EA indicator not showing on chart

Hello All,

I'd appreciate if someone could point me in the right direction. I've recently learnt a bit about doing EA's. I did one using MA's and managed to show the MA's in the chart while backtesting - well, actually, when the test is finished, the MA's show in the chart. Then I can see why trades executed at particular points in time.

So now I'm playing with someone else's EA and I cannot get the Bollinger Bands to show up in the chart. I'm 90% sure that I could see them in the morning hours in the night, but this morning, they're not on the chart. It is a simple call.

double bandHi=iBands(NULL,GB_BANDS_TF,GB_BANDS_PERIOD, GB_BANDS_DEVIA,GB_BANDS_SHIFT,PRICE_CLOSE,1,1);

Does anyone know? Thanks.

Cheers,
Gerry

I should have said... I can print out the values of the band, and they keep changing, as I'd expect. The line is just not on the chart. I tried running on only the last 2 months' worth of data, but that didn't fix the problem.

Thanks,
Gerry

Perhaps the reason is that GB_BANDS_TF is different from the timeframe you attach your EA to?

Hi enivid,

Thank you for that... I changed the basic settings and now I see the lines on the chart. Of course, not sure what that will do to results, but at least I know what's going on. I don't know why I didn't think of that! Thanks again.

Take care,
g

EAs aren't made to show whatever indicator they are using.

They just trade on the parameters assigned to them.

If you want to see the indi, make a template using the settings the EA will use, and use that template on the chart the tester opens at the start.

He was talking about Strategy Tester. You cannot just attach indicator to strategy tester in MetaTrader.

Sure you can. I do it all the time in strategy tester. I use visual mode, and put whatever I want on there with no problem.

Try it...

Hi Bruce,

I soon discovered you were right about indicators not NECESSARILY displaying: some do and some don't. So I tried what you recommend about dragging the EA onto a chart, but I didn't manage.

The EA name and smiley face appear on the chart. The chart has far less history than one that has already been run with the EA (I used a new chart for this). I enabled live trading (on demo account anyway). I made sure that chart was same timeframe as strategy tester below.

The property window that comes up when I drag EA onto chart does not allow 'start date, end date' so I don't know how it would recognize whether I want to do realtime or back testing. The strategy tester window below does not 'start'. When I press the start button on it, it just opens a new chart and runs as it always does.

Please could you explain how I should set things up to run a back test with a template? Thank you.

Cheers,
Gerry

Hi Again Bruce and Enivid,

A new issue has cropped up: when I run the strategy tester now, it runs at a fraction of the pace, like 1/20 or something silly. Not sure why. I thought maybe the ones I dragged onto charts to test are still running in the background, but I've closed all the extra charts, so I don't think so. I'm still running with the same data, timeframe, model, EURUSD, dates... so I cannot see what has changed. It also looks like the chart shows the 'action' differently. The price line hovers in the same spot for about a minute (not showing new prices coming in, ie. up and down movement of line) then it moves to the next period, and the old period's range becomes visible all at once. Then it stays on same spot in next period for a minute or so...

Any ideas?

Cheers,
G

Hello hello,

Just to let you know the EA is running properly again... had to restart laptop to sort out problem.

I'd still like more info' on how to drag EA onto chart for backtesting, please.

Cheers,
g

Hello Bruce,

Thanks so much... I think I've got it now. So you start and EA in visual mode, then you pause it and load a template (or indicators as you please) then you start the EA running again.

It's amazing! I'm so glad I can now see what's happening in backtesting. I had to watch the video twice to realize how it was going to help me... the answer was only towards the end.

Happy trading to you,
Gerry