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1995-03-18
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******************************************
StockChart
Stock Market Technical Analysis Program
Version 2.01 - November 1988
User's Manual
******************************************
Copyright 1988 - David A. Wizda
All rights reserved
Portions of this program include material
Copyrighted by Absoft Corp 1988
******************************************
THE UBIQUITOUS DISCLAIMER
StockChart was written by an amateur programmer and investor.
While every effort has been made to assure the accuracy of the
information provided by this program, no warranty of any kind is
either expressed or implied. If you make investment decisions
based solely on the information supplied by this program, might I
remind you that a fool and his money are soon parted.
ABOUT STOCKCHART
Disclaimers withstanding, I have found StockChart to be a
very useful investment tool and therefore have released it as a
shareware program. Permission is hereby granted to distribute
this program without permission of the author provided that this
file accompanies it and no charge is made for its distribution.
This is not a crippled version (I have been using it in its
previous versions for quite some time), but there still may be
some bugs and I have many enhancements in the works. If you find
this to be a useful program, please send some sort of
acknowledgement, preferably in the form of a check or money order
to:
David A. Wizda
533 East 13th Street
New York, NY 10009-3508
If you send me $15, I will send you:
- The latest version of StockChart
- My most recent data files on the S&P 500 prices, the S&P
100 Put-Call ratios, and any other stocks which I may
happen to be charting at that time
- A companion program, StockRate, which I use for comparing
the performance of my mutual funds versus the Dow Jones
Industrials and the S&P 500
- My current data files for the StockRate program
If you send me something less than $15, I might send you the
above information but I will definitely add you to my Christmas
list. In any case, I would appreciate your input. See the end
of this manual for planned enhancements.
I can also be reached through CompuServe at User ID#
73467,3317.
INTRODUCTION
StockChart is designed for investors who want to perform
technical analysis on stocks. The current version provides you
with the facilities to input the high, low, close, and volume of
stock prices on a daily basis; display the data for the latest
six months; rescale the charts; and draw trend lines.
Additionally, information on short-term trends in the market can
be tracked through use the put-call ratio graphs.
FILES
The only file you need to run this program is "StockChart",
however, you should have also received the data files "sp500",
and "PutCall.dat" along with their ".info" files. We will assume
that you have all or these files for the purposes of the rest of
this Manual.
I also assume that you have already performed "EXECUTE.ME".
If not, rename the files you received by typing the following
from the CLI:
RENAME StckChrt as StockChart
RENAME StckChrt.inf as StockChart.info
RENAME PCD as PutCall.dat
RENAME PCD.inf as PutCall.dat.info
RENAME SP500.inf as sp500.info
All files should be in the same directory.
RUNNING STOCKCHART
To run StockChart, simply double-click its icon, or type
"StockChart" from the CLI. (WARNING: When running from the CLI,
make sure the stack is set to at least 8000).
You will be greeted by the copyright message and a window
prompting you to enter a file name. Type "sp500" followed by the
RETURN or ENTER key. Assuming that you have the file "sp500" and
that it is in the same directory as StockChart, you should see a
graph of the S&P 500 data for the last six months.
To draw lines on the graph, position the pointer and press
the left mouse button. Reposition the pointer and press the left
mouse button again. Voila! Trend lines.
MENU OPTIONS
The program is controlled by selecting items from the menu
with the mouse. The following functions can be selected:
Data Graph Options Put-Call Ratio
Choose Stock Auto Price Limits Enter Data
Enter Data Set Price Limits Revise Data
Revise Data Set Volume Limits Show Put-Call Ratio
Auto Volume Limits
Redraw Screen
These functions are described below.
Data
Choose Stock--A window will appear prompting you to enter
a file name which includes the data for a specific stock.
With this release of the program, we have included data
for the S&P 500 (file name "sp500"). If you have this
file and you enter the correct name, you will be
displayed a graph of the stock performance for the past
few months. If you enter the name of a new stock which
you are charting or if you do not have this file, you
will see a blank graph with irrelevant numbers on the
right side. Don't worry, once you enter a few days of
data, you will get relevant numbers.
Enter Data--You will be prompted to enter the year, month,
day, high, low, close, and volume of the stock selected
under the "Data--Choose Stock" option. You will then be
prompted with "Enter Data (y,N,q)?"
- Type "y" (yes) if the data is correct and you
want it to be written to the file.
