Dr. Dobb's Journal - November 2007 - (Page 10)

D11vox_p5ma 9/10/07 10:05 AM Page 10 Alia Vox by Matt Davey WPF and the Need to Visualize CEP/ESP Data ALGORITHMIC TRADING leverages real-time market feeds, sophisticated analytics, and direct links to electronic networks to capitalize on even the smallest inefficiencies in the market. The requirement for near-instant applications, we need to look towards .NET 3.x and Windows analysis and response to continuous Presentation Foundation (WPF) technology. streams of market data has encouraged WPF is the .NET technology for building GUIs. It offers declaraseveral software vendors—StreamBase, tive programming (XAML), rich composition and customization, Apama, Truviso, and Coral8, to name a and easy deployment. The framework uses Click-Once functionalfew—to develop products that support ity already available in the .NET 2.0 stack. Depending on the hardtechniques such as complex event pro- ware available, there’s also the added bonus of hardware acceleracessing (CEP) and event stream process- tion. In short, WPF combines the best of DirectX, WinForms, Adobe ing (ESP). These products apply business Flash, and HTML in a single environment and both the GUI designrules, generate events, and execute code er and GUI developer can share a common set of XAML files. in real time as new messages arrive, and Adopting WPF now also has strategic advantages. WinForms as can process hundreds of thousands of a technology is unlikely to see any further significant development messages per second. post .NET 2.0, so investing in this technology to underpin the nextWhile these products have become generation of smart-client GUIs would be a soon-to-be legacy invaluable in the execution of algorithm investment. trading systems and monitoring of execuWhy use WPF for CEP/ESP visualization? Traders today have tion strategies, extracting information essentially outgrown the data grid. The frequency of data updates, from the large complex datasets that are the size of trading portfolios, and the many analytical results that generated by these trading styles and traders and/or portfolio managers need to keep track of means that identifying underlying market move- the data grid is just not expressive enough. An algorithmic trading ments is critical to gaining a competitive solution could offer them a view of their trading volume using a advantage. Current vendor software grid. However, identifying the latest updates on a grid usually offerings typically provide dashboards involves flashing the background color of a cell to help provide a that prove to be too simplistic to satisfy visual clue to traders—not exactly the most elegant solution, given real-world demands. Further, the ability today’s 256-MB+ video cards that most PCs carry. Enter WPF. of banks to extend the vendor-offered An improvement over earlier Windows programming environdashboards and integrate with their exist- ments is WPF’s retained graphics system. It cuts down on the number ing trade visualization infrastructure has of redraws a UI element should incur—obviously an advantage given been inhibited by the use of technologies the possible high throughput a CEP/ESP UI may want to visualize. (Adobe Flex, for example) that are not a What benefits does WPF offer over WinForms? Apart from the part of the typical GUI developer’s toolkit. advantage of WPF (XAML) being a declarative programming lanWhen it comes to building GUIs, Java guage, WPF reduces the need to create new controls due to the and .NET dominate investment banks. usage of Styles. A style enables the creation of a reusable represenThe broad deployment of Windows to tation of a desired control appearance and behavior. WinForm the trader’s desktop has resulted in the controls each have a particular shape and border. It offers the conWindows look-and-feel being consid- cept of controls that attach to a shape defined in an external temered by many as a standard part of the plate. Dependency properties are another feature that, once used, user experience. This drives developers you wonder how you ever coded without them. Triggers, events, towards the use of Visual Studio 2005, and data binding within WPF all help to take UI engineering to .NET 2.0, and WinForms as the core another level. development platform for the creation of If you are building new UIs today, have a serious look at WPF. smart client GUIs. WinForms has proven The WPF argument is further strengthened with the release of itself as a platform for developing today’s Visual Studio 2008. You need only to look at the gaming industry to desktop applications. However, for recognize how powerful this platform can be for graphical applicadeveloping next-generation visualization tions—a potential we should leverage in financial markets. DDJ Matt is director of technology for Lab49 (www.lab49.com), a company that builds advanced technology applications for the financial services industry. You can read his blog at http://mdavey .wordpress.com. 10 Dr. Dobb’s Journal l www.ddj.com l November 2007 http://www.lab49.com http://mdavey.wordpress.com http://mdavey.wordpress.com http://www.ddj.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Dr. Dobb's Journal - November 2007

Contents Hmmmm Alia Vox Developer Diaries Developer’s Notebook Smart Compilers - But Smart Enough? Conversations Grid-Enabling Resource-Intensive Applications Distributed Computing: Windows and Linux Adobe AIR: Desktop/Web Convergence Transparency on Demand Reusable Associations Effective Concurrency The Agile Edge Swaine’s Flames

Dr. Dobb's Journal - November 2007

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