the current and prediction analysis.

The current analysis is looking for recent positive moves.  It is weighted towards recent changes and this weighting can be changed by altering the 'weight' parameter in the change analysis parameters menu option.  This analysis shows shares that are currently doing well or badly so the best buys might well be the ones in the Worst shares section.

The prediction is looking for positive changes in the gradient when the share is near its minimum.  This analysis shows the shares that are expected to do well so the ones in Best section should be considered to be possibly the best buys.

Thus shares in the Worst section of the current analysis and in the Best section of the prediction analysis should be considered to be possibly the best buys.  Beware that information of why a share is low or high is just as important as the information produced by this program, so do not assume that because the program predicts a share is a good buy that it definitely is a good buy.  Try to find out more about the shares that the program identifies.


Best/Worst Movers

This option looks at the last two time points collected for every share and calculated the percentage change.  It then lists the highest increases (best ten) and largest falls (worst ten) in the text window.  This window can then be printed.


Current Analysis

The current analysis is looking for recent positive moves.  It s weighted towards recent changes and this weighting can be changed by altering the 'weight' parameter in the change analysis parameters menu option.  This analysis shows shares that are currently doing well or badly so the best buys might well be the ones in the Worst shares section.


Prediction Analysis

The prediction is looking for positive changes in the gradient when the share is near its minimum.  This analysis shows the shares that are expected to do well so the ones in Best section should be considered to be possibly the best buys.


Calculate Max/Min for all Shares
Calculate Max/Min all shares

This option re-calculates the maximum and minimum price for each share over the time range specified in the analysis formula option.

This is an option rather than the maximum and minimum being calculated automatically so that you can enter your own maxima and minima (for example from a newspaper which have values for the last 12 months only).


Edit Menu
Data-Edit Menu Option

File Menu

Edit Menu

Input Menu

Shares Menu

Portfolio Menu

Sectors Menu

Analysis Menu

Data Edit Menu

The Data-Edit menu or desk option allows you to either:-

Add a Share	- Add a share to main list

Delete a Share	- Delete a share from main list

Edit share data	- Edit shares data on main list

Insert Data at Date 	- Share data can be input for a specified date.

Delete Data bet. Dates 	- Share data can be deleted for a specified range of dates.

Prune Data	- Prune Data; reduce the time data according to rules specified in the accompanying dialog

Scrip Issue 	- Historic Prices can be modified due to a Scrip Issue

Rights Issue	- Historic Prices can be modified due to a Rights Issue

Part Paid	- Historic Prices can be modified due to a new payment in part payment issues.

Multiplier 	- Historic Prices can be modified for any reason by a multiplying factor.

Alter Commission Rates 	- Alter rates used by portfolio

Delete Zero Priced Shares	- Delete Zero Priced Shares

Run Full Average Calculation	- Calculate sector averages for all the shares for all time

Run BuySell Calculation	- Calculate the latest BuySell markers

Remove Discontinuities	- Remove Discontinuities from the averages

Sort Shares by Name	- Sort the shares alphabetically.

Teletext

Help


Add Shares
Add a Share

This option is used to add shares that are to be used on the 80 pages.   It may not be necessary to use it very often, but the BBC and Channel 4 do change the shares listed on the share pages from time to time.  It should be used in conjunction with the Delete a Shares command.

To use this option click the menu; initially a blank shares edit box will appear.  Fill this in and press OK and you will see the shares list dialog. In the shares edit box you must as a minimum fill in the share name.

After the shares list dialog has appears clicking on any share button will enable you to add shares onto the current last page.  You may later sort the shares to sort the share list alphabetically.

In this box you must as a minimum fill in the share name.

If you have a Teletext adapter and the share you want is on Teletext you will find it easier to use the Teletext| Change Stored Shares option to perform this function.  In this case the share is positioned alphabetically in the list.


Delete a Shares

This option is used to delete shares that are to be used on the 80 pages.

When selected click on the share name to be deleted.  You will be prompted with a Yes/No box to check you really want to deleted this share.


Edit Share Data

This option allows the editing of share price data and other details about a share.

Selecting this option shows the 80 pages detailing the latest share prices.  These prices can be corrected if required on this form.

Clicking a share name will result in an edit form for that share.  You can alter all prices, the yield, pe ratio, max and min prices.  Additionally you can use this form to rename a share.


