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THE STOCK TRADER A PERSONAL STOCK ANALYSIS & GRAPHING PROGRAM FOR THE IBM PC, XT, AT & OS/2 & COMPATIBLES Copyright 1990 FreeBooter(tm) Software The Freebooter(tm) STOCK TRADER documentation and diskette are copyrighted with all rights reserved. Permission is given to any party or parties to copy the diskette under the Shareware marketing technique providing that neither the content of the program, or the data files, are altered in anyway with the exception of the data files STOCK.IDX, STOCK.HDR, STOCK.DAT. In addition, no individual compensation may be gained in the copying of the diskette other than by valid PC Users Groups, Clubs, or valid Shareware distributors, those groups, clubs, or businesses may charge no more than what is charged for their lowest priced diskette. LIABILITY DECLARATION IN NO EVENT WILL FREEBOOTER(tm) SOFTWARE BE LIABLE, BEYOND THE REGISTRATION PRICE, LESS EXPENSES INCURRED, FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, SPECIAL, INCIDENTAL OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES ARISING OUT OF THE USE OR INABILITY TO USE "THE STOCK TRADER" PROGRAM. THE END USER, IN USING THIS PROGRAM, ACKNOWLEDGES FULL PERSONAL RESPON- SIBILITY FOR ANY GAINS OR LOSSES INCURRED FROM THE USE OF "THE STOCK TRADER". EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES, FREEBOOTER(tm) SOFTWARE SHALL HAVE NO FUTURE LIABILITY TO THE USER OR ANOTHER USER BEYOND THE REFUND OF THE REGISTRATION PRICE OF THE PRODUCT LESS EXPENSES. THE END USER, BY LOADING "THE STOCK TRADER" PROGRAM IN THE COMPUTER, AGREES TO THE LIABILITY DECLARATION AND THAT ANY DISPUTE BETWEEN THE USER AND FREEBOOTER(tm) SOFTWARE WILL BE SETTLED BY THE AMERICAN ARBITRATION ASSOCIATION IN MULTNOMAH COUNTY OF THE STATE OF OREGON. FreeBooter(tm) Software P.O. Box 19624 Portland, Or. 97280 (503)244-4800 All Rights are Reserved. FreeBooter(tm) is a registered trademark. Requirements: IBM-PC or compatible, with a hard disk drive and 512K of memory (512K for PC Jr.). Graphics printer and monitor. The monitor can be EGA or VGA. Remember - If you are a registered user, and run into some difficulty, call (503) 244-4800 and give your name and serial number of your disk. You'll find helpful service with a smile. We won't tell you how to invest your money, or which stocks to track, but we will give you all the help you need with the program. (i) THE STOCK TRADER Introduction.......................................... 1 Converting Unregistered or Earlier Stock Files........ 1 Running the STOCK TRADER Program...................... 3 The Main STOCK TRADER Menu............................ 3 Main Menu "A" - Adding a Stock........................ 4 Main Menu "B" - Begin Portfolio Manager (Reg. Users).. 7 Main Menu "C" - Changing the Program Date............. 8 Main Menu "D" - Deleting a Stock...................... 8 Main Menu "E" - Editing the Stock Data Files.......... 9 Main Menu "G" - Graphing a Stock...................... 10 Main Menu "I" - Indicator Change...................... 12 Main Menu "M" - Modify Printer Defaults............... 14 Main Menu "N" - Renaming Your Stock (Reg. Users)...... 15 Main Menu "P" - Print Trading Sheet................... 15 Main Menu "Q" - Quit Program.......................... 15 Main Menu "R" - Recalculate Indexes................... 16 Main Menu "S" - Split a Stock......................... 16 Main Menu "U" - Update a Stock........................ 17 This is a brief description to acquaint you with the operation of the STOCK TRADER program. We have designed the program to be as self supporting as possible through the use of the EASY menus and DESCRIPTIVE boxes. This manual will aid you to more fully under- stand the program's functions. 1. The STOCK TRADER program is written in Quick Basic and uses Quick Windows Advanced interface management library. The source code is not available for this program. 2. STOCKS.* data files contains the program's stock data. These files hold all the stock information that you have entered for the last one hundred days. SPECIAL NOTE OF CAUTION Do not attempt to alter any of these data files. Quick Basic can be very particular about data file formatting. If you bring these files up on a word processor, DO NOT resave them. If you do, in all prob- ability those files will not format correctly again. CONVERTING DATA FROM UNREGISTERED OR PREVIOUS VERSIONS OF STOCK TRADER If you have been using Stock Trader 3.0 or 4.0 or have been using an unregistered copy of the Stock Trader, you will need to run the CONVERT program before the Stock Trader will recognize your old data. The CONVERT program transfers your old data to the new format. Users of versions 1.0 and 2.0 will probably need to reenter their data. It can also be used to transfer registration to a previously unregistered program from a registered disk. DO NOT CONVERT VERSION 5.0 OR HIGHER. Converting old data: Copy the file STOCKS.DAT from your old Stock Trader onto the new Stock Trader directory. Use the key stroking shown below. If you have installed Stock Trader by using the FreeBooter(tm) UNARC program, all your new files will be in the STOCK directory on you hard disk. If you have installed Stock Trader on you C drive, enter the following commands followed by pressing the ENTER key after each line: C: CD\STOCK5 If you had the Stock Trader on a floppy disk before, place the old Stock Trader in drive A and enter: COPY A:STOCKS.DAT COPY A:STOCKS.IDX COPY A:STOCKS.HDR If you had it on your hard disk before, then enter: COPY (Disk Drive):\(Directory Name)\STOCKS.DAT COPY (Disk Drive):\(Directory Name)\STOCKS.IDX COPY (Disk Drive):\(Directory Name)\STOCKS.HDR Once this is done, enter CONVERT followed by an ENTER. Select the Select 1 option. The process is automatic and will display it's progress as the stock file is converted. (1) If you have been running the unregistered Stock Trader, place the registered disk that you have received in drive A and enter the following: C: (If you are using the C drive) CD\STOCK CONVERT Select the Select 2 option. The process is automatic. We have included three sample stocks in the database. These are AT&T, Hewlett Packard, and Helmerich & Payne Inc. These are for demonstration only and can be deleted. (2) RUNNING THE STOCK TRADER The Stock Trader supports a mouse. If you have a mouse, activate it by going to your mouse directory and enter the proper command to start the mouse in operation. This is generally done by entering MOUSE. The initial screen displays the STOCK TRADER logo. There is a ticker tape that runs across the bottom of the screen while the program is loading the stock data file. The length of time this runs is dependent upon how many stocks are currently in the direc- tory. The stock names and their last closing price, are displayed on the ticker tape line of the screen as they load into memory. The next screen is the FreeBooter(tm) screen. If you are a reg- istered user we thank you for registering. If not, we ask you to register. You may also enter the Portfolio Manager from this screen. If you are a un-registered user it allows you to preview the screen and you will not be able to actually use the program until you register it. After that, we display a disclaimer screen. From this screen you may enter the registration module or go onto the main program. Registration is very easy. WHILE AT YOUR COMPUTER call us on (503) 244-4800. We will ask for your VISA or Mastercard number. We'll be off the line for approximately 30 seconds to verify your card. When we return, we'll ask you for the six digit number that is displayed on your monitor. We'll then give you back another six digit number for you to enter. At that point the Stock Trader will show that it's registered and will display the regist- ation screen. Pressing ENTER at this time transfers the program to the main menu. PLEASE NOTE: The number will change each time the registration screen is called up. That's why it's necessary for you to be AT YOUR COMPUTER to register. After registration, your number will not change. Please reference this number, should you call or write to use in the future. MAIN MENU The program will always return to this menu after any selection has been completed. The current date is posted at the top of the screen. Below that is the directory of the stocks that are cur- rently in the program's data file. This will hold forty-four stocks. After each stock listing, the last closing price is dis- played. Below the stock listings is the menu selection. The program always starts up assuming that you are going to perform a date change. Since the computer gets the current date, you'll probably want to change it to yesterdays date. If this is the case, just press enter or center the mouse over option D and push the left hand mouse button. (3) OPTION "A" ADDING A STOCK TO THE DATABASE Adding a stock to the current directory builds a new section in the data files for that stock. You'll be asked for the stock's name. At this point you have the option of entering the stocks abbreviation as it used on the various stock exchanges, or as displayed in the Wall Street Journal and other sources similar to that publication. Example: The abbreviation used by stock exchanges for American Telephone and Telegraph is the symbol T. Using this abbreviation is useful if you continually get your quotes from a broker, over the phone, or have your own access to a stock market quote machine. Example: The abbreviation used by the Wall Street Journal and other sources similar to that publication, such as the daily newspaper is AT&T. Note that AT&T is not the same as at&t or At&t. The computer recognizes the lower case aberrations as different stocks. This is useful if you chose to track the same stock under different environments, such as, using different long and short term average days and different Chord days. After the name is entered, the program prompts for the daily entry format. This is selected as follows: Full stock pricing (high, low, close, and volume) Limited stock entry (close and volume) Close only One of these three maybe selected using the arrow keys and pressing the ENTER or by moving the mouse and pressing the left button. Whichever you choose, the appropriate entries will be prompted. The high, low and close are self explanatory but the volume conven- tion you choose is up to your own desires. You can either enter the shares sold in units, hundreds, or thousands of shares. We find that for individual stocks, hundreds of shares is the appropriate choice. For large volume measurements such as the DOW Industrial Average, thousands of shares sold is the best, but that is up to you. The only requirement is keep your choice CONSISTENT, otherwise the volume displays on the graph will be meaningless. The last choices are the most difficult to make. These are the selection of the long and short term average days and the Chord days. This requires some further explanation. NOTE: For a complete in-depth review on the subject, I recommend Stock Market Trading Systems by Gerald Appel and Fred Hitschler. This book was used as reference in the calculation setup of the STOCK TRADER. It tends to be an expensive book, but it may be available at your local library. A less expensive book is, Three Point Reversal Method of Point & Figure by A.W. Cohen. (4) Long and short term days are used to determine the smoothing factor of the long and short term averages. As the number of days in- crease, the fluctuating average becomes slower to change. As the level is decreased, the change becomes more apparent and coincides more with the current close of the stock. The interaction of these two averages are the main driving force in the program. As the short term average becomes more positive in relation to the long term average, a buy signal is generated, and conversely, when it goes more negative in relation to the long term average, a sell signal is generated. The buy and sell signals alternate on the graph. It is possible, that in a long term market, neither declining or increasing, no signals other than the hold signal will be generated for one hundred days. This is because of the alternating buy and sell signals. Should a buy be signaled and the stock continues to rise for over one hundred days, the trading signal moves left off the chart and no other trading indicator appears until a signal