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The Stock Trader ---------------- Copyright (C) 1987 All Rights Reserved Created by Larry E. Baugher Versioε 1¼ Releasσ 1 è Table of Contents ----------------- I. Registration Information (Vital for Continued Use!) ........... 3 II. System Requirements and Program Capabilities ................. 5 III. Getting Started and an Overview of Program Operation ......... 7 IV. The Main Menu ................................................ 8 V. The Files Menu ............................................... 9 VI. The Database Editor .......................................... 11 VII. The Graphs Menu .............................................. 14 VIII. Statistical Reports .......................................... 16 IX. Issue Evaluations ............................................ 17 X. Trouble Shooting ............................................. 18 XI. Downloading Data for Source Files ............................ 19 XII. Editing Source Files With Edlin .............................. 20 XIII. Last But Not Least! .......................................... 24 è _______________________________________________________________________________ Please Print!!! USER REGISTRATION FORM ---------------------- Your Name:__________________________________ Age:__________ Address:____________________________________ Phone:_______________ City/State:_________________________________ Zip Code:____________ Please Circle Type of Floppy Desired for Updates>> 5"Std. or 3"HDen. Comments:__________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________ Please Make Money Order Payable to >>> Larry E. Baugher Mailing Address: L.E.Baugher Route 9, 460 Spring Lake Drive Pine Bluff, Arkansas 71603 4 è REQUIREMENTS AND CAPABILITIES ----------------------------- The Stock Trader has been designed to be compatible with IBM Personal Com- puters and the entire 'family' of IBM Compatibles. System requirements will be listed as well as Program Features. This is what your computer hardware should have at Minimum levels in order for the Package to perform adequately; 1.) RAM -- The Stock Trader will run well with as little as 140 Kilobytes TOTAL available RAM. The Stock Trader doesn't eat your lunch for you in having to buy expensive Memory UpGrade Kits! 2.) Disk -- The Stock Trader requires a system configuration of at least 2 floppy drives -5" 360K- or 1 floppy drive -3" 720K-, and of course if you are fortunate enough to have a Hard Disk, that is perfectly suitable as well, actually preferred. 3.) Video -- You must at least have a Monochrome Graphics Adaptor to use this Package, (i.e. your B/W Monitor must be able to display various shades of gray when color is transmitted to it). If you have a RGB or EGA or even a VEGA adapter with color mntr. you will be able to enjoy the full extent that the graphs and screens provide in color. Some of the screens display as many as 10 different contrasting colors! All of the charts are in full High Resolution Color. 4.) DOS -- The Stock Trader runs under any DOS Version that is at least at 2.11 or higher, up to and including 3.2! 5.) Modem -- A Modem is NOT REQUIRED, but it is highly recommended that you use one. Again to emphasize, a modem is not mandatory. 6.) Print -- Several Program functions require a printer. This is used only to provide a 'Hard Copy' of what the Stock Trader will output to you on Video. It is NOT mandatory to have one, but again to fully utilize the benifits of the package you should have one. It is advised to use a Dot Matrix printer capable of handling the ASCII extened 256 character set, all print operations but 1 however will work perfectly fine with a Daisy Wheel Printer. PROGRAM FEATURES ---------------- 1.) All screen displays are color, in vivid High Resolution 640 x 200, an EGA or VEGA will display in 640 x 350! 2.) Help Screens are available from any Menu Display. 3.) Over 1400 Common Stock Issues of the New York Stock Exchange are put into The Stock Trader's Securities Database. 4.) You are given the option of adding Issues to that Library that are on other exchanges such as the AMEX or NASDAQ right at home if you desire! 5 REQUIREMENTS AND CAPABILITIES ----------------------------- 5.) The Stock Trader's User Library is Relationally incorporated into the Stock Trader's Securities Database to provide pertinent background in- formation for any Price and Volume file that you would like to add as a member to the Securities Database. (NYSE Common Issues) 6.) A system with (2) 5" floppy drives or (1) 3" floppy drive can enter in excess of 300 members to the database, each member containing a months worth of price and volume information! A Hard Disk owner's limits are only governed by the amount of his available disk space! 7.) The Stock Trader is also an efficient resource manager with your disk space. You have the ability at any time to delete old members that you no longer wish to track from the database and the Stock Trader will automatically try to load any new members into the freed space within the database. 8.) Printed output is available with full size (80 column) graphics output available with a dot matrix printer that can address the ASCII 256 character set. If you dont have one, Tandy's DMP 130 is an exceptional value for a little over $200.00. 9.) The Stock Trader will automatically graph to scale any Security without regard to its price range. The one month graph is scaled in such a man- ner as to maximize daily price and volume deviation. 10.) The Stock Trader makes fundamental issue evaluations on any issue that you have made a member of in the User Library. The Stock Trader not only evaluates the issue on its own merits but it also evaluates the issue against its competitors, its Industry Group performance, and its last known market performance. 11.) The Stock Trader comes equipped with a Database Librarian that can display all existing database members to you and quickly reference and describe them to you, even though DOS doesn't even know that they exist! 12.) The Stock Trader can also provide fast access to Statistical data on any Member within the User Library. 