GSB Forums

Reading List for complete newbs?

CandyMachine - 10-12-2018 at 09:54 AM

From playing around with the GSB trial, I'm noticing that I lack the foundation to grasp it. Even the help file is difficult for me to grasp. I have trading experience, but none with creating algorithms. Should I get a book(s) on statistical analysis? Can anyone recommend a sequence of reading material for someone who is a blank slate; reading material that can help me go from start to proficient GSB user in the cleanest way possible? It doesn't have to be the fastest way possible. I'd rather have a solid foundation than just figure out how to make it work but not understand the "why". That would probably result in lots of floundering as holes in my skills continually pop up and I make 1000's of forum posts in seek of help. As much as I'd rather dive right in, I'm trying to do this the right way. I greatly appreciate any help.

admin - 10-12-2018 at 02:48 PM

As gsb matures docs, videos, courses will appear and or get better. Right now there is also paid option of tuition. There might also be very cheap tuition from my researcher who has lower level of skills than one of our most experienced users who does tuition. It is not essential but basic easy language course wouldn't do any harm. But I have other questions. Are you competent on tradestation or multi charts? There is also a basic older free course by Halifax on the docs section of the forum

CandyMachine - 10-12-2018 at 05:52 PM

That's great that you plan to expand the literature. However, I totally understand why you've allocated your time and energy the way that you have. Also, it's reasonable to expect that someone interested in your product would have a basic knowledge of the underlying principles of GSB. (If you want to appeal to the "pure trader", I know the literature will help but that's up to you.) Information on the underlying theories that GSB uses is scattered on the interwebs and I didn't know if there's a good textbook that would serve as a good primer. A place to learn about Walk Forward testing vs Monte Carlo. Testing vs. training vs. validation (upon typing this I'm seeing the halifax pdf has info on testing vs training) Perhaps, most of the people here came from other more basic builders and that served as their foundation?

I guess one basic question I have is why are "strategy building" and "walk forward" separate optimizers? The first thing you do is optimize parameters with strategy building, right? Does the walk forward just make small adjustments to the strategy in question and further optimize?

Also, while we're on the topic of the help file, I couldn't find anything on the following tabs in the walk forward: "Profit Factor - Walk Forward Current" vs "Profit Factor - Walk Forward Out of Sample". Does current mean "in sample"?

Thank you!

admin - 10-12-2018 at 06:03 PM

Quote: Originally posted by CandyMachine  
That's great that you plan to expand the literature. However, I totally understand why you've allocated your time and energy the way that you have. Also, it's reasonable to expect that someone interested in your product would have a basic knowledge of the underlying principles of GSB. (If you want to appeal to the "pure trader", I know the literature will help but that's up to you.) Information on the underlying theories that GSB uses is scattered on the interwebs and I didn't know if there's a good textbook that would serve as a good primer. A place to learn about Walk Forward testing vs Monte Carlo. Testing vs. training vs. validation (upon typing this I'm seeing the halifax pdf has info on testing vs training) Perhaps, most of the people here came from other more basic builders and that served as their foundation?

I guess one basic question I have is why are "strategy building" and "walk forward" separate optimizers? The first thing you do is optimize parameters with strategy building, right? Does the walk forward just make small adjustments to the strategy in question and further optimize?

Also, while we're on the topic of the help file, I couldn't find anything on the following tabs in the walk forward: "Profit Factor - Walk Forward Current" vs "Profit Factor - Walk Forward Out of Sample". Does current mean "in sample"?

Thank you!

The initial ccore of GSB users were extremely experienced traders but over time I tried to make things aimed for people with lower experince. A very high % of people has also used adaptrade builder and or straquant. The was excellent for all as lots of people came in with prior experience in system builders and found GSB worked much better.
The GSB videos cover most of what you need to know. There is a through one on WF. I think most of your questions are answered here. GSB builds systems and genetically will some what chose bet paramters. WF requires a lot of cpu power to we only do this for the systems your really want to be much more thorugh on. For those ts / mc users - know that wf takes hours or cpu and human time. GSB is breeze. Just a right click and send to your local macine or the cloud.
wf current is the final paramters that gsb found to be best. wf oos is the results if we did not have the wisom of hind site.
PF you can look up in trading dictionary grossprofit/-grossloss
Sorry if the reply is not though. Off fishing...

CandyMachine - 10-12-2018 at 09:54 PM

Ok, thank you. The more I dive in, the more this seems achievable and less overwhelming. Maybe I will just dive right in ;-) Here's to January when I should actually have some free time. Hope you catch some lunkers!