Insert Data at Date

This option allows data for all the seven pages of shares to be input at a specified dates (other than the latest date).

If you do enter a date later than the latest date you will be given an error.  To enter such a date just use the Input Todays data option to put into todays date.  You are not expected to put future data in.  If you did want to do this then you could alter the system clock in your PC.

Additionally you are given an error if you put in a date that already exists.


Delete Data between Dates

  This option allows data to be deleted for all 80 pages of shares between the specified date range.  If you only want to delete one date put the from and to dates the same.


Prune Data

  This option allows you to reduce the number of time points data according to a simple rule defined in the accompanying dialog box.  The maximum number of data points allowed in the program is 250.  When this starts to get full or earlier if you want the program to load the data faster then you can use this option.

When you select this option you are presented with a dialog, which allows you to enter the following data example:

Separation of 1 days for last 30 days

Separation of 7 days for previous 100 days

Separation of 14 for all previous days.

In this example after execution the last 30 days will have a separation of 1 day or more; the previous 100 days will have a separation of 7 days or more and for time more than 130 days ago the data separation will be 14 days or more.  Note that the actual dates recorded are not altered; just certain dates are deleted.


Scrip Issue

Scrip Issue allows the modification of prices due to a Scrip Issue.  You put in the number of new shares issued which replace the number of existing shares.  The program multiplies all share prices before the ex Scrip Issue date by the following factor:

 factor = Existing Number/(Existing Number + New Number)


Rights Issue

Rights Issue allows the modification of prices due to a Rights Issue.  You put in the number of new shares issued which replace the number of existing shares.  The program multiplies all share prices before the ex Rights Issue date by the following factor:

factor = Existing Number/(Existing Number + New Number)


Part Paid

Part Paid allows the modification of prices due to a Part payment being made.  You put in the part payment amount.

The program adds this amount all share prices before the ex Part payment date.


Multiplier

Multiplier allows the modification of prices by a specified factor.

You put in the multiplying factor and the date before which the shares prices are to be modified.

The program multiplies all share prices before the date by the multiplying factor:


Alter Commission Rates

  This option allows you to alter the way the commissions calculated.  It allows three rates to be specified for different buy price ranges and add in VAT and Stamp duty.  The commission is used by the portfolio area of Market Breaker.


Delete Zero Priced Shares

This option deletes shares which have prices set to zero.  This is an easy way of getting rid of shares for which data is no longer downloaded.  However, use this carefully.  If it were used when a teletext 400 load had been done and the teletext 2000 had not been done you would loose all the teletext 2000 data.


Run Full Average Calculation

This option calculates sector averages for all the shares for all time.

You should not normally need to run this option because each time data is downloaded from teletext the average for that day is calculated.  However, if for some reason the averages appear incorrect or you have imported some data or you have changed the sector groupings of the shares you will need to run this.

This takes a long time to process so the time waiting bar appears on the screen.  The sector averages are used by the graph plots when a share and its sector is shown.  Note that when this is run the discontinuities in the share prices will re-appear.  These discontinuities occur when extra shares were added to the price history.   This happened in August 1994 (for example) when Channel 4 started their Teletext 2000 service.  You should there run the Remove Discontinuities option after running this.


Run BuySell Calculation

This option is normally re-run after every teletext download so does not normally need to be run on its own.


Remove Discontinuties
Remove Discontinuities

When the option to re-calculate averages is run the average for each sector is calculation.

However, when extra shares were added to the price history data a discontinuity in the average occurs.

This happened in August 1994 (for example) when Channel 4 started their Teletext 2000 service.

You should there run option to remove these discontinuities.


Sort Shares by Name

This option sorts the shares alphabetically.  It is a good idea to run this after new shares are added because new shares are always added to the end of the list.

This options takes a little while to run.  The status bar shows the progress of the sort.  If you wish to stop it at any stage you can press escape.  If you does this the sort order is returned to the state it was in prior to starting the sort.


Teletext

File Menu

Edit Menu

Input Menu

Shares Menu

Portfolio Menu

Sectors Menu

Analysis Menu

Edit Data Menu

Teletext

Edit Sequence File.

Edit teletext Page Definition File

Change Stored Shares

Check items (switched on and off by clicking on them)

Auto Oldest Delete

CRC Checking

Ignore Adverts

Teletext Window

Help


Help

This option provides the information available in this file.