to sell is generated The same is true in the sell mode. If a sell is generated and the stock continues to fall, the indicator moves left off the screen after one hundred days if the decline continues. The Chord can be the most difficult to understand. Basically, it is a straight line that spans the fluctuating closing prices over the number of days designated. This feature is to prevent being "whipsawed" in a rapidly fluctuating market. If a buy signal is generated, the Chord looks back in the history the specified number of days. If that close was higher than the close on the day the buy was signaled, the buy signal is inhibited. The reverse is true on the sell. If the close in the history was lower than the current close, the sell is inhibited. The program allows you to put zero days in this indicator if you choose. When you do this, just remember, that the trading will come more often than if you were to use a Chord figure of five to ten days. A good place to start is 45 days on the long term average, 10 on the short term average, and 5 on the Chord. To visualize how these indicators function, it's probably best to look at what would occur if both the long and the short term averages were the same. With that, both averages would be changing at exactly the same rate. Since the short term average would never change in relation to the long term average, neither a buy or sell signal would ever be generated. (5) As soon as we make the long term average greater than the short term average, then the changes start to occur. The following rules apply: 1. The greater the difference between the long and short term averages, the greater the number of buy and sell signals. 2. The shorter the short term average, the more responsive it will be to the market and the greater number of trades will occur. 3. The longer the Chord length, the less likely the stock will be affected by short term trading fluctuations. 4. The longer the Chord length, the more likely you are to get caught holding the bag in a downward trending market. For a complete description of how these indicators are to be set and how they function within the program, consult page 11. Not all stocks behave in the same way. A penny stock like "Risky Oil" or "Maybe Uranium" will exhibit entirely different character- istics than "Consolidated Solid Gold Bank". For this reason it may be beneficial to examine a month's worth of data on a pros- pective stock before making any decisions to buy and sell. At the end of the month the short and long term averages can be re- adjusted along with the Chord to determine the best indicator values for the particular stock under study. Once acceptable trading in- dicators are established, it will generally hold true for that part- icular stock. Through a sequence of varying the long and the short term averages and the Chord length, an acceptable graph presentation can be obtained. Be cautious of reducing the short term average below seven days and the Chord below three days. The program does not take into account the cost of the trades with your broker. If either the Chord or the short term values are set too low, the program calls for trades with great frequency and the broker gets rich instead of the program user. The longer the study period of the stock, the more accurate the long term average to short term average ratio becomes, so it does pay to wait a bit before taking any actions. History of less than thirty days should not be trusted. The indications that are generated by the program rely on a good extensive data files. Without the back up of an extensive data file, it gives you the best that it knows. This may not be satisfactory. (6) OPTION "B" Begin Portfolio Manager Once "B" is pressed or selected with the mouse or arrow keys the Portfolio Manager is activated. If you are a registered user, the program will be activated otherwise only a preview is shown. The screen displayed will show all the stocks that you currently have in the portfolio. The box at the lower right hand side of the screen displays the current profit or loss and the percentage of profit or loss. To add a new stock into the portfolio select A with the mouse, cursor or arrow keys. Once activated the pop entry screen comes up showing all the stocks currently in the database. The stock must be in the Stock Trader database before you can place it into the Portfolio Manager. Enter the date that you purchased the stock, the number of shares purchased, the total price including commission and finally the brokers commission. If all figures are correct activate the accept box on the screen otherwise activate the cancel. The Calc screen button, when activated, goes to the data file and loads in the latest stock prices on the stocks that you are following in your Portfolio Manager. If you have deleted the stock from the Stock Trader database no update will occur for the stock that you have deleted. The Delete button activates the delete mode. Once selected move the highlighted bar to cover the stock you wish to delete. Once selected be either the arrow keys or the mouse the stock will be deleted from the database. The +Dividend screen button activates the dividend pull down. Enter the value of the dividend. The select either Add To, Replace or Cancel. Adding To will take the current dividend and add it to the existing dividend. Replace will replace the dividend in the file with the current dividend. Edit allows you to edit existing data in the file. It acts the same way the add function works. Quit will return you to the Stock Trader Program. (7) OPTION "C" CHANGING THE DATE The date that you enter here is posted on the data files when you enter the updated stock prices. Note: this date is in the MM/DD/YY format. The date that is entered will appear on the main menu at the top of the screen. It is absolutely necessary to enter the stock data in sequential order. The program does not sort by date once entered. It is up to you to place the stock prices in the file in their proper order. Should you inadvertently enter the dates in the incorrect order, the program will let you remove the improper entries using the edit selection (E) on the main menu. It is possible