- Type "n" (No, the default) if the data is
incorrect and you want to re-enter it.
- Type "q" (quit) if you do not want to enter any
data.
Years, months, and days must be entered as one or
two-digit integers (e.g "88" for 1988, "8" for August).
Prices must be entered in decimal form (e.g. "112.5", not
112 1/2). I suggest entering volumes in thousands (000
omitted) for single stocks and in millions (000 000
omitted) for stock indexes.
For holidays, enter the date as described above, and
"0" for the high, low, close, and volume.
After you enter data, the graph will be redrawn.
Revise Data--You will be prompted to enter the record number
for the data that you want to review for possible
revision. If you hit "RETURN" you will be shown the last
20 entries.
If you want to revise one of the entries shown, enter
its record number and then enter the data as described
above.
If you do not want to revise any of the data, press
"RETURN".
Graph Options
Auto Price Limits--This is the default when you first
review the graph. When selected, the top of the price
graph will be set to the highest price within the period
and the bottom of the price graph (the lowest vertical
line, about 2/3 down the screen) will be set to the
lowest price. All other prices will be scaled
proportionately.
After you perform this function, the graph will be
redrawn.
Set Price Limits--You will be prompted to set the Upper
Bound and the Lower Bound which correspond to the top and
bottom horizontal lines. All other prices will be scaled
proportionately.
Since there are 16 fixed intervals between lines, you
may wish to set the limits at "round" values by inputing
multiples of 16. For example, if the Automatic Price
Limits are 275.125 and 249.875, you could set the Upper
Bound at 276 and the Lower Bound at 244.
If you enter an upper bound which is less than the
actual high, some of the higher prices will be off the
screen. Likewise, if you enter a lower bound which is
higher than the actual low, some of the lower prices will
extend into the volume area.
After you enter these values, the graph will be
redrawn.
Note the "Grid %" number in the lower right-hand
column. This number is calculated by dividing the
interval between the horizontal grid lines by the last
closing price. It indicates the relative vertical
(price) scale of the graph. This is useful in
visualizing the commonly used 3% break-out rule.
Auto Volume Limits--This is the default when you first
review the graph. When selected, the top of the volume
graph (the lowest line of the price graph) will be set to
the highest volume within the period. All other volumes
will be scaled proportionately.
After you perform this function, the graph will be
redrawn.
Set Volume Limits--You will be prompted to set the upper
bound of the volume graph (the lowest line of the price
graph). All other volumes will be scaled
proportionately. You may set the upper bound at a value
lower than the actual high volume, in which case the
volume line will extend into the price graph.
Put-Call Ratio
Versions 2.0 and greater add provisions for entering one
Put-Call ratio graph in a separate window. The accompanying
file "PutCall.dat" includes data for the S&P 100 Index. You
are free to use any index, however, this version limits you
to one.
Enter Data--This operation is the same as described above
except that you enter the date followed by the call
volume and the put volume. All data is written to the
file "PutCall.dat" in the current directory.
For holidays, enter the date and the previous day's
call and put volumes.
Revise Data--This operates the same as described above under
"Data--Revise Data."
Show Put-Call Ratio-- A graph will appear in a window at the
bottom of the screen showing the put-call ratio for the
last six months.
Some analysts believe that a put-call ratio above 1.3
(the shaded area at the top) is a bullish indicator and
that a ratio below 0.6 (the shaded area at the bottom of
the graph) is a bearish indicator.
ENHANCEMENTS
The following enhancements are under consideration for the
next version. Your input is requested as to which should take
priority.
- Trim File--As you continue to add to the data files, they may
soon become filled with useless data. This function will
trim off the data from the beginning of the file
- Print Data--This function will print the contents of data
files
- Moving Average--This function will allow you to overlay
moving average lines (user specified duration) over the
price-volume graphs
- Advance/Decline Ratios
- Better I/O and Error handling
- Printed manual with more examples, better explanations, and
sample graphs (I'm really looking for an excuse to get a
better printer and some desk-top publishing software).
- Anything else that you want. Please let me know, whether or
not you send me any money.
SOURCE CODE
Source Code is available on request. Versions 2.0 and later
of this program have been written in AC/BASIC (a compiled BASIC
language available from the Absoft Corporation). I am fairly
sure that most of the program functions will work using the Amiga
Basic interpreter except that you will have to rewrite the
routines for drawing trend lines because of timing differences
between the compiler and the interpreter.