Edit Sequence File

Selecting this options runs up the Notepad text editor within the program and allows you to edit the SHARES.SEQ file. See Automatic teletext Update for a description of the contents of this file.

When you have finished editing the file use the File Save option and then the File Exit option.


Edit Teletext Page Definition File

This option allows you to select and edit one of the .PAG files containing download data about individual pages.


Change Stored Shares

This option provides a quick and easy method of changing the shares which are to be downloaded.

  It is only useful if you have done an Load Teletext2000 (at least once after the program has been installed).  Once you have performed a download, the software will have created a file called SNAMES.NNN (this is not included as one of the installation files) which contains all the share names in the download (whether in the normal data or not) and the prices on the latest day of the download.  This if you close the computer down and run it up it will still know about all the possible shares on teletext.

Once you have done one of these options a list of all possible shares names is available.

Once selected a dialog box appears containing two list boxes.  In the left hand list box is a list of all possible shares which can be downloaded and in the right hand box is a list of the current shares for which data is held.  If you select a share name in the left hand box the share with the same name in the right hand box will be highlighted if it exists.

In normal use there are three functions which can be performed on the lists.  Please Note that if you use these options they change the data immediately.  The act of using the CANCEL button re-loads the last saved data from disk.  It would be sensible to save any data you have changed first because if you leave this dialog using cancel the data from disk s reloaded.

Add To	This adds the share selected in the left hand box to the list in the right hand box.

Delete	This deletes the selected share in the right hand box.  This will also delete all data associated with the share.

Rename	This renames the share selected in the right hand box with the share selected in the left hand box.

At the bottom left hand side of the dialog box is a button marked as Show only Excluded which provides extra functionality.  However, if you use this option it can take about 20 minutes to return to the point you were last at.


Show Only Excluded

This is a selection button on the Change Store Shares  dialog.  This option should be used sparingly because it can take as long as 20 minutes to set the computer up in the mode.  If you do go ahead and perform it you can stop it by pressing the ESC key at any time.

Once you have accepted to go ahead with this option the left hand side of the dialog will empty.  If the status bar on the main window is visible you will see display the share names it is processing.  You can use the mouse to move the dialog box upwards to see the status line if you wish.  You may also perform other tasks within Windows (not the program) if you wish (although doing so will severely slow down the processing of the program).

During the processing the left hand box may start to get some entries and the right hand box will have stars added onto the line.  Eventually the system will finish processing the data and you can continue.

Once finished the left hand box contains all shares which are excluded from the stored shares.  The right hand box contains the shares which were in the


Auto Oldest Deletet
Auto Oldest Delete

There is a maximum number of price time points that can be stored for the 210 possible shares.  In versions 5.0 and later of Market Breaker (PC version) this maximum is set to 250 time points.  If this menu item is ticked then when the maximum number is reached the old share is automatically deleted.


CRC Checking

Associated with every teletext page there is a CRC code which can be used to see if the page was received correctly (ie there were no missing or corrupt characters).  If you have this item ticked then the each page is checked and only accepted if it is not corrupt.  If you have a weak TV signal then you will receive many CRC errors and you should un-tick this item (in which case you should check the numbers downloaded- a missing number makes a factor of 10 difference).  If this occurs a 'Too Many CRC errors' will be displayed and the download is aborted.  If one page gets a CRC error 'CRC Error' is displayed in the last error control in the download dialog, if you have a reasonably strong  TV signal this should normally clear and the download will eventually manage to get the correct subpage.


Ignore Adverts

By default the program will ignore subpage 0 (unless a single page is requested).  If you un-tick this option then page 0 will be accepted.  It is very unlikely that you will ever use this option, but it is provided because there is no predicting what the television companies (particularly the BBC) might do.


TeleText Window

 When the window appears it comes up in 'On Air' mode taking data directly from the teletext card.  Clicking on the channel numbers changes the channel.  Double clicking on any three figure number on the teletext screen will request that page number (if the number is double height click you must click in the top half of the number).  Double Clicking on the 'FastText' line at the bottom of the teletext screen requests the associated FastText page number.  To request a specific page number type it into the control above the Get Page button and then click the Get Page button.