to enter a series of entries for different dates in one sitting by going back to the date change screen from the update section each time you start an entry for a new date. You are always given the option to use the current date or change it. Pressing ENTER in the update section will pass this option. OPTION "D" DELETING A STOCK When this option is selected, a stock menu window appears in the right side of the screen window. Pressing Esc will return the program to the main menu. You may select the stock to delete with either the arrow keys or the mouse. When positioned over the stock name, press either the ENTER key or the left hand mouse button. Three push buttons are then presented. You may ACCEPT, and therefore, delete the stock or CANCEL and return to the main menu. RETRY allows you to go back and reselect another stock in the event that you have made a mistake. When the stock has been selected, and an ACCEPT is selected the stock and all its history will be deleted from the database. There is no way to recover any data once the stock has been deleted. (8) EDITING A STOCK OPTION "E" When this option is selected, a stock menu window appears in the right side of the screen window. Pressing Esc will return the program to the main menu. You may select the stock to edit with either the arrow keys or the mouse. When positioned over the stock name, press either the ENTER key or the left hand mouse button. Three push buttons are then presented. You may ACCEPT, and therefore, edit the stock, or CANCEL and return to the main menu. RETRY allows you to go back and reselect another stock in the event that you have made a mistake. Once selected, a new history window will appear with the last 30 days for unregistered users, or 100 days for registered users. The highlight bar can be moved with the arrow keys or by moving the mouse in the right hand vertical highlight control bar. Once the appropriate date is selected, press either the ENTER key or the left mouse button. Three push buttons will be displayed. Pushing DELETE: This will erase the entry under the highlight bar. All entries will then move up one space. Entry #99 in the database will be duplicated for entry #100. Pushing INSERT: This will insert a blank line above the position of the highlight bar. This will move all entries back one space. Data in slot #100 will be lost. Pushing EDIT: This will convert the screen into a normal update data entry screen to allow you to correct any mistakes that you may have made. The 95% and 105% value checking, that are present in the Update module, are not in force on the high and close values when using the edit feature. Pressing Esc returns the user to the selection menu. At this point you can select another stock to edit or press Esc and return to the main menu. Prudent practice would dictate that the user run Option R after the completion of any editing functions. (9) GRAPHING A STOCK OPTION "G" When this option is selected, a stock menu window appears in the right side of the screen window. Pressing Esc will return the program to the main menu. You may select the stock to graph with either the arrow keys or the mouse. When positioned over the stock name, press either the ENTER key or the left hand mouse button. Three push buttons are then presented. You may ACCEPT, and therefore, graph the stock, or CANCEL and return to the main menu. RETRY allows you to go back and reselect another stock in the event that you have made a mistake. This option is the most exciting in the whole program and basically the one function that makes all the others necessary. Once the stock has been selected, and the process completes for that stock, you'll have a one hundred day trading history on the screen. Pressing Enter returns the screen to the stock selection menu. Pressing Esc returns the program to the main menu. The stock you selected is displayed at the top of the screen. Directly to the right and down are the graph values for the selling price of the stock. Each gradient divides the screen in a horizontal line for quick reference. This is by gradients of one, two, five, fifteen or twenty points. Across the bottom of the screen is the history date spaced at 5 day increments. With each date is a vertical line that divides the screen top to bottom. On the left hand side of the graph is a box labeled 30 DAY AVERAGE. This box gives a visual one hundred day high, low and close average. The combination of the price lines and the date lines presents a grid or graph on which the display is drawn. The daily stock bars show the stock's high at the top of the bar, the low at the bottom of the bar and the close at the small line on the right hand side on the bar. The signals for buy, sell and hold are as follows: Buy - Green Sell - Red Hold - White In addition small triangles pointing down in red, and up in green are displayed above the suggested trading days. (10) These colors follow the program instructions that are set down by the selection of the short term, long term, and Chord settings. As the values are changed in selection "I", the buy and sell signal also change due to the different priorities of the averages and Chord. The relative volume bars for each day are placed vertically just above the dates at the bottom of the graph. These bars give the relative trading volume for each day for that stock. Do not compare different stocks on the volume bar size. This is only for the stock you are observing. The algorithm for this function looks at all trading days, picks the highest day, and then gives that day the tallest bar. All other days are adjusted from that highest day for that one stock on the screen. The stock's daily volume can be important in your decision-making, but this function is not included as part of the algorithm in the buy-sell trading flags. Stock gains or losses on a very light day may not have the same weight as those on a heavy trading day. For example: The week prior to Christmas is traditionally slow. Prior to making any judgment calls, you may want to consider the consequences of any action that you may take when full volume or heavy volume trading resumes. In short, be cautious of any trading based on prices during