13.) Registration of this package entitles you to discounts of over 70% on future versions of this package, provided response is acceptable. DEFINITIONS ----------- User Library - Entries made into the Securities Database with the Stock Trader that contain downloaded or manually entered price and volume information, relationally link to the rest of the Database. Source File - This is the actual ASCII 'flat' file that you have made by either typing it in or from downloading it from a main- frame information network. The Stock Trader converts and re-arranges this data, and then loads it into the User Lib. Member - This is the name given to the converted data loaded into the User Library, because it is no longer a file, rather it is a small part of a whole. It is given a name so that you may address it exclusively instead of having to address every- thing to access a small portion of information. 6 GETTING STARTED -- HOW IT WORKS! -------------------------------- Hopefully you will take the time to read the manual before you attempt to use the Software. The first thing that you should try to do is print this file. If your printer can be set to 66 lines per page do so. Then type the DOS print command PRINT MANUAL.DOC. If you can not set your printer to 60 lines per page try setting your printer not to page advance over the perforations. This should keep your alignment fairly well. You will need to unarc the program disk and the Library Disks on completely seperate disks, because there isn't enough room on a floppy to contian the .arc file and the unarced files at the same time. Once you have done this you should have two floppies, 1 contianing 3 .exe files the other contian .lib and .idx files. The floppy with the 3 .exe's is your program disk. The other of course is your library disk. Put the Install .exe on to the Library Disk. Place a copy of SORT.EXE on the Program Disk. Place the Library Disk in drive A: and type INSTALL. The opening screen will tell you that you are in the Installation Program. You must run the this before you use the Stock Trader because I can not predict with any certianty what will happen if you don't! The Installation Program creates the controlling mexeus of the Securities Database starting pointer addresses and their drive locations. Without it, forget it! Those 12 little bytes control the actions of 700,000! This package must ALWAYS be installed from a floppy disk. As you proceed through the Install Program you will be asked what drive do you want the Program and Library Disks to be located on. Answer A, B, or C, but do not answer the same drive for both disks unless you have a hard disk. If you have a hard disk, take advantage of its speed and load it there! The Install Program will create a directory for you on it called C:\TRADER. Don't worry about having to keep a key disk in the A: drive like some packages. It will run by itself on the hard disk. Just move to that directory by typing C:\TRADER and then type the word TRADER. Floppy users will put the Program Disk in the drive that they had specified in the Install Program and type TRADER. The open- ing screen will shortly appear. The Stock Trader works by using an intricate system of record pointers that tells your computer where to go to find the information that you have requested in a command. The Stock Trader takes information that you submit to it in the form of source files, compresses it, establishes what it relates to concerning all of the other information in the database and stores it with pointers, or in other words addresses to the locations of areas of information that already exist that directly or indirectly relate to what you have had the Stock Trader add as a new member to the Securities Database. The only important thing that you need to know when loading a new member is the Issue's Ticker Symbol. The Stock Trader uses this as a building block to gather other relation data for the new member. The Stock Trader 'links' every piece of available information it has that relates to any member in the User Library. The member name can be anything that you wish to call it. Member names can be no longer than eight characters, contianing A-Z,0-9. Hyphens are also permitted. Sound complicated? It is. How the Stock Trader plots, graphs, and makes its Issue evaluations will remain a secret. Besides,you're probably bored with this already and only care if it works! One last note. The Securities Database isn't compatible in any way to commericially sold DBase Packages, i.e. DBase II,III. 7 THE MAIN MENU ------------- The Main Menu will take you to wherever you want to go within the Stock Trader. The Menu and ALL other menus are operated by Functions Keys that cor- respond to a brief description of what they do. At this screen Function Key 1 [F1] will take to the File Management Area. The File Management Menu lets you display free memory and disk space, lists all downloaded source files alphabetically, delete source files, change the names of existing source files, loads source files as new members into the User Library, thereby merging them into The Stock Trader's Security Database. The File Management Menu is also the gateway to the Database Editor which gives a great deal of flexibility to the Securities Database. The next Function Key [F2] will take you to the Graph Menu. The Graph Menu gives you the ability to graph any member in the User Library to scale. You may access the Database Librarian from here where you can find out what members are in the Database, and get a brief but informative description of what Securities they actually represent in the event that you have forgotten! You can obtian printed price and volume data on any member within the Database and additional background information on the Issue as well. You can get a screen full of im- portant statistical information which can vitually indicate to you whether or not you want to get involved with the Issue or not! Function Key [F3] provides you with both statistical and graphical informa- tion on members within the Securities Database. Simply enter the member name that you want to have processed when prompted for it and let your printer and the Stock Trader go to work! The next Function Key [F4] will take you into the 'brain' of the Stock Trader and will load in its Logic unit. From here the Stock Trader will make an intensive comparison of the Member specified and evaluate it on a scale from 0 to 10. Always remember that The Stock Trader can not help you with an Issue that has a catastrophic late breaking event. The Stock Trader can only make an evaluation of an Issue based upon how current the information relating to it is in the Database. Always use two sources of information when dealing in the Securities markets. Barring any major late breaking events to an Issue, and provided that you have maintained your subscription of regularly scheduled li- brary updates, the Stock Trader should faithfully be able to give you a pretty good idea of whether or not that Issue's for you and your risk level. Thus you can now see how critical these library updates are to you! Without them, you are going to be very mis-informed. GIGO - Garbage In, Garbage Out! Function Key [F5] will display a help screen for you to briefly remind you what the function keys to that menu will do. Lastly, Function Key [F6] will re- turn you to the operating system and store all of the new pointer addresses to the database, if they changed. Function Key [F7] will enable you to request information from the Secur- ities Database by entering a valid Ticker Symbol. If there is any data on the issue requested a brief summary panel will be displayed on the issue.If the Stock Trader doesn't have any data for the issue it will tell you accordingly. 