The buttons on the right are described below:

Get Page	Requests the page which has been entered in the page control above it

Copy	Puts the contents of the Window in the Paste buffer and then pastes it into the log window below.  Note that when the log window is printed the font will be converted to a system font before printing.  Note that if you want to print using the Teletext font then you can paste the data into another application such as a word processor.  The Teletext font will only be available to the application if your printer is capable of supporting raster fonts.

Browse/No Browse	This options starts requesting pages including and greater than the page number in the page control.  It also saves the screens in a different file for each channel.  If a file already exists you will be asked if you want to delete it.  Otherwise the data is appended onto the end of the file.  Each file can be viewed using the 'Off Air' and Channel buttons.  Terminate this action by clicking the button again (now called 'No Browse').

Off Air/On Air	Clicking 'Off Air' will start the review of some previously saved Teletext pages.  Upon clicking this button a scroll bar appears and the hold button is pressed.  These pages can be traversed three different ways.:

entering a number in the page control and clicking 'Get Page' button

double clicking a number on the page (FastText is not currently supported when Off Air).

Using the scroll bar to the right of the Teletext Window.  Upon clicking this button (now called 'On Air' ) starts searching on live data

Hold/No Hold	Clicking the 'Hold' button stops searching for pages on both the Off Air and On Air modes.  Note that when Off Air the Hold button is automatically selected when a page is found.

Note that if you do not have a teletext card you will still be able to use the 'Off Air' Option to see the files that come as a demonstration with the version of the program.  Channel 6 has no associated file.


Hints
Useful Hints

You may find it easier to download the teletext 2000 shares in the early morning rather than the evening.  The reason is that the pages are currently broadcast faster in the morning than the evening (typically downloads take 10 minutes in the morning and 20 minutes in the evening).  If you perform a download of both Teletext 2000 and Teletext 400 before 9:00am the Teletext 400 data will be loaded into the previos day.

If you see a button, clicking on it will give you extra information/detail.  For example share name are found on buttons clicking on that button will lead to further information on that share.

If you every see the a button with No Data on it then clicking on that button will assume you want to add a information.  This is used in the share listing and share portfolio parts of the program.

The find a share quickly just hold the control key down and type the first letter of the required share.  This will bring up the page where the shares are listed starting with the letter pressed.

If you are interested in a grouping/sector of shares select that group in the Chooser box to see a smaller group of shares.  If you have downloaded the Teletext 400 shares there will be a special group called Teletext400.

If you cannot find your defined groupings in the sector Chooser, it is because they are right at the bottom below all the sector lines marked as UNKNOWN.


Teletext 400

The Teletext400 are the shares which are downloaded from teletext for the day of the download rather than the previous day of the Teletext2000 shares.

See downloading Teletext400 shares.


Chooser
Sector Chooser

The sector chooser lists two types of item:

•	the sector groups defined for each share

•	the user defined groups

Please note that the user defined groups are at the bottom of the list beyond the sectors called UNKNOWN.

When a group is clicked a View of the market is produced consisting of only that group.  The idea is that this smaller grouping of shares will be easier to view and navigate through then the large number of 2200 shares.

You can change the sector names using the Edit Sector Names option.

You can create and modify your own share grouping using the Edit Share Groups option.

There is one special user defined Group called Teletext400.  This grouping is defined by the computer every time a teletext 400 share download occurs.  It enables just the Teletext 4000 shares to be seen.

The other special sector is the first one called All.  This group lists all the shares and is the normal default.  This default can be changed see details on the INI file.


INI File

Copyright © 1989-1995 Alibro Software

Copy (100101104) Registered to:

A Person

A Street

A Town

Code

**** The following lines is configuration data for teletext download

**** channel, topline, botline,shcol1,shcol2,prcol1,prcol2,namelength

1,6,22,2,22,11,31,7

2,6,22,2,22,11,31,7

3,7,21,2,22,11,31,9

4,6,20,2,22,12,32,9

5,6,20,2,-1,12,-1,9

[2000]

4,6,20,2,22,12,32,9

[RESULTS]

Name=7

Turnover=Turnover!Total turnover!Gross revenue

Profit=Pre-tax profit!-Pre-tax loss!Pre-tax revenue

EPS=EPS!-LPS

Div=Dividend!Final dividend

InterimDiv=Interim dividend

TotalDiv=Total dividend

Comment=16,20

YearEnd=Results for year to

Final=Results for year to

Interim=Results for six months to

Million=m

Billion=bn

[PE]