relatively light trading volume OTHER INDICATOR LINES ON THE GRAPH: The long term average is displayed on a red fluctuating line, and the short term average is displayed with a green fluctuating line. If you have placed the stock in the portfolio module, the purchase price will be displayed on a straight light blue line. PRINTING GRAPHS You can print the graph with most graphics printers. The only requirement is to load in the graphics utility that is supplied with your version of DOS. The process is as follows: Just after you boot the computer and have entered the time and date, insert your DOS disk into drive "A". If the prompt is not showing A then TYPE A: -- At the A prompt type GRAPHICS (Note: This program does not work with all printers.) This loads the graphics utility into RAM. The selected stock can then be graphed on the screen by pressing Shift-PrtSc. We have supplied a series of GRAPHICS.COM type programs to work with a variety of monitors and printers. You should be able to find one that works with your monitor and printer. These programs are from other shareware authors. If you use these programs, the authors expect to be compensated. The instructions and programs are in GRAPHICS.EXE. Running this program un-archives all the files. You can print the documentation by entering COPY GRAPHICS.DOC LPT1. (11) SETTING INDICATOR VALUES OPTION "I" When this option is selected, a stock menu window appears in the right side of the screen window. Pressing Esc will return the program to the main menu. You may select the stock to set the indicators with either the arrow keys or the mouse. When positioned over the stock name, press either the ENTER key or the left hand mouse button. Three push buttons are then presented. You may ACCEPT, and therefore, set the indicators of the stock or CANCEL and return to the main menu. RETRY allows you to go back and reselect another stock in the event that you have made a mistake. The greatest versatility of the STOCK TRADER program is the ability to change the trading indicator values for each stock. A good good starting position is 45 days for the long term average, 10 days for the short term average, and 5 days on the Chord. Before we get into descriptions of how the three indicators function together, it might be best to describe exactly how the long and short term indicators are computed. The Long Term Indicator evaluates the long term rolling average of the stock. The higher the value that this indicator has, the more it is biased toward history rather than present stock transactions. To put it another way, the longer the long term indicator, the less effect today's price will have on the index. Both the long and the short term index are calculated each day by the following formula: AVERAGE=((CLOSE-AVER.(YESTERDAY))*(2/TERM DAYS+1)) + AVER. (YES- TERDAY) The Short Term Indicator is calculated exactly the same as the Long Term Indicator. The only difference between the two indicators is the numerical value TERM DAYS that you have chosen for each indicator. The buy and sell signals are generated by the interaction between these two indicators. These two signals alternate and generally have a series of hold signals between them. There will never be two buy, or two sell signals, in succession. A buy signal is generated after a sell signal has been given and when the Short Term Indicator becomes more positive in respect to the Long Term Indicator than it was the previous day. (Even though it may still be negative) The sell signal is exactly opposite. A sell signal is generated after a buy signal when the short term indicator becomes more negative (even though it may still have a positive value) than it was the previous day. The buy and sell signals are mitigated by the Chord selection. When either a buy or sell signal is generated, the program looks at the Chord length and compares the present day's close with the close that occurred the "Chord value days" past. In the event of a buy signal, the present day's close has to be higher than the Chord length days close, or the buy signal will be inhibited. In the event of a sell signal, the reverse is true. The present close must be lower than the Chord close, or the sell signal will be inhibited. (12) Unfortunately there is no "best" choice of indicators for any stock. An owner of AT&T might select a short term average of 75 days while the long term is 240 days and the Chord is 10 days. The investor who selects these values probably has no interest in selling AT&T. He or she knows that over the last year AT&T has varied from $17 to over $25, but the dividends have remained constant. This investor is probably in for the "long haul" regardless of what the stock does. In this case they are probably using STOCK TRADER as a "keep track" mechanism. You might be quick to jump here and say that 240 days long term average, 30 days on the short term average and 10 days on the Chord is the best choice for your trading, but before you proceed further consider that AT&T is a "blue chip" stock. The stocks that do not fall in this category would be treated entirely different and each of these stocks are treated differently by various individuals. Fine tuning your trading indicator selections is very easy. Start by selecting a suitable long term average. Blue Chip Stocks - greater than 75 days Moderate Stocks - 45 to 75 days Speculative Stocks - less than 45 days Then set the Chord at 5 days. Next change the short term average either up or down. When the recalculation is completed, go back to the graphing mode and check the results. Does the trading occur where you feel it should? If it's too early, lengthen out the short term average. If it's too late, shorten it up. Once that is achieved then examine the Chord. Is the trading occurring too often because there are to many peaks and valleys? In that event, lengthen the Chord until the excessive trading stops. Do not try to change all the indicators at once. When all in- dicators are changed at once, total frustration generally occurs. This type of abrupt trial and error method can leave you in absolute confusion and keep you sitting at the computer for a long time before you arrive at the proper