Metatrader 4 and Bitshares

[lil_jay890]

Any updates on the progress?

I don't think much has been done since the last post... I've been trying to drum up some interest again though.

The BTS community is stuck on this thought that fee's are the problem with adoption and market cap growth.  The fee's aren't the problem, the interface is.  I'm hoping that the blocktrades worker proposal can be redirected to creating an metatrader plugin.  They seem like the most able candidate to integrate bts and mt4.  I would even advocate doubling their pay to get this done if that's what it takes.

The Chinese bts community is stuck on fees.

They also complain about UI. However most of them have never used MT4 (even BM hasn't).

Its used worldwide, bm isnt a trader so he doesnt know

This is why cnx hasn't put this high on their priority list.  They are not traders and they don't see the low hanging fruit right in front of their faces.

Mt4 is the most popular trading platform in the world. Saying china doesn't use mt4 is another sweeping generalization that Chinese forum members seem to use all to often. There may be a cheaper option, but none will instantly open the door to millions of traders like an mt4 plugin and license would.

[xeroc]

If you need assistance with the API and stuff .. just drop me a line

[abit]

Any updates on the progress?

I don't think much has been done since the last post... I've been trying to drum up some interest again though.

The BTS community is stuck on this thought that fee's are the problem with adoption and market cap growth.  The fee's aren't the problem, the interface is.  I'm hoping that the blocktrades worker proposal can be redirected to creating an metatrader plugin.  They seem like the most able candidate to integrate bts and mt4.  I would even advocate doubling their pay to get this done if that's what it takes.

The Chinese bts community is stuck on fees.

They also complain about UI. However most of them have never used MT4 (even BM hasn't).

Its used worldwide, bm isnt a trader so he doesnt know

True.

[jsidhu]

Any updates on the progress?

I don't think much has been done since the last post... I've been trying to drum up some interest again though.

The BTS community is stuck on this thought that fee's are the problem with adoption and market cap growth.  The fee's aren't the problem, the interface is.  I'm hoping that the blocktrades worker proposal can be redirected to creating an metatrader plugin.  They seem like the most able candidate to integrate bts and mt4.  I would even advocate doubling their pay to get this done if that's what it takes.

The Chinese bts community is stuck on fees.

They also complain about UI. However most of them have never used MT4 (even BM hasn't).

Its used worldwide, bm isnt a trader so he doesnt know

[abit]

Any updates on the progress?

I don't think much has been done since the last post... I've been trying to drum up some interest again though.

The BTS community is stuck on this thought that fee's are the problem with adoption and market cap growth.  The fee's aren't the problem, the interface is.  I'm hoping that the blocktrades worker proposal can be redirected to creating an metatrader plugin.  They seem like the most able candidate to integrate bts and mt4.  I would even advocate doubling their pay to get this done if that's what it takes.

The Chinese bts community is stuck on fees.

They also complain about UI. However most of them have never used MT4 (even BM hasn't).

[fuzzy]

Metatrader4 is the defacto forex consumer trading platform http://www.metatrader4.com/en

The key feature of MT4 is the ability to buy, create and run your own trading bots - this is a massive source of liquidity and trading volume and there are vast libraries of such bots available on the metatrader marketplace https://www.mql5.com/en/market/mt4

There has been some discussion about how to integrate metatrader 4 with bitshares, and I have good experience of both platforms so I know what it will take. I've created this thread to open the discussion about how this might be achieved.

There are a few things to know about MT4 first:

1. This is a margin trading platform. You go long/short with your base currency as collateral in your desired market, and you always close your order with one of the opposite type, so if you buy, you must sell to close your position. This means you always end up back in the same currency you started out with.
2. There is typically leverage available, the amount varies depending on your broker
3. I *think* the available markets are hard coded into the platform, so you have to offer markets like EUR/USD, JPY/USD etc
4. The is no orderbook available to traders (this is a big negative point)
5. The spreads are typically denoted in Pips, which are fractions of a dollar (this is a bit of a sticking point for integration)
6. The metatrader 4 client side app communicates with the broker via a custom protocol - there would need to be a bitshares bridge server
7. Placing and cancelling limit orders is free
8. There are order types bitshares doesn't support right now, buy stop and sell stop which are resting orders which do not activate until the price reaches them (opposite way to regular limit orders)
9. Metatrader the corporation would almost certainly be opposed to this integration, so this would need to be done with no central point of failure in terms of legal ramifications

I propose something radical to address point 7, which is a huge point for existing MT4 users who would never accept having to pay for that: require a Proof of Work for placement and cancel orders, but have 0 transaction fee. That would prevent spam while costing no currency.