5,High,24,Low,30,Yield,35,PE,39

[OPTIONS]

Backup=No

DefGroup=All

Adapter=Microtext

Ignore=Advert


Results Section of INI File
Results

[RESULTS]

Name=7

Turnover=Turnover!Total turnover!Gross revenue

Profit=Pre-tax profit!-Pre-tax loss!Pre-tax revenue

EPS=EPS!-LPS

Div=Dividend!Final dividend

InterimDiv=Interim dividend

TotalDiv=Total dividend

Comment=16,20

YearEnd=Results for year to

Final=Results for year to

Interim=Results for six months to

Million=m

Billion=bn


Options

[OPTIONS]

Backup=No

DefGroup=All

Adapter=Microtext

Ignore=Advert

This sections defines the system defaults.

Backup=No/Yes	means that no backup file will be created.  Since the data file is nearly 3Mbytes.  Much space would be taken by having a backup file.  However, if you have spare disk space then please set this line to Backup=Yes.

DefGroup=All/...../  	defines the default for the Sector Chooser

Adapter=Microtext	defines the teletext adapter driver (in version 5.00 only the Microtext Adapter is supported.

Ignore=Advert	This defines the string used on the Teletext pages to denote an Advert containing no price information.  From time to time Channel 4 change this string.  If they do this change Advert to the new string and closedown and re-start Market Breaker.


Sequence File

*2000  Indicates Teletext 2000 service

4,532,45,Adjust

4,533,43,Adjust

#

*400  Indicates Standard Teletext Service

! Note Group all the shares from the same channel together

! BBC1 share pages are all commented out

!1,221,4

!1,222,4

!1,223,3

!1,224,1

! Download the FTSE rate from P201 SubPage 1 Also from BBC1

!$,NIKKEI,1,201,1,1,Tokyo

!$,FTSE,1,201,1,2,FT-SE

! Load indices from channel 4 page 500 any sub page

@,Indices,4,500,-1

! Channel Four share pages

4,511,5

4,512,3

4,513,3

4,514,4

4,516,1

#R

[Results]7,20

%,4,521

%,4,522

!

The # symbols is used to tell Market Breaker about a new section.  The #R must be used to denote the start of the Results section.


PAG Files

PAG files enable download of multiples price information from a single Teletext page where the format of the page is not column based as most share prices screen are.

The example below shows the channel 5 teletext page 500 page where the FTSE price is below the line saying FTSE.  For this type of page you specify the row and column positions of the start of every price.

An example .PAG file is as follows:

Note a majority of this file is comments

! this file define the position of prices and meaning on a page

! this is setup for C4 p500

! this is what it looks like - just here to help not needed

! -----------------------------------------

!1  P500     Teletext   500 Feb15 20:17:43

!2

!3

!4

!5

!6 __ H E A D L I N E S  ____

!7

!8 INFLATION SURGES TO 3.3% IN JANUARY 503

!9

!0 HIGH STREET HIT BY 0.9% SALES SLIDE 504

!1 UNEMPLOYMENT REACHES THREE-YEAR LOW 505

!2 GALLAHER TO LEAVE SAATCHI & SAATCHI 506

!3 _______________________________________

!4     FTSE       Dow   3993.58   +35.33

!5                Tokyo 17,991.00 -147.47

!6   3074.9       $     1.5599    +0.2

!7   +3.6         DM    2.3588    +0.2Pf

!8   at CLOSE     EFF   87.0      +0.1

!9 _______________________________________

!0 City index   501   Company news     520

!1 City diary   509   Wall Street      530

!2 Prices index 510   Family finance   540

!3      SPORTING INDEX SPORTS PRICES

!4             SEE PAGE 604

!

FTSE,16,3

Dow,14,21

Tokyo,15,21

Dollar,16,21

DM,17,21


Common Questions & Problems

Q1.  I did a share download in the evening of Teletext 2000 and Teletext 400 shares and I saw that most shares have no price information.  Why is this?

A1.   In the evening before Midnight the Teletext 400 share prices are for today and the Teletext 2000 share prices are for yesterday.  Market Breaker therefore downloads data for the two days into different dates.  The Page listing only shows the latest days shares so all shares which are not from Teletext 400 have no price and are shown as a blank.  There are two ways round this.  After a download select Teletext400 in the Sector/Chooser, and you will just see those shares.  The other way is just to perform a Teletext 2000 download and therefore only download the previous day.