8 THE FILES MENU -------------- The basic function the files menu is to provide you with a means of manag- ing your source files. To redefine what a source file is, a source file is a 'flat' ASCII file that is created by downloading or by manual entry. This file is then in turn loaded into the Securities Database and becomes a 'member' of the Securities Database. The Operating System is able to recognize a source file but DOS can not 'see' or even detect the database members. The Database Librarian is your only effective guide to use to 'look inside' the Database. Function Key [F1] will enable you to delete or change the names of any source file that you may have made either by means of data entry or from down- loading data via a modem. After pressing the function key the Stock Trader will ask you do you want to delete a file? Answer with a Y or N. If you wanted to make a change to a source files name you would respond with a N. After you have made an appropiate response to this prompt, the Stock Trader will take you to another screen and ask you to enter the name of the source file that you wish to either change or delete. Enter the file's name accordingly WITHOUT using the file names extension of .TDR . Press your Return Key. If you were deleting a file you will be asked the name to change it to. Enter the name to change to the same way. You will then see two boxes with either CANCEL or DELETE, or if you're renaming a file they will read CANCEL or CHANGE. Use your arrow keys at this time to confirm your decision to perform the function by either pressing the left or right arrow key to move to the desired box. Once you have done this the box will highlight itself. Press Return again and you've done it! The Stock Trader will then return you to the Files Menu. **** IMPORTANT NOTE! If you are using an IBM Compatible that doesn't have the same type of a keyboard as an IBM your arrow keys are then addressed on your numeric keypad where they would appear on an IBM. #4 is the Left arrow, #6 is the Right arrow Function Key [F2] will display all of your source files to you alphabetic- ally. After the Stock Trader is done listing the source file names, it will display your existing free disk space and how much free ADDRESSABLE memory you have left. The amount of memory displayed free is not a display of total free memory, rather it is a display of how much memory The Stock Trader can still dynamically use. I toyed long and hard with giving the Stock Trader the ability to access all unused RAM in a system and decided against it. There is too many memory resident and DOS memory resident programs floating around. Conflicts of memory boundaries could occur very easily. The next key, Function Key [F3], is your door to entering new members into the Securities Database from 'flat' source files. Upon pressing the function key you will be prompted to enter the source file name to be loaded. Enter it accordingly without using the .TDR extension. You will then be prompted to en- ter the finished file name. This is the name of the Database Member. The Issue 9 THE FILES MENU -------------- will always be referenced by The Stock Trader by this name. The Finished name will be unknown to your operating system (DOS). Enter it accordingly, not using any file exstensions. You will then be asked to enter the Issue's Ticker Symbol which is used common in the Securities markets to refer to an Issue in abbrevi- ated form. You must know the ticker symbol. After you have done this, the Stock Trader will first check that the Ticker Symbol is at least valid, not necces- sarily correct, and that your source file specification exists. If the Trader encounters a problem with either of these conditions it will inform you of the error and return you to the previous screen. Should everything be correct the Stock Trader will look for any already existing space to store the new member after it determines how much space it will require, and load it into already allocated area before going for more 'fresh' space. The Trader will give you a live display of the data conversion and source record count loading. Once loading is complete The Stock Trader will confirm to you that a new member has been loaded into the Securities Database under the finished file name that you had specified. Strike any key and you will return to the Files Menu. Function Key [F4] will take you to the Database Editor, which we will dis- cuss on the next page. You may create source files without the use of a modem from using its Data Entry Function and then load them into the Securities Data- base using previously discussed [F3] from this screen. Again, Function Key [F5] is your help key. By pressing it the Stock Trader will display a screen of brief reminders of what the various function keys do on this menu. Lastly, Function Key [F6] will take you back to The Stock Trader's Main Menu so that you may go on to process the Database Members that you have made using this Menu. Helpful Tip - You find enclosed with your packed 7 demonstration source files. Notice how they are named. I always incorporate the ticker symbol into the name to help me remember what it is. STOCKCTX tick=CTX 10 THE DATABASE EDITOR ------------------- The Database Editor is what gives the user the ability to enter data on an Issue without using a modem. It also lets you make Annexations to the Master Library so that you may display and analyze Issues that are traded on markets other than the New York Stock Exchange. Database Members may be managed from here were they can't be managed anywhere else since