Theory: Gridding Microtrades

I've been thinking about grid based strategies designed to take
advantage of volatility without incurring great risk.The idea is that
the strategy be followed using a carry trade pair in the event that you
do inevitably end up holding some positions. You'll want a platform
with a decent spread. Oanda often has about a 3.0 pip spread on the
AUDJPY pair -- my current pair of choice.So, let's

Oanda FXTrade On Ubuntu Dell Mini 12

Okay, it's working.I have Oanda running a single FXTrade window while
I'm open in another browser typing this blog post.Here is what I did to
get this working:Close down extra charts -- only the basic platform
window is running.Eliminate extra currency pairs -- only follow two or
three active pairsShrink the window -- show everything but in as small
a footprint as it practical.With these steps I

Dell Mini 12 -- Ubuntu

I recently bought the Dell Mini 12 thinking it would be noiseless, so
that I could leave it on overnight while I slept. I tend to wake up
from time to time so that would be an easy way to check for Forex
opportunities during the night.Unfortunately, running the Oanda FxTrade
application causes the system to grind to a halt. Right now my profile
automatically opens multiple charts (1 min, 15 min

MT4 EA: Stupid Programming Mistakes

Well, I spent last evening tracking down some problems in my next foray
into programming expert advisers.It turns our that a simple logical
test was using an '&' instead of an '&&' between two terms.This little
horseshoe nail caused some position closing attempts to fail with an
error 138 -- meaning that the price being used to close the position
was too far away from the market price.I also ran

MT4 EA: Moving Towards Sustainability

Yesterday's experiments with creating an expert advisor to scalp the 5
minute chart show great profits and great risk.I've been working to
reduce the level of risk without taking away the reasonable chance of
making reasonable profits.Here is the most recent chart:This is running
from 01-Feb-2009 to 25-Apr-2009 and obviously surviving any ups and
downs during that period.I'm still not happy with

MT4 EA: Aggresive 5 Minute Scalper

Well, it's the weekend, what else is a grown man to do?I had an
inspiration for an (overly) aggressive expert advisor today. Basically,
it's a simple buy low and sell high machine using oscillators.Scope out
the chart. It does fairly well for a period of time and then when the
market finds it's achilles heel it is undone.All is not lost. I have
some ideas for improving the aggression factor as