Q2.  In the Teletext400 download there only appears to be just over 200 shares.  Where are the remaining shares?

A2.  Market Breaker has been set up so that the Teletext2000 shares can be downloaded in full.  Where the Teletext400 shares have the same name as that used in the Teletext2000 screens, these shares download perfectly.  However, Channel 4 (in their own wisdom) often use a totally different abbreviations for a share in the two listings.  If you find this annoying please complain to Channel 4.

Q3.  Downloading has stopped working?

A3.  From time to time both Channel 4 and the BBC have changed the format of the share pages.  They tend to move one of the columns 1 character to the left or right and sometimes increase of decreases the length of a column.  In the past few years either the BBC or Channel 4 have done this about once every 12 months at worst.  Hopefully now more people are using computers this may get better.  However, because of this we have made it possible to change the format of a page.  This is described in detail in the Teletext Overview and an example INI file is shown in INI.

Q4  The spelling of some of the shares seems to have changed on teletext.  How do I correct this?

A4. Slightly more regularly than format changes, the spelling of some shares changes.  For example in January 1995 Channel 4, in their wisdom, changed the spelling of 90% of the shares in the Teletext2000 listing (it also took them several days to iron out the mistakes they made when they did it).  In order to cope with these events we have provided the functionality in Change Stored Shares.

Q5  Channel 4 have added some shares. How do I easily add them?

A5.  Market Breaker makes it easy to find out about new shares and add then.  Use the Change Stored Shares and click the Show only Excluded button on the dialog.

Q5.  Do I have to download the prices every day?

A5. No you can load the data every day, every two days, every week etc.  You can even load the data at irregular intervals.  However, the moving average algorithm works better if the intervals are regular so it is suggested you choose to do daily or weekly downloads.

Q6  I am getting close to the 250 time points (or I have got a message that time data is full).  What do I do?

A6.  You need to delete some time data points.  You could use the delete Date between Dates, but the best function to use is Prune Data.  Pruning keeps the most recent data and deletes the older less relevant data at regular intervals.

Q7  When I run the program I get a message saying that there is not enough memory.  What do I do?

A7.  Market Breaker must run on a machine with a least 4 Mbytes of RAM memory.  This message can still ocurr on machines with this amount of memory if you are running another large application such as a Work Processor with a large document already loaded.  If you get this message shut down the other applications and try again.  A trick can be to try twice even with the same machine set up.  The reason why this can work is that Market Breaker requires large amounts of contiguous memory.  When an out of memory error occurs Windows does reorganise the way its memory is arranged and trying a second time can sometimes be effective.

Q8  When I run the program I get a message saying that there is not enough memory.  What do I do?

A8.  Market Breaker must run on a machine with a least 4 Mbytes of RAM memory.  This message can still ocurr on machines with this amount of memory if you are running another large application such as a Word Processor with a large document already loaded.  If you get this message shut down the other applications and try again.  A trick for Windows 3.1 users can be to try twice even with the same machine set up.  The reason why this can work is that Market Breaker requires large amounts of contiguous memory.  When an out of memory error occurs Windows does reorganise the way its memory is arranged and trying a second time can sometimes be effective.

Q9  I tried Results download and got a number of errors about shares not found.  What do I do.

A9.  Results download functionality is provided for experienced users of the program.  If the Results information is not updated daily the majority of the data within market breaker is still valid.  Because Channel 4 is inconsistent in the naming of the shares in the results pages, approximately a quarter of every Results download will not match.  In order to get a match you will need to change the full name of the affected shares in the share edit box to that used by channel 4 and then repeat the results download.  A results downloaded can be repeated as many times as you like without any problem.


Working with Quicken

Quicken 3.0 for Windows is produced and marketed by Intuit Inc.  This program is designed for home accounting and investments.  It is able to keep a track of your total income and expenditure which includes keeping track of investments.

Because Quicken 3.0 for Windows is such a good program there was no point in Market Breaker implementing and therefore duplicating its many good features. For this reason we allow you to record Portfolio transactions in Market Breaker and then export them to Quicken to enable you to track with all your accounts and expenditures.

