My eBook is ready for release, yay!

Well, I've finally finished the last set of changes to my eBook about building your own betting/trading software/bot. I plan to keep adding more examples and expanding it further, but for now, I'll release what I have. So far, I have added 9 new different examples, showing how to do the following.

1. Log on to your account using the Betfair free API
   
2. Getting a list of events
   
3. Getting a list of markets and runners
   
4. Displaying market prices in a "ladder" style.
   
5. Matched price and Bollinger band graphs
   
6. Volume graphs


7. Weight of money graphs
   
8. Placing a bet
   
9. Placing a below minimum stake bet, updating bets, cancelling bets.
   

At the top of this post, there is a screen shot.

Is this a blatant ad? Yeah, I suppose so, but I'm really excited that I've got this far. It's been hard to find time to work on this and seems to have taken me bloody ages.

Testing My Strategy

Whilst trading on the horses the other day, I managed to get caught out a couple of times by a change in price move. I was trading using the ladder interface in Bet Trader pro, but my laptop had been playing up and I couldn't see the graphs very well (and I don't find them very clear anyway), so I think I missed seeing the momentum change (or perhaps there was no signal of a change, although I was trading using the momentum of the prices matching). As I am revising my eBook about trading software and bots, I have decided to add in some graphing examples and started building them. My primary goal is to be able to see the equivalent of bollinger bands (price envelopes - kind of like in Bet Angel Pro) and also some kind of momentum indicators. I've been talking about graphing applications for a while but now is the first time I've got to really get on with it. I'll include any code in the eBook and will make the executable available, if anyone wants to play with it (it won't be a battle hardened application like Bet Trader Pro or Bet Angel Pro mind!) but might be useful to run alongside. I just want to know if I am missing any signals or whether my strategy is flawed. I'm hoping that there are signals that I'm not seeing yet otherwise it's back to the drawing board.

Graphs, graphs, graphs.

I didn't get to trade today. I was having trouble connecting to Betfair. I tried Bet Trader Pro, Bet Angel Pro and Betfair Direct, but there was no joy. I assumed there was a problem with the API but none were reported on the site. Oh well.

Instead, I spent a bit more time looking into technical analysis and charting. This is a technique used in financial trading. It is where the trader uses the graphs of price and volume to determine price moves. I've recently started using graphs more, as I find they give a quick indication of any overall trend and sometimes you just get some obvious humdinger trend lines. I want to experiment with some more of the financial type indicators, like bollinger bands (basically a price envelope) and moving averages. Anyone had any experience using them with bet trading?

Beer

I didn't do any trading last night, as my fiance Sam and I were out to dinner with an old friend of hers. I'm feeling somewhat worse for wear today. That last extra drink seemed such a good idea at the time. We got home, relieved our baby sitter (Sam's mum!) and then effectively passed out on the bed. i woke up at 5am still fully clothed. Oh dear.

Anyway, I have been looking around for some graphic components as i hope to put together my own graphing application, to show prices and volumes with price bands (bollinger bands) from Bet Fair data, using the BetFair API (free version). Not sure when I'll get time to work on this, as I am splitting any free time between: spending time with the kids, wedding related planning, trading, reading (mainly about trading, etc), eating and sleeping.