Click on the ticker tape (any mouse button) to pop up the configuration window. Currently, you can choose between three different quote sources,
finance.yahoo.com - provides decimal values, north american markets (default service) finance.uk.yahoo.com - provides decimal values, european markets www2.marketwatch.com - fractional values, us markets only
Enter the security symbols (stocks, bonds, mutual funds) that you wish to track, and adjust ticker speed, font, and data refresh options to suit your needs.
TclTicker saves user configuration into the file $HOME/.tclticker.
Also, if your network requires HTTP requests through a proxy, enter the proxy hostname (omit http://), and a port number (assumed to be 80 if not entered.)
If you plan to use mailquote, you might need to specify a smart SMTP mail host that will relay your mail. Otherwise, the ezsmtp package will attempt to contact 'sendmail' (or equivalent) on your localhost, TCP port 25.
Adjust other parameters as you desire. A smaller value for 'ticker delay' causes the ticker to run faster. The settings take effect after you press 'Ok'.
The timestamp shown in the tickertape is the local time of the last quote fetch. Note that quotes are usually delayed 15-20 minutes or more by quote providers.
You can write your own quote service. You should name the file of your new quote service as 'service'.tcl. Refer to the distributed quote services as models for new services. Be sure to rebuild the Tcl file 'tclIndex' in the library directory.
Symbol lookup is provided. Press the 'Symbol lookup' button on the configuration window. The lookup function uses the previously selected quote service lookup (if available). NOTE - if your site requires an HTTP proxy, be sure to set the proxy first, making sure quotes are being received. Otherwise, the symbol lookup may hang, because the proxy had not be previously set. If your search is too general, the results may not include the symbol for which you are searching.
You can also use your web browser on any site that provides quotes & symbol lookup (finance.yahoo.com, quote.lycos.com, www.etrade.com, cnnfn.com, www.schwab.com, www.dbc.com, www.datek.com, etc.)
Also note that different quote providers require different symbols for composite or industry averages. For example, the three major composites commonly tracked in the U.S. are:
finance.yahoo.com | www2.marketwatch.com | |
Dow Jones Industrial Average | ^DJI | $INDU |
NASDAQ Composite | ^IXIC | $COMPQ |
Standard & Poor's 500 Index | ^SPC | $SPX |
The default ticker symbols you get when you start TclTicker for the first time includes both sets.
TclTicker accepts one command line argument, the word 'setup'. This takes you directly to the setup configuration window, before starting the ticker.
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