Within Quicken you must first create an Investment account.  It does not matter what you call it.  Click the Accts button on the Quicken toolbar and then click new in the accounts list.  Then select Share Investment Account.  You enter the name and click OK.  Select that account in the account list and then go to the File menu and select Import.  Click the Browse button and navigate the directory structure to find the Market Breaker directory.  If you have entered some Portfolio transactions you will see a number of .QIF files.  There will be a QIF file for every Portfolio item.  They are names as follows:

Txy.QIF

where x is the portfolio number (0 to 3)

and y is the item in that portfolio (0 to 27)

Thus the transactions for the first portfolio item in the first portfolio will be contained in a file called T00.QIF.

You can import as many of these into Quicken as you like.

Please note that if you import twice or re-import after adding further transactions in Market Breaker, Quicken adds all the transactions twice.  The only way round this (currently) is to delete transactions (using CTRL D or Edit | Delete Transaction) before importing.

Please also note that if there is currently no easy way of exporting from Quicken into Market Breaker.

These areas will be improved in later versions if the demand arises.


Transaction Actions

Within the drop down list box in the Transaction dialog box is a list of actions.  The list given is the full list of actions available within Quicken.  Market Breaker does not currently interpret all of these.  The full list is only provided when exporting the transactions to Quicken.

Market Breaker currently only supports the following actions:

ShrsIn	Add shares to account (shares investment accounts and unit/investment trust accounts)

Buy	Buy security with cash already in account (shares investment accounts only)

(ShrsIn and Buy are treated identically by Market Breaker but note Quicken will treat then differently as described above)

ShrsOut	Remove shares from account (shares investment accounts and unit/investment trust accounts)

Sell	Sell security and leave cash in account (shares investment accounts only)

(ShrsOut and Sell are treated identically by Market Breaker but note Quicken will treat then differently as described above)

Div	Receive cash from dividend (shares investment accounts only)

IntInc	Receive cash from interest income (shares investment accounts only)

The other Action types are only provide for use within Quicken and are totally ignored by Market Breaker after a warning message is given.


Transactions

The Transaction Dialog can be run from two different places.

•	It is run the first time a new portfolio item is created in which case it is assumed that a buy transaction is to be performed.

•	It can be run from the edit portfolio dialog box by clicking the transaction button.

  This dialog shows the chronologically entered transactions for the current portfolio item.  There can be up to 200 transactions stored for each item.  These transactions are stored on disk in files which can be imported directly into Quicken without further processing.

This dialog uses the concept of a current line.  The current line is the one current selected for input.  When the ReCalc button is clicked only the current line is recalculated.  Additionally the bottom comment field displays and/or allows entry of a comment about the current transaction line.  When a recalculation is performed the totals are recalculate dependent on the defined Transaction Action.


Print

The Print commands allows printing of the Information Window to the to the default windows printer.  The default printer can be changed using the Windows control panel.  See Windows help for more details.


Print Setup

Print setup allows the default printer to be configured.


Overview of Teletext 400 & Teletext 2000 Services

Channel 4 now carries two separate teletext share price services.  These are called Teletext 400 and Teletext 2000.  The difference between the two is that the Teletext 2000 prices corresponds to the previous days close prices whereas the Teletext 400 share prices are updated regularly through-out the day.  The other difference is that the Teletext 2000 service is supposed to carry every share on the London Stock exchange.  This is not quite the case since some shares are missing but there are well over 2100 shares listed.  Market Breaker is able to download either or both these services.  The program can also be configured to download share prices from other teletext systems on cable and/or satellite and also the BBCs CEEFAX service.  The default setup of the system is to download just channel 4s services.  The program is aware of the two Channel 4 services and will store the data for the appropriate date.  The program is also able to capture results information for companies broadcast on Channel 4.

To use the automatic download facility you will also need to purchase the Teletext Adapter hardware.  Currently only the adapter made by Microtext is supported.

 as well as the BBCs CEEFAX service.  The setup

The computer can also be configured to download share prices from other teletext system on cable and satellite.  To use the automatic download facility you will also need to purchase the Teletext Adapter hardware.  Currently only the adapter made by Microtext is supported.


Overview of Teletext 400

Channel 4 now carries a service called Teletext400.  This service carries about 400 share prices, with the price information being updated several time per day.  Within Market Breaker this term is used for any share data which is broadcast on the data it is valid (to be compared with Teletext2000 data which is broadcast one day in arrears).

See Teletext 400 for details on how to configure the download.