evaluation for an individual stock. Once the proper settings have been achieved, these settings will be effective for a considerable length of time. For your reference, the previous indicator values are displayed across the top of the screen. Once you have entered the values for the long, short, and chord, you are asked to Accept, Cancel or Retry. Accept will change the values. Cancel will return you to the main menu. Retry allows you to reenter the values. (13) MODIFY PRINTER DEFAULTS OPTION "M" Most printers will accept the control codes that are currently in the program default. These control codes regulate the underline, emphasis, and double strike. There are two codes for each function. One code turns the function on while the other turns it off. Within each code there is room for installing five control code characters. The first, if used at all, is the escape code or 27. Although many printer manuals mention the Escape function, some do not give the control code number for Escape. Keep in mind that this code, if used, is always first. This code usually starts the printer setup. Some control sequences do not use the five spaces provided in the program for the control codes. In that event make the leading spaces 0 and use the last spaces for the control codes. Most printers use only one or two control codes. In most cases CODE1 and CODE2 will both be 0. HP Laser printers may use all five. Most printers use only three and that's generally with the underline feature. The control code for this feature on most printers is 27, 45 and then either 1 or 0. One turns the underline on, while 0 turns the underline off. The easiest way to determine if these codes need adjustment is to print out a stock listing and examine the result. Are the numbers under close, short term, and long term averages boldfaced if the value goes up? When it goes down, are they underlined? When the value stays the same, is it in standard print? If these questions can all be answered yes, then the print defaults do not have to be adjusted. If it becomes necessary to adjust any of these functions, you'll have to go to the instruction manual that was supplied with your printer. The functions that you need are generally placed in the back of the manual in an appendix. Note that most of the sequences start with Escape. That means character 27, and that's the figure to put into the first ( ) if there are five codes. If there are less than five fill the leading slots with zero. It should look like this after you finish ( 0 ). Next enter the first code. This is generally 27. Then look for the next code under the DEC column. This is the decimal equivalent of the code letter. For example Emphasis is generally Escape E. This would be entered as ( 0 ) ( 27 ) ( 69 ). 69 is the decimal equivalent of E. This does become confusing sometimes, so if you're a registered owner of the STOCK TRADER, and have contributed to FreeBooter user support, call FreeBooter(tm) Software at 503-244-4800 and we'll be glad to assist you in entering the proper values. (14) NEW NAME OPTION "N" When this option is selected, a stock selection window appears on the right hand side of the screen. Select the stock name that you wish to change with either the down arrow key or the mouse. When the highlight bar is over the proper stock press Enter or the left hand mouse button. You are then prompted to Accept, Cancel or Retry. Cancel returns you to the main menu, Retry starts you back at the start of the New Name screen and Accept transfers control to selecting a new name. Pressing Esc at anytime will return you to the main menu. Entering the new name followed by Enter will return you to the main menu where you will find the stock resorted with the new name. PRINT TRADING SHEET OPTION "P" When this option is selected, a stock menu window appears in the right side of the screen window. Pressing Esc will return the program to the main menu. You may select the stock to print with either the arrow keys or the mouse. When positioned over the stock name, press either the ENTER key or the left hand mouse button. Three push buttons are then presented. You may ACCEPT, and therefore, print the stock or CANCEL and return to the main menu. RETRY allows you to go back and reselect another stock in the event that you have made a mistake. The one hundred day history is almost a duplicate of the screen that comes up when the stock edit option is selected. Due to the limita- tions of the printer there are some changes from what is presented on the screen. 1. The entire one hundred days is presented on the printout. 2. Decreases in the close, long term, and short term averages are underlined. 3. Increases in the close, long term and short term averages are displayed in boldface. Aside from these variations, both the printed and the screen present- ations should be the same. If the printout does not come up correctly, it is necessary to change the printer control commands that direct the printing functions. For this, go to the Main Menu and select option M. This process allows you to make all the changes necessary to make your printer conform to the required print commands. Should the boldface not be distinctive enough, you should either change the printer ribbon or reink it. (15) QUIT PROGRAM OPTION "Q" This option terminates the program and returns you to the DOS prompt. RECALCULATE INDEXES OPTION "R" When this option is selected, a stock menu window appears in the right side of the screen window. Pressing Esc at this point will return the program to the main menu. You may select the stock to recalculate with either the arrow keys or the mouse. When positioned over the stock name, press either the ENTER key or the left hand mouse button. Three push buttons are then presented. You may ACCEPT, and therefore, recalculate the stock or CANCEL and return to the main menu. RETRY allows you to go back and reselect another stock in the event that you have made a mistake. This option should be used whenever you edit the stock. Since changes have been made, it will change the values of the long and short term indexes. SPLITTING A STOCK OPTION "S" When this option is selected, a warning screen will come up. It allows