DOS doesn't recognize that they exist! To avoid redundancy, and to avoid turning this manual into a manu- script I will briefly touch on how some of the functions in this menu work, since they respond the same way as in the Files Menu. The Database Editor's first Function Key [F1] gives you the ability to add new Issue information from other markets not contained in the Master Library. The Master Library contains an abundance of important statitical information on Issues. There are over 1400 already in it! In order for the Stock Trader to process Issues from other markets, the Issue must be FIRST Annexed into the Securities Database via the Database Editor and the Master Library. After you have pressed the function key, you will see the Editor retrieving all of the database pointers so that they may be altered and restored to their new proper values once the Annexation is complete. Once the retrieval is complete the Database Editor will display a data en- try panel that is to be used when making Database Annexations. The panel will be broken down into specific item entries. After each item entry there is a gray shaded box. The shaded area is there to let you know what is the maximum length of that item entry. DO NOT enter data beyond the shaded area! A flashing yellow arrow will direct you as to which item will be entered next. As you type in data for an item, the shaded area will disappear and display what you have typed in. It is perfectly fine if you do not fill the entire shaded area to an item, but never exceed the maximum. The information that you type in on this panel must be accurate. Sources of where to get the information for this panel would be at your public library in periodicals such as the Value Line Investor Survey, Standard and Poors, or you may use Online Information Services such as General Electric's GEnie and Compuserve. The first item on this panel is the Issue's Name. This is pretty self-ex- planatory. Enter it accordingly. The second item is the Issue's Ticker Symbol. Enter accordingly. Next item, exchange, is a four (4) byte field that requires you to use abbreviated codes for the exchange. The Securities Industry standard abbreviations for the 3 major markets are; 1.) NYSE - New York Stock Exchange 2.) AMEX - American Stock Exchange 3.) OTC or NSDQ - The Over the Counter Market The fourth item is the SIC number. This number is a number from 0 to 9999 that is used in the Securities Industry to identify an Issue's Industry Group. It is a very important number to The Stock Trader. Then our next item to enter is the Issue's 52 week high selling price. This item can be no larger than 5 digits and 1 decimal point, for a total field length of 6. This is a strictly numeric item, do not use dollar signs or commas. Item number six is the Issue's 52 week low selling price. Procedure is the same as the 52 week high. The next two en- tries pertain to the dates of occurence of those high and low selling prices. Pay close attention to the format of the date. Last 2 digits of the year first, then 2 digits for the month, it is important that if the month is less than 2 11 THE DATABASE EDITOR ------------------- digits big to fill it in with a preceding zero, i.e. July = 07. The last two digits represent the day, as with the rule of preceding zero in the month, this also applies to the day, i.e. 05 for the fifth day of the month. The next item is the Standard & Poor's Rating. Acceptable entries range as follows; 1.) N/A (None) 6.) B 2.) C- 7.) B+ 3.) C 8.) A- 4.) C+ 9.) A 5.) B- 10.) A+ The annual dividend rate is our next item to enter. This entry is to include all cash disbursements to the shareholder in a one year period. If the Issue doesn't pay a dividend enter zero. This is a strictly numeric field. Do not use dollar signs or commas. Only a period is allowed other than a number. The next item is the Quarterly dividend rate. The same entry rules apply to this as with the previous item. This item gives the amount paid of the yearly dividend. Some Issue's pay their dividend semi-annually, if your Issue is like this, enter the semi-annual rate here. The last two fields for entry are the Number of shares outstanding for the Issue and its earnings per share. The field for shares outstanding can be any number from 999000000 to 0. You must not use any commas when entering this! The earnings per share is a numeric field that may have one decimal point. This en- try is representative of what the Issue's earnings have been for a year. Do not use any dollar signs! Once all the entries have been made you will see the loading screen appear. It will display the Stock Trader's activity as it establishes this new entries position and relational pointers within the Securities Database. If your data was correct in all entries the Stock Trader will confirm a successfully comple- tion message to you and return you to the Database Editor's Menu. The next Function Key [F2] will permit you to change a Member's name that currently exists in the User Library. This function works the same way the re- naming function does in the Files Menu. Please refer to that section if you en- counter any problems. Function Key [F3] on the Database Editor's Menu is the selection used to make source files to be loaded into the User Library without a modem. Once you have pressed [F3], you will be taken to the Data Entry Panel. This panel looks and behaves simularly to the Annexation Panel. The first entry to be made is the name of the that you want the Source File to have. This can be up to 8 characters long. Characters can be from a-z, 0-9, but do not use any periods or slashes. Hyphens are permitted. Do not use any file extensions in the name. The Stock Trader will assign one of its own. To get out of this mode press [F10]. The Stock Trader will return to the Database Editor Menu immeadiately after your next input using the Return key. To add on to an existing source file that you are working on, type in the source file's name and the Stock Trader will append any additional entries behind the entries that have already been made. 12 THE DATABASE EDITOR ------------------- The first entry is for the date. Examples of the format are shown beside the entry box. Use a preceding zero for any month or day that doesn't require two digits. Example 870905 represents Sept. 5, 1987. The next entry is for the Issue's daily volume. This volume is entered in hundreds, just as it is listed in the newspaper. Do not use any commas in this field. All