Nt8 drawing objects and templates.

[sezor]

There appears to be a gotcha in Ninjatrader 8's (8.0.19.1 &
previous) interaction between drawing objects and templates.
If one saves a template while there are drawing objects on
the chart, those objects will be saved in the template but
Ninjatrader doesn't reveal what it's done.
Nor does it offer a means of visualising or deleting them.
Each time you make alterations and re-save the template, any
further drawing objects on the chart accumulate in it. And
if you happen to use the same template on more than one
instrument, the template will contain drawing objects
applying to different instruments.
One way to delete the marooned objects is to open a chart
which has the indicators you want and which is known to have
no drawing objects on it and save that as a template having
the same name as the faulty one - so overwriting it.
Similarly, to prevent the problem occurring, save as
templates only charts which have no drawing objects on them.

[NinjaTrader_PatrickG]

I would not expect drawing objects to be saved as part of a chart template. Can you elaborate on what exact steps I would need to take to replicate what you're reporting?

[sezor]

I would not expect drawing objects to be saved as part of a chart template. Can you elaborate on what exact steps I would need to take to replicate what you're reporting?

I would suggest first
- making a note of the size of the template file in use in the chart
- creating some dots in the chart
- saving the chart as the same template
- checking the size and contents of the template file.
The things which led me to this were:
- charts using templates were losing their indicators at start-up
- Ninja was crashing (windows putting up a window saying that
Ninja had ceased to function), often once a day
but I'd been inserting dots for over a month.
One of the template files was over 200k in size (instead of 12k)
and when I opened it up there were more than 100 dots in it.
Since deleting that template file and starting with a new one,
there has been no repetition of the symptoms.

Come to think of it, this problem occurred under Ninjatrader 8.0.19.0.
I've updated to .1 since then and haven't tried inserting dots in it.

[User1104]

Pretty sure drawing objects are saved in a workspace file and not a chart template...

[NinjaTrader_PatrickG]

I cannot reproduce as you suggest because I did not have any chart templates to start with. Can you recreate this symptom if you begin with a chart that has no templates or add-ons applied then create a new chart template?

Also, based on the symptoms you're describing, it sounds like you're having many unexpected symptoms of which this is only one. Please send me your workspace, templates, log, and trace files so that I may look into what occurred.

• You can do this by going to the Control Center-> Help-> Email Support
• Expand 'Other files' and enable 'Workspace files and UI settings' and 'Template files'.
• Please reference the following ticket number in the body of the email: 2317913 ATTN PatrickG

[sezor]

I cannot reproduce as you suggest because I did not have any chart templates to start with. Can you recreate this symptom if you begin with a chart that has no templates or add-ons applied then create a new chart template?

Also, based on the symptoms you're describing, it sounds like you're having many unexpected symptoms of which this is only one. Please send me your workspace, templates, log, and trace files so that I may look into what occurred.

• You can do this by going to the Control Center-> Help-> Email Support
• Expand 'Other files' and enable 'Workspace files and UI settings' and 'Template files'.
• Please reference the following ticket number in the body of the email: 2317913 ATTN PatrickG

I've rooted around in my backups and found an example
template file in C:\Dox\NinjaTrader 8\templates\Chart
dated October 8, which I attach.
It is 500k+ in size and contains 288 occurrences of the string
/Dot
The indicators it references, one of which occurs on the
main panel as well as a subsidiary panel, are all Ninja
ones.
I don't mean to be unhelpful but this problem has cost me so
much time that now that it's solved I simply want to let it
drop. Not without informing other users of the software in
case it's of use to them.

2317913 ATTN PatrickG
the log and trace files concerned go back 2 months or more.

[sezor]

I've rooted around in my backups and found an example
template file in C:\Dox\NinjaTrader 8\templates\Chart
dated October 8, which I attach.
It is 500k+ in size and contains 288 occurrences of the string
/Dot
The indicators it references, one of which occurs on the
main panel as well as a subsidiary panel, are all Ninja
ones.
I don't mean to be unhelpful but this problem has cost me so
much time that now that it's solved I simply want to let it
drop. Not without informing other users of the software in
case it's of use to them.

2317913 ATTN PatrickG
the log and trace files concerned go back 2 months or more.

It turned out that XML files are not accepted so I altered
the "XML" to "txt"

[NinjaTrader_PatrickG]

Having all of the files I requested would give me a bigger picture view of what is occurring on your end and would likely be necessary for me to troubleshoot effectively. For example, if your drawing objects are all 'global' by default, then that changes thing significantly. I can learn this and many more things with all of the files I requested.

I could not reproduce the symptom with the chart template you provided. Here are the steps I took:

• Download your file, change the extension to .xml, and place the file in the templates > chart folder
• Open NinjaTrader, connect to data, create an ES 12-19 1 minute chart, and apply the template
  • There are no drawing objects in this chart
• Draw a couple dot chart marker objects, re-save the template
• Open a new chart and apply the template
  • There are no drawing objects in this chart

When you say "now that it's solved", what do you mean exactly?

[sezor]

[QUOTE=NinjaTrader_PatrickG;n1075953]Having all of the files I requested would give me a bigger picture view of what is occurring on your end and would likely be necessary for me to troubleshoot effectively. For example, if your drawing objects are all 'global' by default, then that changes thing significantly. I can learn this and many more things with all of the files I requested.

> There are no drawing objects in this chart
That's what I said in the opening post of the thread.
>those objects will be saved in the template but
Ninjatrader doesn't reveal what it's done.
Nor does it offer a means of visualising or deleting them.<
> When you say "now that it's solved", what do you mean exactly?
Charts don't lose their indicators at start-up and Ninja
doesn't crash.

[NinjaTrader_PatrickG]

Let me make sure I understand the issue - you do not see the objects on the chart but are simply concerned with the file size and record of the dots in the literal xml file?

[sezor]

The original post in this thread is not a request for help,
Patrick, it's a bug report.
But the bug isn't easy to see. Ninja hides it.
To see it one has to resort to other software capable of
reading Ninja's data files - nothing more complex than a
text editor.
That enables you to see what Ninja is hiding from users and
from itself - which happens to be compromising its
functioning.

[NinjaTrader_PatrickG]

I apologize that I originally misunderstood what the symptom was you were reporting that was undesirable.

I was able to reproduce what you've reported in that drawing object information is saved into the chart template file. The Development Team is performing analysis now. The internal tracking number is 14133. When this change is implemented into NinjaTrader, you'll find this tracking number in the release notes:

https://ninjatrader.com/support/helpGuides/nt8/?release_notes.htm