[wsam29]

Here's a good thing to do testing out a strategy in real time when the markets are open and not hind site entry exit.

use the up down arrows and plot them are the bars in which you had a thought about entry or exit.

Let me rephrase that so it does not sound like impulse trading.

Plot the arrows because conditions have meet your entry/exit criteria.

[Moneybox]

Hey thanks for the tip wsam. It’s like back testing in real time, you can look back at your session and see immediately how good/bad your strategy was and make adjustments on the fly, and best of all it doesn’t cost you a cent. I will give it a try.

Shawn

[wsam29]

It more of seeing how your train of thought during real time trading when the future is unknown, because anyone can back test and see past results but will not have the confidence to actually trade the "system".

This way you can even monitor your thought and emotions and see if any changes need to be done to your trading method or strategy.

I know it also helps me keep each bar of information lined up to tell me exactly what is going on.

You'd be surprised when you get all your criterias lined up how much easier it is to pull the trigger.

As long as you know what those arrows you plot represent to you, you will have a visual journal as to what you were thinking and planning on doing based on those thoughts and observations.

I was very lazy and could not express my throughts and observations from my past trading experiance.

[keymoo]

Another way to backtest is to use tick replay. eSignal has this - you can replay the day tick by tick and see candles form at any speed you want. This is a great way of backtesting without seeing what's going to happen next. I wish I had the time and discipline to do this kind of backtesting - it is very time consuming but ultimately valuable.

[MseTrap]

I do this as well when I test additional trading signals during the live hours. What I also do is put the arrow at the particular price the market was when I made the decision and I also will put a small text comment at the arrow telling me what my indications were. what setup signals were in alignment and why I think that trade will work.