This thread is not for everyone. We all have different personalities at FF, and my philosophy will conflict with other philosophies out there. Just realize I am doing this in good faith, and will always try to present accurate and truthful information to help your ideas along.
Remember, 90% modeling quality in your backtests (in most cases) or all bets are off. Scalping EAs at 90% MQ are likely worthless. Please read the backtesting sticky here:
http://www.forexfactory.com/showthread.php?t=7637
To be successful, you will have to dedicate time to coding in MQL or some other trading language.
In the spirit of the James16 chart thread, I have decided to give back to the FF community. The purpose of this thread is to convey some lessons I have learned as I built my own EA.
Well the first thing to do is collect M1 data of the pair you are building for. Each currency has its own "personality," and what works for one pair may not work for another. I found free M1 data back to 2001 from Micheal Saganski, an euntreprenuer:
http://www.forexfactory.com/showthread.php?t=22963
The website has since been shut down. You can pay for backdata, or you can Google for hours like I did until you find it. My database has 2 million minutes of EURUSD data in it. It is my testbed, and it is what I use MT4 to backtest with.
Bottom line:
YOU WANT AS MUCH DATA AS POSSIBLE TO BACKTEST ON. A year or two just isn't a large enough population to base your decisions on when your hard-earned money is at stake.
Remember, 90% modeling quality in your backtests (in most cases) or all bets are off. Scalping EAs at 90% MQ are likely worthless. Please read the backtesting sticky here:
http://www.forexfactory.com/showthread.php?t=7637
To be successful, you will have to dedicate time to coding in MQL or some other trading language.
In the spirit of the James16 chart thread, I have decided to give back to the FF community. The purpose of this thread is to convey some lessons I have learned as I built my own EA.
Well the first thing to do is collect M1 data of the pair you are building for. Each currency has its own "personality," and what works for one pair may not work for another. I found free M1 data back to 2001 from Micheal Saganski, an euntreprenuer:
http://www.forexfactory.com/showthread.php?t=22963
The website has since been shut down. You can pay for backdata, or you can Google for hours like I did until you find it. My database has 2 million minutes of EURUSD data in it. It is my testbed, and it is what I use MT4 to backtest with.
Bottom line:
YOU WANT AS MUCH DATA AS POSSIBLE TO BACKTEST ON. A year or two just isn't a large enough population to base your decisions on when your hard-earned money is at stake.