See Overview of Teletext 400 and Teletext 2000 Services for an overview of the two services.


Overview of Teletext 2000

Channel 4 now carries a service called Teletext2000.  This service carries about 2200 share prices, with the price information being updated only at midnight at the end of the day the price was set..  Within Market Breaker this term is used for any share data which is broadcast one day in arrears (to be compared with Teletext400 data which is broadcast/updated several time on the day it is valid).

See Teletext 2000 for details on how to configure the download.

See Overview of Teletext 400 and Teletext 2000 Services for an overview of the two services.


Overview of Results Downloading

This facility is provided for the experienced user.  If the Results information is not updated daily the majority of the data within market breaker is still valid.

Both Channel 4 and the BBC carry Results information for shares.  Market Breaker is currently configured to receive just the Channel 4 results.  The reason for this is that Channel 4 confine a single result to a single subpage, whereas the BBC sometimes put more than one result on one subpage.

Market Breaker use looks at the text on a results page and performs a translation of the information based on a lookup for commands held in the results section of the INI file.

The data is extracted and stored in the program and can be viewed in the Results dialog.

Because Channel 4 is inconsistent in the naming of the shares in the results pages, approximately a quarter of every Results download will not match.  In order to get a match you will need to change the full name of the affected shares in the share edit box to that used by channel 4 and then repeat the results download.  A results downloaded can be repeated as many times as you like without any problem.


Overviews of Market Breaker

Screen Components

Teletext Screen Component

Overview of Market Breaker

Overview of Teletext 400 and Teletext 2000 Services

Overview of Results Downloading


Screen Components

See also Teletext Screen Components


Teletext Screen Components


Yield

Yield is calculated using the most recent total dividend result using the following formula:

Yield = (Most recent downloaded Total Divident) * 100/80*100/(most recent price in pence)


PE Ratio

PE Ratio is calculated using the most recent downloaded price and most recent EPS (earning per share) result downloaded into the program

If  EPS<0 then PE Ratio=0

otherwise

PE Ratio = Most recent downloaded price/ EPS


Value of the Company
Value of the Company & No Shares

These are fields in the List Edit box.  They are related by the formula:

Value of Company= Number of Shares * Latest Price per share

Once the number of shares is set the Value of the company will vary as the share price varies.

Therefore by default you can vary the Number of Shares.  However, if you click the radio button to the right of Number of Shares you will be allowed to set the Value of the company.  Pressing Re-calc button will recalculated the number of shares.  Click the radio button again to return the dialog to its original state.


Status Line

The Status Line provides Latest status information on the program.  The information is only displayed for about 15 seconds.


Information Window

Information Window displays messages and a history of activities to the user.

It is also used as a means of printing.  The Font used in this window is the teletext font.  This is so that a teletext screen can be pasted into the window.


Desktop Buttons

	Click one of the 10 desk buttons to reveal a popup shows the 8 pages associated with the button.  Click the item which corresponds to the first two letters of the shares you are interested in.
	See Share Lists for a description of the list dialog box displayed.


Teletext Buttons

	Get Page Requests the page which has been entered in the page control above it Copy Puts the contents of the Window in the Paste buffer and then pastes it into the log window below.  Note that when the log window is printed the font will be converted to a system font before printing.  Note that if you want to print using the Teletext font then you can paste the data into another application such as a word processor.  The Teletext font will only be available to the application if your printer is capable of supporting raster fonts. Browse/No Browse This options starts requesting pages including and greater than the page number in the page control.  It also saves the screens in a different file for each channel.  If a file already exists you will be asked if you want to delete it.  Otherwise the data is appended onto the end of the file.  Each file can be viewed using the 'Off Air' and Channel buttons.  Terminate this action by clicking the button again (now called 'No Browse'). Off Air/On Air Clicking 'Off Air' will start the review of some previously saved Teletext pages.  Upon clicking this button a scroll bar appears and the hold button is pressed.  These pages can be traversed three different ways.: entering a number in the page control and clicking 'Get Page' button double clicking a number on the page (FastText is not currently supported when Off Air). Using the scroll bar to the right of the Teletext Window.  Upon clicking this button (now called 'On Air' ) starts searching on live data Hold/No Hold Clicking the 'Hold' button stops searching for pages on both the Off Air and On Air modes.  Note that when Off Air the Hold button is automatically selected when a page is found.