characters must be numeric. Example 87000 would be entered into the panel as 870. The third item to enter is the Issue's highest selling price for that day. Do not use any dollar signs or exceed the maximum length of the field shown on the panel example. The inter-day high usually isn't the price that a stock had closed at, but it is possible. The next entry, is just the opposite of the previous entry. Enter the low- est selling price of the day. The same rules apply as with the previous entry. The last entry refers to the last or closing price for the day of that Issue. again, the same rules apply here as well. Once you have made the last entry the Stock Trader will store the record, clear the entry boxes, and will be ready to take another entry. If you were finished, press [F10] and then press your Re- turn key. The Stock Trader will return you to the Database Editor Menu. Function Key [F4] will allow you to delete a member from the User Library. This is useful when you are no longer interested in the member. The Stock Trader will then free that space within the database and will try to allocate it to the next new member loaded. This function works very simularly as the Delete function in the Files Menu. Please look there if you encounter any pro- blems. The fifth Function Key [F5] will, like the other menus, display a help screen to you. The help screen will have brief reminders of what the various function keys do in that particular menu. The last Function Key [F6] will let you return to the Files Menu. 13 THE GRAPHS MENU --------------- The Graphs Menu is the principal area of information retrieval. The Data- base Librarian is located here. Statistical reports and printed price and vol- ume reports are also available from here. The first Function Key [F1] will chart a member for you as long as it is in the Securities Database. You can find out what members are in the User Library by using [F2] the Librarian. Once activating [F1] you will be prompted to enter the name of the database member that you wish to have charted. Enter the member name accordingly taking care not to enter any extensions to it, such as .TDR . The Stock Trader will first scan the database to see if the member exists, if found the Stock Trader will display the graph. The graph tells you at the top in the lefthand corner the first date that has been graphed and places a flashing arrow pointing to that day on the chart. The upper righthand corner displays the last date that has been graphed and also places a flashing arrow pointing to it on the chart. In the upper center part of the screen the Issue's Ticker Symbol is displayed. Along the lefthand side of the chart the Stock Trader scales the corresponding dollar amounts of the issue. Along the bottom of the chart in bar graph form the Stock Trader displays the Issue's daily volume in a comparative scale to the Issue's average daily trading volume, which is displayed in the lower righthand corner of the screen. The daily volume is charted as being fairly equivalent to the average daily trading volume if it is even or as the height as the black lines used to seperate the daily plottings. If the volume for that day was 2/3 of average or less, the Stock Trader will only make a bar about half of the height of what the black dividing lines are. For days in which the volume doubles, triples, quadruples, the average daily trading volume the bar increases in height corre- spondingly. Daily price closes are plotted directly above that days volume. It does occur frequently that an Issue will 'plunge' dramatically in price under heavy volume and the graph will appear to have not plotted the Issue's price for the day. Just the opposite! What has happened is that the price went so low and the volume was so high, that when the volume was plotted for the day, it over wrote the price plotting! Examples of this can been seen by creating a member during the month of October 1987. The demonstration members provided also bear this out! After you are done viewing the chart press return and you will return to the Graphs Menu. The Stock Trader will chart for a one month period or 23 trading days. Try to keep your members to that size. To chart an Issue for 6 months make 6 one month members. Function Key [F2] will take you to the Database Librarian. The Librarian is the tool that you have that can tell you what exists inside the database be- cause DOS doesn't know! After pressing [F2] the Librarian will display a screen of member information to you. To exit the Librarian and to return to the Graphs Menu press [F10]. To get the Librarian to move to different members press your upper and lower arrow keys. You will see the Librarian move about by seeing his smiling face with an arrow pointing to the issue he can highlight for you. To see what issue a mem- ber actually represents move the Librarian to the name of the member you are interested in. Remember that if your keyboard is not like an IBM that your up and down arrow keys will be [8] for up and [2] for down on your numeric keypad. Press [F8] and the Librarian will give you a descriptin of the member. Strike any key to make the description leave the screen. If you would like to look at 14 THE GRAPHS MENU --------------- the next page press [F7]. If there are no other pages to be retrieved the Li- brarian will inform you of this. The next Function Key [F3] will provide you with a printed price and vol- ume report of any member that is in the User Library. After pressing the func- tion key you will be prompted to enter the member's name that you would like to have printed. Enter the member name accordingly without using any exsten- sions. The Stock Trader will check to see that it is a valid member of the database, and if finding it is, the Stock Trader will print your report. You may use a daisy wheel or dot matrix printer for this function. Your fourth option from this menu, Function Key [F4], will provide you with a screen known as the Issue's Statistical Profile. It will provide a wide vari- ety of information that is pertinent to your decision making process when con- sidering to buy, sell, or hold an Issue. Simply press [F4] and enter the name of the member that you wish to have processed accordingly. Press any key when you are finished viewing the screen to return to the Graphs Menu. As always, Function Key [F5] will display a help screen to you that will give you a brief description of the various abilities of the function keys for that menu. Strike any key when you are done viewing to return to the Graphs Menu. Function Key [F6] will take you back to the Main Menu of the program. 