Programming questions

Hi

I'm new to metatrader although i have done a fair amount of c programming in my time! I'd be really grateful if somebody to answer a couple couple of questions re EA's:

1) The functions Bars returns the no. of bars on the current chart so I reference the current bar as Bar(0) and the previous Bar as Bar(1) ... is that correct?

2) If I only want my EA to be executed against the closing price of the previous bar when the current bar opens - what is the best way to program that? I don't want the signal be flagged a zillion times during the current bar?

3) When the chart first comes up I'd like it to mark all of the long/short/close points but obviously not instigate a trade unless it is the current bar - what is the best way to handle that?


Thanks

Paul

Hi,

There is no Bar function in MT4 as far as I know. But you assertion is right, you usually reference the current bar using the 0 index value, previous 1, etc.


Hm, a quick thinking, a solution would be to check the time on the chart in a manner that is related to you timeframe. For example for 1H timeframe you keep a global variable containing the hour part of time when the Start() function was last called. So every time your Start() function is called you know that it was called at least once if the global var value and hour part of time is the same. Do you know what I mean?
This is a quick solution from the mind of a programmer, it may be a cleaner way to do it, if anyone knows please tell.


Again use a global boolean var that is true when MT first calls start() function. In start() if this var is true you simply iterato throgh all available bars and plase arrows where trades would have been taken. Now set you var to false and get back to you usual Start() function job.


Hope it helps

soso


thanks a lot - i will have a play!

Paul

You are thinking of the Bars (not Bar) function which does what you say, however it is a constant and you cannot access individual bars that way. Instead you can access the High, Low, Open and Close of each bar via:

Open[0], High[0], Low[0], Close[0] (for current bar)
Open[1], High[1], Low[1], Close[1] (for previous bar etc.)

soso's other solutions for 2 and 3 would probably work just fine.