you to exit back to the main program by pressing Esc. Pressing any other key will pass to a stock menu window in the right side of the screen window. Pressing Esc will return the program to the main menu. You may select the stock to split with either the arrow keys or the mouse. When positioned over the stock name, press either the ENTER key or the left hand mouse button. Three push buttons are then presented. You may ACCEPT, and therefore, split the stock or CANCEL and return to the main menu. RETRY allows you to go back a reselect another stock in the event that you have made a mistake. Splitting a stock occurs infrequently, but when it does, it can be inconvenient if this option is not included in the program. This generally occurs when the stock has either become too high priced or the company has been taken over by another company, and a stock swapping takes place between the new company and the investors. To perform the split, you will be asked to answer the following ques- tion: How is the stock splitting? XXXX shares for XXXX shares. (16) If the stock is splitting 2 for 1 (two new shares, for one old shares) enter 2 in the first space and 1 in the second space. Many other split combinations are possible. Just remember to enter the new shares first, and the old shares second. Once entered, the program adjusts all figures so that they appear to have been entered at the new share level. For example: On a two for one split, the number of shares is doubled. The high, low, and close prices are cut in half. The volume is doubled and the long term and short term averages are cut in half. This is done for all history entries for the stock which splits. If you have made an error, do not be concerned. Merely go back into the stock split section and reverse the procedure. If you had entered 2 for 1 go back and enter 1 for 2. The process is reversed and you'll be back to exactly the place you were before you started. There may be some minor decimal changes but nothing that will effect the programs accuracy. This method may, on the surface, seem to distort the true facts of the stock's movement. If you do not change the original price of the stock, the split will immediately reduce the stock price and the program would signal a sell due to the much lower price. Although it may be advisable to sell at this time, it may also be advisable to hold onto the stock. The only way to keep the performance tracking is to change the price of the stock throughout its entire stored history. Only in this way will the true indications to buy, sell, or hold be realized. UPDATING A STOCK OPTION "U" When this option is selected, you will be asked if this is manual entry or a importing quotes from an ASCII file. Select the proper entry with the arrow keys and press enter or select with a mouse. MANUAL ENTRY A stock menu window appears in the right side of the screen window. Pressing Esc will return the program to the main menu. You may select the stock to print with either the arrow keys or the mouse. When positioned over the stock name, press either the ENTER key or the left hand mouse button. Three push buttons are then presented. You may ACCEPT, and therefore, print the stock or CANCEL and return to the main menu. RETRY allows you to go back and reselect another stock in the event that you have made a mistake. Depending on the pricing selection that you have chosen, the program prompts for some or all of the following - day's high, day's low, day's close, and day's volume. These figures are checked for accuracy in several ways: (17) 1. If today's high or close differs from yesterday's high by greater than 5%, the program asks if you want to enter that figure. 2. If the low is greater than the high, the program asks you to reenter all the figures. 3. If the close is greater than the high or less than the low, the program asks you to reenter all the figures. The values that are entered can be none, one, two, or three decimal places. e.g. 12 7/8 would be entered either 12.875 or 12.88. For quick reference the following are suitable input values: 8 1/8 - - - 8.125 or 8.13 10 1/4 - - - 10.25 45 3/8 - - - 45.375 or 45.38 16 1/2 - - - 16.50 or 16.5 4 5/8 - - - 4.625 or 4.63 69 3/4 - - - 69.75 13 7/8 - - - 13.875 or 13.88 11 - - - 11 or 11.0 or 11.00 As you can see, there is no need to add the zero to a whole number or after a .5 figure. The program automatically does that function for you. After entry, you may Accept, Cancel or Retry. The running values for the long and short term averages are calcu- lated each time the entry is completed. These values are posted in the history along with the other entered values and saved to the database. The action of the long and short term average are the major driving calculations that signal the buy, sell, and hold trading indicators to the graphing program. These trading indicator flags are also set at the time of the update entries. Since the actions of the long and short term averages are an accumulation of all the previous history, the need is obvious to have the trading days in sequential order. Placed out of sequence, the long and short term averages become a meaningless calculation and the trading indicators have no value at all. When you complete the entry, you are returned to the stock select screen. You may then select another stock to update, or press ESC to return to the main menu. (18) ASCII FILE IMPORTING First you must download the file from your stock quoting service. Since downloading functions vary for different services, it is next to impossible to describe all the ways a stock file can be down- loaded. If in doubt, consult the manual supplied with your stock quotes service. There is an option to save the file that you have downloaded. It may be necessary to capture the download in a buffer before saving the file. Again consult your download service manual. Save the file to C:\STOCK\QUOTES when the save file option comes up. This will save your file on the C drive, in the STOCK directory under the name QUOTES. If your service provides an editing feature, then edit out the header and footer information that contains no actual stock quotes. The new importing feature does good at screening