15 STATISTICAL REPORTS ------------------- This function of the Stock Trader will give you a full size printed chart of an Issue provided that you have a dot matrix printer capable of correctly interperting the full ASCII 256 character set. In addition it prints a variety of supporting background information as well with the graph, other than what is supplied in the video version. To use this function simply press Function Key [F3] and have your printer online. You will be prompted to enter the name of the member that you wish to process. Enter the member name accordingly, taking care not to enter any file extensions. The Stock Trader will first check to see that it is a valid member within the User Library. Once it has established that it is, that's all there is to it! When your printer is done printing the report the Stock Trader will return you to the Main Menu. Note: A Dot Matrix Printer that can not print the extended character set will only distort the chart, leaving the rest of the report as it should be. 16 ISSUE EVALUATIONS ----------------- This feature of the Stock Trader is very easy to use. It works in the same manner as the Statistical Reports option. The evaluation given by the Stock Trader is a very intensive comparison of the issue's own characteristics, its comparative standing with other issues in the same line of business, same gen- eral industry standing, and its price behavior relative to market behavior. THe Stock Trader will also keep a count of how many other issues there are in the same business. This is an important factor to consider when estimating the growth potential of a company. Alot of competition means low pricing, low pro- fits, and over-capacity. DISCLAIMER OF LIABILTY ---------------------- The Stock Trader's intentions are to give the user a general 'ball park' evaluation of an issue. Evaluations can only be as accurate as the information is current. The Stock Trader does NOT make explicit recommendations to you of any kind to buy, sell, or hold a security. The author of this product advises that if the Stock Trader has directed you to an issue that you feel that you may be interested in, go to your Public Library and research it further. If you keep up with your scheduled updated libraries, the Stock Trader will easily fullfill this objective. To use this function, press [F4]. When you are prompted for the member name to be evaluated enter it accordingly. The Stock Trader will check for the names validity, and if valid, the Stock Trader will commence analyzing the issue. The Stock Trader will display a 'running' tally of the number of logical compari- sons that it is making. It will make you thankful that you weren't trying to do it by hand! When the processing is complete, the Stock Trader will prompt you to strike any key to view the results. Note: The two questions that you are asked aftering the member name are very important. Try to answer them to the best of your knowledge. The proper responses are Y or N to either question. The Stock Trader will use what you have inputed only in border line situations concerning rank. 17 TROUBLE-SHOOTING ---------------- Because of the wide variety of IBM compatibles or 'clones', their was a de- finite need to make The Stock Trader flexible enough to accommadate this vast spectrum. Below is a list of hardware related differences that have occurred on different IBM compatibles. Other items listed include 'What to do if' situa- tions. The arrow keys that point Up, Down, Left, Right, on some keyboards of a va- riety of compatibles differ from those of an IBM. If this is true in your case, and you will know this when your arrow keys don't seem to work, they will be located on your numeric keypad as (4) Left, (6) Right, (8) Up, (2) Down. It has been found that not all monochrome monitors with graphics adaptors can handle the amount of speed or contrasting colors that are transmitted to it. You will know if yours can or can't pretty easily. The symptom is pretty terminal! Your machine will virtually lock up, causing no damage to your unit, but forcing you to reboot your system. The Trader's assembly language routines use dynamically allocated RAM and draw in RAM until they can be transmitted to the screen. The transmission of the image from RAM to video through the video graphics adaptor can be too much for it! Best results are obtianed by using a CGA,(Color Graphics Adaptor), or higher grade of video adaptor, i.e. EGA, etc. If you are a hard disk user and you want to re-install your package, you must first remove the old C:\TRADER directory before you can install it again. As fate has it, somethings get deleted by mistake! If you ever accidentally delete the file CNTL.TDR you must re-install the Stock Trader. If you do not, the defaults will tell the Stock Trader that it is in a hard disk environment. The second problem is that the default also assumes that all of the Stock Tra- ders neccesary files are in a directory called C:\TRADER. If it doesn't exist and everything isn't where its suppose to be, Uh Oh! On exceptionally rare occassions, 1 in 96 times actual count, video screen imaging will 'break up' causing the RAM area that is used by The Stock Trader, to 'break up' as well. You will see distortion on your display, and/or you will receive a message saying that there has been a STRING HEAP CORRUPT in the Stack which is a technical term for where items are stored in memory. This will cause no harm to your machine or your data. The only thing that it will cause is an inconvience. You will have to back out of the program and restart it. This has only occured in one screen while the package under went intense testing. It is highly probable that you may never have this happen to you! 18 DOWNLOADING DATA FOR SOURCE FILES --------------------------------- The easiest and fastest way to obtain your raw data for processing by the Stock Trader is by downloading it from a networked information service. The two most commonly known are GEnie and CompuServe from which this program was originally obtained. There are others, such as Delphi, so you are not limited to just two. For personal prefrence only, I would highly recommend that you use GEnie in conjunction with this package, because of the ease of editing and GEnie's low rates, not necessarily because of their variety of services. The examples used here will be