Point 8 could easily be addressed by adding these order types into the DEX.

In summary, I think it would be possible to integrate IF bitshares supported margin trading in a compatible way.

Cheers, Paul.

you wonderful man....

[Akado]

Even if they are, all it takes is Blocktrades to agree to do this and get it up to vote.

[Pheonike]

Any updates on the progress?

I don't think much has been done since the last post... I've been trying to drum up some interest again though.

The BTS community is stuck on this thought that fee's are the problem with adoption and market cap growth.  The fee's aren't the problem, the interface is.  I'm hoping that the blocktrades worker proposal can be redirected to creating an metatrader plugin.  They seem like the most able candidate to integrate bts and mt4.  I would even advocate doubling their pay to get this done if that's what it takes.

The Chinese bts community is stuck on fees.

[lil_jay890]

Any updates on the progress?

I don't think much has been done since the last post... I've been trying to drum up some interest again though.

The BTS community is stuck on this thought that fee's are the problem with adoption and market cap growth.  The fee's aren't the problem, the interface is.  I'm hoping that the blocktrades worker proposal can be redirected to creating an metatrader plugin.  They seem like the most able candidate to integrate bts and mt4.  I would even advocate doubling their pay to get this done if that's what it takes.

[TravelsAsia]

Any updates on the progress?

[jsidhu]

...
Since we don't have the resources to build something like that, we need to make it easy for third parties to interface with the api and hook up their systems.

At the very least the api should be made as friendly as possible for people wanting to write bots..

^--- This 

Im a dev myself and what I can tell you with certainty is that if you are trying to cater to a standard api protocol its almost 90% there to try to actually integrate one as a proof of concept. Its just common sense.

[liondani]

...
Since we don't have the resources to build something like that, we need to make it easy for third parties to interface with the api and hook up their systems.

At the very least the api should be made as friendly as possible for people wanting to write bots..

^--- This 

 

[DestBest]

...
Since we don't have the resources to build something like that, we need to make it easy for third parties to interface with the api and hook up their systems.

At the very least the api should be made as friendly as possible for people wanting to write bots..

^--- This 

[svk]

To me it makes so much sense and is not very hard.. The api integration shouldnt be too bad, the risk reward is massive and to me makes sense to go for it for bts team.. But i dont think they will understand like us ever since they domt have time to go use it for a few weeks to judge themselves.

To be fair it IS hard to do: You have to decode their proprietary protocol, create a bridge server into the bitshares wallet, have the core bitshares team add the missing order types and then somehow get metatrader the company to be ok with the idea.

edit: the rewards would be huge, though.

Its not trivial if i made it sound like that but its alot easier problem then the ones they have already solved in crypto. I think there are also examples of bridges already done that perhaps somehow can be shared or metatrader can shed light on.  Its api work ontop of a few commands.. And since its a standardized api it makes sense to figure out and integrate into a real trading engine instead of guessing what type of trading the world wants.

Agree... We know what traders want and what they use, let's not try to reinvent the wheel.

What I don't get about this forum is how people say we should ask traders what they want and emulate that.  We (me since I have been trading currencies for 9 years and trade with a large group of people, also I assume jsidhu is a trader) tell them exactly what they need to do to attract traders... Then the non traders here read it and say "nah that's to complicated. Let's make it like polo. That's what traders will want!".

It's like I'm talking to a wall... Why do u guys ask for opinions, when you have no intention of utilizing them?  We are never going to reach total consensus on a interface, so just provide the tools to 3rd parties so they can create their own.

I totally agree with that, there's no way really we can make something that comes close to MT4 or any of the other specialised trading interfaces. Those have years of development behind them with massive teams, we have 2.5 people working on this GUI, 0.5 of which (me) have been working on the exchange interface. Since we don't have the resources to build something like that, we need to make it easy for third parties to interface with the api and hook up their systems.

At the very least the api should be made as friendly as possible for people wanting to write bots..

[eagleeye]

*claps at everyone in this thread*

Brownie points should be distributed to all in this thread