out lines that contain non-stock functions, but it's good to remove them until your sure that the Stock Trader will screen your particular non-stock quote lines. This has been tried with Compuserve and Prodigy and the screen works well at screening our non-stock lines with those suppliers. The next screen will ask you to name the importing file that you have created from the stock quoting service. If the program finds the file that you have named, it will proceed. Failing to find the file it will notify you and you can retype the name, or press Esc to go back to the main menu. There is a practice file already on the disk. It's named QUOTES.TXT and matches the stocks that are currently in the data file. The practice file has one stock that will update automatically, and two that you need to select the stock to update. The automatic stock update will execute if the program can match up a stock name that is in the import file, with a stock name that is currently in the database. If it can not find the stock it will ask you to select the proper stock. Insure that you select the proper stock to update. In the manual update mode, there is a high-low warning flag that activates if the stock deviates more than 5%. In the import mode the computer assumes that the stock quote service is correct, and you have selected the proper stock. The current import mask is set to transfer several stocks for one day from the Compuserve service. There are two import modes. 1. One stock for up to 150 days. (Only 100 days will remain in history) 2. Several stocks for a single day (up to 44) In option 1 there is no stock name field. In option 2 there is no date field. To reset the capture mask simply press F1 when the vertical stock selection window comes up on the right. NOTE: IF YOUR STOCK QUOTE COMPANY USES FRACTIONS INSTEAD OF DECIMALS BE CAUTIOUS IN SETTING THE CAPTURE MASK. THE JUSTIFICATION IS RIGHT AND LEFT OF THE SPACE BETWEEN THE WHOLE NUMBER AND THE DECIMAL. THIS MEANS THAT IF (19) YOUR STOCK DROPS BELOW ONE DOLLAR THE STOCK QUOTE GENERALLY REVERTS TO SIXTEENTHS! THIS COULD PUSH THE NORMAL QUOTE TWO PLACES TO THE RIGHT IN THE CASE OF 11/16. IF ANY STOCK THAT YOU CAPTURE IS IN A LOW RANGE, BE SURE TO TAKE THIS INTO ACCOUNT WHEN SETTING THE CAPTURE MASK, OTHERWISE YOU COULD END UP WITH SOME VERY STRANGE FIGURES. To reset the mask press F1. This will activate the bar selection menu at the lower right. To totally reset the mask, it's best to delete the current settings by selecting each mask setting and cancelling that setting by pressing F1. When you have a clear bar in the upper window, reset the mask by selecting each value and assigning it on the bar. You can move the cursor with the arrow keys until it is placed exactly in the correct position for either the beginning or end of the field, then press the enter key. Use the arrow keys to go to the other end of the field, and press the enter key again. If you have made any error, just reselect the field again at the vertical menu window and press F1. This will erase the field on the upper bar. NOTE: THE COLORED FIELD BAR MUST BE EXACTLY OVER THE DESIRED DOWNLOAD FIELD OR THE PROGRAM WILL NOT ACCEPT VALUES CORRECTLY. IN THE EXAMPLE THAT WAS SUPPLIED WITH THE PROGRAM, ALL THE FIELDS ARE CONTIGUOUS. THIS MAY NOT BE THE CASE WITH THE QUOTE SERVICE THAT YOU ARE USING. Continue with each selection until complete. IF YOU ARE IMPORTING MULTIPLE STOCKS FOR A SINGLE DATE, THE DATE FIELD WILL NOT BE NECESSARY. IF IMPORTING A SINGLE STOCK FOR MULTIPLE DATES THE STOCK NAME FIELD WILL NOT BE NECESSARY. Since we are already set on option 2 the next screen will verify the date you will be using to post stocks. You can keep it or change the date. Switch the push buttons with the arrow keys and Enter. If you choose to change the date you'll be transferred to the date change screen. Input the date by using two digits for month, day, and year. For example September 8, 1992 would be entered Month 09 Day 08 Year 92 You will then be given the option to accept or retry then settings. Anytime that you change the import capture mask and that mask does not include the date you will come back to this screen. Upon completion of the date entry, if necessary, the download screen will come up. If the computer can match a stock in the database with one from the import file, it will automatically post the update to the stock. Failing to find the stock it will bring up a vertical selection menu and ask you to identify the stock to be updated. You can use the up/down arrow keys to make the selection and then press enter or use the mouse and press the left button for selection. You can also use the mouse to scroll through the available stock selection by placing the mouse on the right hand scroll area, and pressing the left hand mouse button. (20) Once selected you'll be given the option to Accept, Cancel, or Retry. If you press Cancel the process will abort and revert back to the main menu. We also have a "Significant Whoops" screen in the automatic import module. Should you have incorrectly misnamed the data fields, for example reversing the high and low fields, or the quote service has given you figures that can't possibly be (high is lower the close) you'll receive a Whoops. You can then cancel the entry or skip the individual transaction. Before making a selection you can also do the following Pressing Esc - By-passes the current stock reading that is under the light bar in the left hand stock quotes and advances the selection one step. Pressing F1 - Will allow you to reset the import capture mask. Pressing F2 - If you are posting many dates for a single stock it is necessary to have the oldest date at the top of the screen. Most services will provide the history in the correct order. If it does not pressing F2 will reverse the order on the screen. Pressing F3 - Returns the program to the main menu. As each stock in the import file is posted, you will see the high- light bar move down one selection. When the end of the file is reached the update program will revert back to the main menu. THANK YOU FOR YOUR SUPPORT ON THE STOCK TRADER PROGRAM. IF YOU HAVE REGISTERED, THANKS AGAIN, IF NOT, PLEASE DO SO. (21)