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[QT] QT Tip #33: Creating a Historical Spread Chart
Date: 2008-03-27 03:50:03
Categories: GENERAL
QT Tip #33: Creating a Historical Spread Chart For example if you're interested in seeing a Corn spreadchart of July 1996 versus December 1996. Create a new spread chart, using the create new frame button. In the first leg, type the symbol CN96 and the second leg type in CZ96. NOW HERE'S THE KEY: UN-check the "Limit to" button. Then click okay. QT Tip #34 Seeing the bid-ask trade size QT now offers the size of the bids and offers!* A great way to get a feel of the market movements! If your quote monitors aren't displaying the size in the bid and ask columns, here's how to turn this great feature on! In your custom quote monitor, go up to the menu QuotesMonitor and scroll down to Preferences. A Preference dialog box will appear, make sure you're on the 'Look' tab. Just above the lower preview window, ensure the "Show bid/ask/trade size" box is checked. Click 'Ok'. Now notice the numbers in parenthesises in your quote monitor bid/ask columns. *Only exchanges that transmit this data will actually display.QT Tip #35 Using the toolbar buttons in QT. The buttons in QT can be 'hovered' over with the mouse pointer for approximately 2 seconds and a description of the button will be shown. You can use this feature until you become familiar with the icons on the buttons. Buttons are grouped by function. Some buttons along the toolbar are static and never change. Other buttons change depending on whether you are looking at a chart frame, a news frame, or regular quote monitor frame. Also, groups of buttons can be hidden or displayed, by single clicking on the small vertical bar between groups of buttons.QT Tip #36 Changing the order of your columns in a quote monitor You can change the order of columns in a table by simply by draging and dropping the column that you would like to move. Left click on the column that you would like to move and drag it to the position in the quote monitor where you would like it to rest. **Note: While dragging the column - the left hand mouse button must remain "clicked"QT Tip #37 How to use the contract lookup function in a quote monitor In order to access the contract lookup function in a quote monitor you will need to click on the icon that resembles a large magnifying glass. Once done a dialogue box will appear that has a symbol of each exchange running vertically down the left hand side. Single click the exchange that the contract trades on and a list of contracts will appear in the "symbol" box. Scroll down to the contract of your choice and check the box to the left of the name. Next, you will need to check what months and years you would like displayed. Once completed, this contract will be visible in the "contract to add" field. Now simply click the "add futures to selected contracts" button and click "OK" in the "Contract Lookup" dialogue box and the contract will be displayed in your quote monitor.QT Tip #38 Understanding QTPlus Environment QTPlus uses the concept of workspace containers. You can create one or more workspace containers, and they show as tabs along the bottom of QTPlus. Workspaces can be renamed, reordered and of course filled with with charts, quote monitors, and news monitors, and archived audio links. To rename a workspace, select the tab you want to change. Double click on it and change the Tab name then click "okay". To reorder the workspace tabs, left click hold and drag the tab to the new position.QT Tip #39 Enabling Large Icon Buttons QT Now Has Large Buttons! Quicker, Easier Navigation! How To Enable: Go to the General Menu along the top of QT. Scroll down to 'Customize Main Toolbar'. Just above the 'OK' button is "Icon Size" drop down box. Click on it and select Large. Finally click 'OK'. Because the buttons have grown in size, some may not fit into the previous space. Don't worry! The hidden buttons can be accessed from a button drop down menu. The button menu is a thin vertical button with small black double arrows. If you click on that, a menu with buttons will drop down to access the extra functions.QT Tip #40 Chart Study Short Cut To quickly change the parameters on your chart studies (Moving Avg, RSI, Stochastics), just outside the chart area in the lower left corner of the window, double click the study abbreviation. The dialog box for your particular study will pop up and you may make you changes to the parameters. QT Tip #41 Quickly Expanding/Contracting Chart, Quote, News Windows Double clicking on the blue title bar above the chart will expand a window to it's full size and double clicking will reduce it to it's original size. If you have multiple charts in a workspace double click the blue title bar twice and the chart will expand to full size. To make the chart the original size and placement in workspace, double click blue title bar again.QT Tip #42 Time & Sales makes QTPlus version even more friendly! The time and sales frame can be loaded in numerous ways. One way is to create a new time & sales frame from "Create new frame" button icon. Type in your contract symbol into the available box. Next, adjust the time period. Then click Query button. Also making T&S even more friendly is ability to search for a particular price. Notice a button near the top of QT that looks like a pair of binoculars. Clicking the Binocular button will allow you to enter a price to search for. The prices, if found, will be highlighted.QT Tip # 43 QT Weather - important maps at the click of a mouse! If you have a Weather workspace tab please see Viewing Weather Maps below. If you do NOT have a weather frame in any of your workspaces, you can create one! From the frame menu, select new frame. In the dialog box under "frame type" scroll down to Weather. Click okay. A new weather window should display in the current workspace. Viewing Weather Maps To see any particular map, simply