how they would appear if you downloaded the data from GEnie. For beginners, downloading is the term used to describe the data transfer process from a Host computer,(Mainframe), to your computer. You should be using a data capture method that captures to disk what is being displayed on the screen. The source file must be in ASCII format so that you may later use edlin, the DOS Utility Editor, to 'clean up' the data. Tandy's Deskmate is an excellent package to use for this purpose. It is buy no means the only one! In fact there are better ones available, but because Deskmate is widely circulated package that comes with Tandy PC's I choose this for demonstrative purposes. After signing on to GEnie or the service of your choice, go to their Secu- rities Menu. I will not go into any detail as to how to use the information services because both CompuServe and GEnie have excellent online help facili- ties. Go to the Specific Issue Inquiry. You will want Issue histories on price information. Type in the Ticker Symbol to use as a Specifier when prompted. You will be asked a range of dates to specify start and stop points. Notice that the date format on GEnie is the same as in the Stock Trader. One reason why I recommend GEnie. If you are using any other service that does not give pricing dates in this format YYMMDD, then you will have to convert everyone of them to that kind of format. You will be prompted as to how you want the data displayed. Specify any op- tion that you wish, as long as you specify that you wish to have the data in a DOWNLOAD FORMAT! Once you have made all of your selections, you will recieve the prompt Ready to Download with a Y or N prompt. Before answering the prompt, turn on your disk capturing mechanism. With Tandy's Deskmate you would press [F3] Receive and enter the filename of your choice. Once you have done this, everything that is displayed on the screen from that moment on will be captured to the disk under that name. Answer the Host computers prompt now to begin the transmission of data. Once all of the data has been transimitted and you re- ceive a new prompt from the host service, press [F3] again. This will stop the disk capture. If you don't, you'll just end up having a lot of garbage that you will have to delete out with Edlin. Write down the Ticker Symbol information to what you have just downloaded or build it into the filename as I have suggested earlier in the demonstration files. You're done! No proceed to the instructions on editing this information using the DOS system utility Edlin. 19 EDITING SOURCE FILES WITH EDLIN ------------------------------- The source file contains alot of useless and unorganized information. It must be removed and put into a useable state for loading and further organiza- tion by the Stock Trader. Type EDLIN (filename) press return or enter. (filename) represents the name that you gave the file when you downloaded it. If you were using Deskmate, add an extension of .DOC to the end of the name that you had originally entered. You should see a message saying 'End of Input' and an asterisk. Type L press return or enter. Edlin will display the first 22 lines of the file to you and number them in there chronological order as they exist within the file. Example; 1: Ready to Download? Y 2: 3: 4: Date Volume High Low Last 5: 6: 871103 12340 23.375 22.500 22.875 7: 871104 43210 23.125 23.000 23.000 8: 871105 98701 24.250 23.000 23.875 9: 871108 54321 24.375 22.500 22.750 10: Press (S) to SCroll or Enter to Continue ? 11: 871109 32143 22.375 22.125 22.375 12: 871110 87654 23.250 22.250 23.000 13: 14: Please Enter Specifier? 15: USE YOUR DOS REFERENCE MANUAL UNDER EDLIN TO HELP UNDERSTAND THIS! This is what you might see from edlin. The only lines that we want in this example are 6 thru 9, and 11 thru 12. In your actual file only the lines that appear like this are the only lines of any kind that you want to exist in the edited source file. Anything else will cause serious problems. We have established our valid lines of data for this screen. The lines that we want to get rid of are 1 thru 5, line 10, 13 thru 15. To get rid of these unwanted lines type 1,5D press enter or return. Type 1L press return. This is what the source file now looks like. Notice how edlin re-assigns line number 1 to what was formerly line 6! This is important. Always list the file after a deletion before deleting further because the sequence numbers have changed! You may delete something that you may have wanted! Example; 1: 871103 12340 23.375 22.500 22.875 2: 871104 43210 23.125 23.000 23.000 3: 871105 98701 24.250 23.000 23.875 4: 871108 54321 24.375 22.500 22.750 5: Press (S) to SCroll or Enter to Continue ? 6: 871109 32143 22.375 22.125 22.375 7: 871110 87654 23.250 22.250 23.000 8: 9: Please Enter Specifier? 10: 20 EDITING SOURCE FILES WITH EDLIN ------------------------------- Now we will want to take out what is now line 5. This is a prompt that was issued by the Host computer to Signal that we wanted to Scroll the screen or in other words, clear screen and continue. Type 5D press enter or return. We have no deleted line five. Notice the difference from the last delete command. A single line number issued followed by a 'd' will delete that line only. The previous delete command that we used specified a starting line of 1 and an end- ing line of 5. In other words delete lines 1 thru 5 inclusively. The line dele- tion commands in your actual sources will be different in most cases. That's why we're taking the time to explain how the commands work! The file now looks like this after typing in 1L press enter or return. Example; 1: 871103 12340 23.375 22.500 22.875 2: 871104 43210 23.125 23.000 23.000 3: 871105 98701 24.250 23.000 23.875 4: 871108 54321 24.375 22.500 22.750 5: 871109 32143 22.375 22.125 22.375 6: 871110 87654 23.250 22.250 23.000 7: 8: Please Enter Specifier? 9: Looking Better! Now lets get rid of lines 7, 8, and 9. Type in 7,9D enter. The 7 represents the first line to delete. The 9 represents the last line to delete. All others in between will also be deleted. The file now looks like this; 1: 871103 12340 23.375 22.500 22.875 2: 871104 43210 23.125 23.000 23.000 3: 871105 98701 24.250 23.000 23.875 4: 871108 54321 24.375 22.500 22.750 5: 871109 32143 22.375 22.125 22.375 6: 871110 87654 23.250 22.250 23.000 Hey! Looking real good! Now all that we have to do is to get rid of all of the blank spaces and make sure that there is a comma between every column to seperate them into distinct fields. To do this we will utilize a different com- mand. We will use the Replace command. The first command will look like this; type 1,6?R ^Z, press enter or return. This command is very critical. To avoid confusion the key strokes are; 1. type in 1 2. type in , (comma) 3. type in 6 4. type in ? 