Losing saved chart drawings

[NinjaTrader_Matthew]

This behavior where old drawing tools were removed after 20 days due to performance concerns in prior versions has been removed in NinjaTrader 8.

We may revisit another approach if we begin to run into the issues which originally prompted this sort of unpopular policy down the road, but for now - NinjaTrader 8 will not remove drawing objects until manually deleted.

[NinjaTrader_Jason]

Hello GlennL,

I will forward the suggestion to disable the deletion of drawing objects to development. Thank you for your feedback.

[GlennL]

I concur, I think the auto deleting of drawing objects should be disabled in future versions/releases of NT

[lucascarter]

why would they ever have it delete the drawing automatically? I can delete them if I want them to be deleted...

[martied16]

Hi,

This is a coded by designed and we have not made any changes in this area. In previous versions of NinjaTrader, we found that users often had very old drawing objects saved in workspaces which would use unnecessary computer resources, contributing to performance problems. We have found the 20 day auto remove objects to be a reasonable setting and most users do not even notice that the old objects are being removed as they usually are not needed.

With that said, if you have a specific system where this design is causing issues for you, it is technically possible to change and configure this limit. The steps I'm providing are not supported and could have further unknown consequences, but you are free to proceed at your own risk.

1. Shut down NinjaTrader
2. Navigate to (My) Documents\NinjaTrader 7
3. Locate the Config.xml file, right click on this file and select "Open with"--> select "Notepad" (or any other text editor)
4. In the config file, search (Ctrl + F) for this element:

    <AutoRemoveObjects>
      <int>20</int>
    </AutoRemoveObjects>

5. Once located, you can change the element value to a number of days which you may find reasonable.

    <AutoRemoveObjects>
   [B]   <int>60</int>[/B]
    </AutoRemoveObjects>

6. After making your desired changes, save the file and close the text editor.

Finally you may restart NinjaTrader and the draw objects should use the new value.

My suggestion to users who decide to change this value is to take caution and pay close attention to all objects that have been drawn. Please make sure you are removing old objects manually as NinjaTrader may not dispose of these depending on the settings you have configured.

Please note that this is not a supported technique and we do not encourage user to change this value. Knowing this, we will not be able to provide further assistance in this area beyond what has been posted in this thread. We also cannot gurantee that this workaround will not change in the future without notice.

However if you have any questions, I'd be happy to answer what I can.

Mathew,
Thank-you for your prompt reply. This workaround is just what I needed and is most welcome. I understand your warnings about system overload and will be very attentive to any signs of declining system performance.
Considering that long-term charts are very important to some traders, maybe the developers could find a solution for those who do trade long term. Maybe a screen upon installation of NT with choices for long-term or short-term system setup. Or maybe upon saving a workspace initially you can be asked if the charts are for long-term use or short-term use. I'm sure the developers can find a solution for this very important issue.
Anyways, thank-you again for your solution.

[NinjaTrader_Matthew]

Hi,

This is a coded by designed and we have not made any changes in this area. In previous versions of NinjaTrader, we found that users often had very old drawing objects saved in workspaces which would use unnecessary computer resources, contributing to performance problems. We have found the 20 day auto remove objects to be a reasonable setting and most users do not even notice that the old objects are being removed as they usually are not needed.

With that said, if you have a specific system where this design is causing issues for you, it is technically possible to change and configure this limit. The steps I'm providing are not supported and could have further unknown consequences, but you are free to proceed at your own risk.

1. Shut down NinjaTrader
2. Navigate to (My) Documents\NinjaTrader 7
3. Locate the Config.xml file, right click on this file and select "Open with"--> select "Notepad" (or any other text editor)
4. In the config file, search (Ctrl + F) for this element:

    <AutoRemoveObjects>
      <int>20</int>
    </AutoRemoveObjects>

5. Once located, you can change the element value to a number of days which you may find reasonable.

    <AutoRemoveObjects>
   [B]   <int>60</int>[/B]
    </AutoRemoveObjects>

6. After making your desired changes, save the file and close the text editor.

Finally you may restart NinjaTrader and the draw objects should use the new value.

My suggestion to users who decide to change this value is to take caution and pay close attention to all objects that have been drawn. Please make sure you are removing old objects manually as NinjaTrader may not dispose of these depending on the settings you have configured.

Please note that this is not a supported technique and we do not encourage user to change this value. Knowing this, we will not be able to provide further assistance in this area beyond what has been posted in this thread. We also cannot gurantee that this workaround will not change in the future without notice.

However if you have any questions, I'd be happy to answer what I can.

[martied16]

Ok, this thread is 2 years old now. Is there a fix for this 20 day drawing deletion nightmare? Soon I'll be forced to go to another platform, I'm tired of losing info. I love Ninja but if I cannot keep my work safe what good is it?

[NinjaTrader_RyanL]

Hello geoninja,


Thank you for your feedback, I have submitted your suggestion to our development team to add another request for drawing objects to remain longer than 20 days and I will update this thread when I hear back from development.

[geoninja]

Seconded. This is an exceedingly irritating "feature", in the worst MS sense. Forcing this onto the user without an option to turn it off is terribly inconsiderate. Ninja Devs can do much better than this.

Geo

[NinjaTrader_RyanL]

Hello alexbourne,


Thank you for your post and welcome to the forums!


I have added this submission to our development team for further tracking on this suggestion and will update this tread with the suggestion ID after hearing back from development.

[alexbourne]

I have to say that this has to be one of the dumbest features I've ever heard of. I just about had a heart attack when I opened up my workspace and thought that I had lost several months of data. I would recommend changing this in the future. I'm glad that there is a workaround at least.

[maggiej12]

i'm glad you found the workaround. I was going to send it to you if you hadn't.
It is a bit of a pain to have to do that though. I agree with you that Ninja should not erase drawings on saved charts without asking.
One thing you want to be careful of that i did a couple times out of habit: if you pull up a blank workspace, be sure to not hit save when you close it. Otherwise you will lose all the drawings you had on it even if you go in and change the last seen date.

[kinderlich]

I have the same issue. I hade 100s of hours of drawings that I haven't viewed in 1 month and now they are all gone. This default of removing drawings which have not been viewed in 20 days is crazy wrong. Please tell the developers to remove drawings only if confirmed. It shows that the platform cannot really be used for serious long range chart work.

Edit: I found a workaround!

You edit the workspace xml .. I replaced the lines that read

<LastSeen>2011-11-05T22:50:38.766545-04:00</LastSeen>

with
<LastSeen>2011-11-25T22:50:38.766545-04:00</LastSeen>


And the drawings are visible again. (I'm unhappy I have to do this workaround though)

[NinjaTrader_Kyle]

Hi maggiej12,

That should be fine - just please be sure to include 'ATTN: Ryan' and a link to this forum thread in your message.

[maggiej12]

Ryan,
My backup file is over 600MB and I am not able to send it through regular email. I can extract my workspace folders from them and send those to you. will this be ok?
All also have a dropbox folder i can invite you to and you can access the entire file through there.