click on it. To return to the previous weather page, click the "back" button on the toolbar. (Looks like a rewind button) Also there is a second page of weather radar, satellite images, and weather data maps. Look for the underlined blue words "here". You can use the same "back" button to return to the previous pages.QT Tip #44 - Using Workspace Templates! What are they? They allow you to organize your charts, quotes, options, & news frames the way you work. With Workspace templates you can choose from a predefined layout or build your own. How to Create: Create a new workspace, then choose a template. That can be done from either the Workspace menu or simply clicking on the 'Create New Workspace' button. A dialog box will pop up. Along the left hand side are predefined layouts. Click on a few examples and see the changes on the right hand side. When you find one you like, click 'Ok' button. The buttons between the windows of the dialog box allow you to create your own template, delete a template from the list or rename the selected template. When done creating your new workspace, be sure to save your changes. Note: Workspace templates can only be defined for new workspaces, they cannot be applied to existing workspaces. QT Tip #45 - How to use the contract lookup function in a quote monitor In order to access the contract lookup function in a quote monitor you will need to click on the icon that resembles a large magnifying glass. Once done a dialogue box will appear that has a symbol of each exchange running vertically down the left hand side. Single click the exchange that the contract trades on and a list of contracts will appear in the "symbol" box. Scroll down to the contract of your choice and check the box to the left of the name. Next, you will need to check what months and years you would like displayed. Once completed, this contract will be visible in the "contract to add" field. Now simply click the "add futures to selected contracts" button and click "OK" in the "Contract Lookup" dialogue box and the contract will be displayed in your quote monitor. QT Tip #46 How to change the order of your columns in a quote monitor You can change the order of columns in a table by simply by draging and dropping the column that you would like to move. Left click on the column that you would like to move and drag it to the position in the quote monitor where you would like it to rest. **Note: While dragging the column - the left hand mouse button must remain "clicked"QT Tip #47 Learning Icon Functions in QT In order to get a better feeling of what each icon's function is you can look at the drop down menus. Next to each icon is a description of that icon's function.QT Tip #48 - Local & Server Saves Once you've personalized your QTPlus workspace to suit the way you work it's important that you save your changes. You can access the Save feature in numerous ways. One way is by going to the General Menu and selecting "Save Settings". There is also a button on the tool bar that looks like a small floppy disk, that you can click. And finally when you close the QT program you are asked if you would like to save. It's always good practice to save your settings to both your local computer and the server. By saving your setting to the server you can use the Red Cross icon on the tool bar in case you lose your way in QT. QT Tip #49 - Red Cross Button Icon If you ever lose your way in QT you can return to your last saved settings on our server by clicking on the Red Cross button. Saving Your Settings Locally versus on the Server Saving your personal setting to the server will preserve your workspace charts and studies, quote monitors, & news window categories that you have set up. Please be sure to save your setting to the server periodically. Doing so will protect your setting in case your computer has equipment failure. One way to utilize saving to the local harddrive is the ability to maintain 2 different workspaces. You could set up your office computer to look at certain markets during the day and your home computer to look at different overnight markets.QT Tip #50 - Symbol Search The symbol search function can be found in the Short Cut Bar along the left hand side of QTPlus & QT Ag. If the shortcut bar is hidden, you can un-hide it by moving your mouse to the upper LEFT hand corner below the create Workspace button. There is a small grey button with a small black arrow, clicking that will un-hide the shortcut tool bar. Next move your cursor down along the left bottom to the tools button. The tools button looks like a small hammer & screw driver. There should be button in the short cut bar called Symbol Search, go ahead and click it. The symbol search dialog box will pop up. Typing in a partial phrase such as "euro" will return all contracts with the term euro in it. In this example this would include Euro FX contracts, S&P Europe Market index, and Eurodollar contracts.QT Tip #51 - CREATE A KEYWORD SORT OR CUSTOM NEWS TAB SEARCH If you have problems getting through the entire news feed, try A "keyword" sort. In addition to the categories shown on the QT news page, you can use the pink icon that looks like binoculars to pull up individual stories that contain the search word. The dialog box that opens when you initiate a new "keyword" search will give you the ability to select your keyword search to story titles only or expand it to include the news story bodies. It's also possible to go back in time, past a weekend by expanding the number of days searched. Also you can save the "keyword" sort as a tab so you can conduct the search again just by clicking on that particular tab. This is a great help in using the Reuters news feed. Another little secret: Use a keyword search such as [QT] and pop up all the QT headlines! Great for a quick reference to answer the question, "Why did the market do that today?" --- QT Headline News Service Copyright 2008 [QT]. All rights reserved. ---