5. type in R 6. type in (1 blank space) 7. type in (1 blank space) 8. type in (1 blank space) 9. press the [CTRL] and [Z] buttons at the same time (creates ^Z) 10. type in , (comma) 11. press return or enter 21 EDITING SOURCE FILES WITH EDLIN ------------------------------- This command means this in plain English; For every occurrence of 3 blank spaces in lines 1 thru 6, replace them with a comma and delete the other two blank spaces! Each time that edlin finds and replaces three blank spaces with just a com- ma, it will prompt you with this O.K.?. If you press your enter or return key edlin will make the change permanent and go on to look for the next occur- rence of three blank spaces. Once you get edlin's commands down pat and get your self-confidence built up you will get to where you just hold your enter key continually down and let edlin zip right thru all of the changes! Now our source file looks like this; (type 1L) 1: 871103, 12340,, 23.375,, 22.500,, 22.875 2: 871104, 43210,, 23.125,, 23.000,, 23.000 3: 871105, 98701,, 24.250,, 23.000,, 23.875 4: 871108, 54321,, 24.375,, 22.500,, 22.750 5: 871109, 32143,, 22.375,, 22.125,, 22.375 6: 871110, 87654,, 23.250,, 22.250,, 23.000 Well, that's not quite what we wanted but let's edit some more and see what we come up with. It appears that every field has at least two blank spaces or more. Let's delete those, and then on our last pass of our edits we'll scan to delete any occurrence of double commas and replace them with just one comma and deleting the other one. Type in command 1,6?R ^Z This means for any occurrence of two blank spaces found between lines 1 thru 6, to replace them with nothing! After you have done this and have completed all of the string replacements the source file now looks like this; 1: 871103,12340,,23.375,,22.500,,22.875 2: 871104,43210,,23.125,,23.000,,23.000 3: 871105,98701,,24.250,,23.000,,23.875 4: 871108,54321,,24.375,,22.500,,22.750 5: 871109,32143,,22.375,,22.125,,22.375 6: 871110,87654,,23.250,,22.250,,23.000 All Right! We're almost there. Now let's get rid of the double commas and we'll be all set to load the file with the Stock Trader. Type in this command; 1,6?R,,^Z, Again you will go through and OK edlins changes by pressing your return or enter key after a change has occurred. This command meant; For every occurrence of double commas found in lines 1 thru 6, replace them with a single comma. The command format is then for your later use, because the lines that you will edit in the future will be different from this example, as follows; 22 EDITING SOURCE FILES USING EDLIN -------------------------------- 1. Enter the line number where editing is to start 2. Enter the last line number of the file where editing is to stop 3. Enter a question mark 4. Enter a R to signify a replacement operation 5. Enter the character sequence to be searched for and replaced 6. Press [CTRL] and [Z] keys at same time to denote end of search sequence and the beginning of the replacing sequence 7. Enter what you want the search sequence to be replaced with, if you just want it deleted don't enter anything and press return. Our finished file now looks like this. Every finished source file must look like this! There can be no blank spaces of any kind anywhere. Only numeric data seperated by commas should exist in the source file. 1: 871103,12340,23.375,22.500,22.875 2: 871104,43210,23.125,23.000,23.000 3: 871105,98701,24.250,23.000,23.875 4: 871108,54321,24.375,22.500,22.750 5: 871109,32143,22.375,22.125,22.375 6: 871110,87654,23.250,22.250,23.000 Now, you may be one of the fortunate people who have a word processor that doesn't leave control characters in the text. Tandy's Deskmate and Word Star are two examples of word processing applications that behave like this. If you have either of these applications you can do the very same thing with them. All you have to do is give the file the same DOS extension as your word processor uses to identify it text files. For example, Tandy's Deskmate uses a .DOC on every word processing file to identify. Use the DOS file rename command to put this extension onto your raw data filename. Then call it up on Deskmate as a document and do your editing. If you have a word processing application that is different from the two I have mentioned, try it out! It doesn't hurt to try. Just make a backup copy of your raw data file before you try it in the event things don't quite work out! One other important note. Edlin makes an automatic backup copy of how the file that you began editing originally looked. The file- name of the backup has the same name as the original except that it has an ex- tension of .BAK on it. So, if you goof, don't fret alot about it. Delete the goof and rename the edlin backup copy with the DOS rename command. The last thing that you must do now that your editing is complete, is to put a file extension of .TDR onto your source filename and copy it over to where you have designated in the Installation Program where your Library Disk would be. That's it! 23 LAST BUT NOT LEAST! ------------------- If you are a floppy drive user you should do the following; 1.) Copy MANUAL.DOC to another floppy and then delete it from the Library Disk. 2.) After you are done experimenting and looking at the preloaded demonstration source files copy them as well and delete them from the Library Disk. I wish to strongly encourage all users of this package to distribute it freely to others that may be interested in the package. Use the pre- loaded demo files and User Library members to get yourself acquainted with the Stock Trader and how it works. Enjoy the program and I hope to hear from you soon. Sincerely, Larry E. Baugher This sample package of The Stock Trader has only 300 Issues loaded into it's Securities Database. Registration and payment of the Library Updates will get you your full database of nearly 1500! Registration to thisver- sion will also entitle you to FREE upgrade to the second version of this package to be released in May or June of 1988. The second version will graph industry groups of issues queried and display in a comparative graph the issue's competitors. Let me here from you!