I recommend that you read several books on Technical Analysis first. This is so you can understand the types of things AFL is trying to accomplish.
Contrary to a general purpose language like C, AFL is very purpose built (Yes (all you geeks) I know that C was originally developed to write the UNIX operating system, but it has evolved into a GP language C++.) If you have experience with a general purpose language, AFL seems rather strange, like the circumstances under which a variable is just assigned a number, and when a var is actually an array of numbers. Or when can you get away with doing what is actually array arithmetic and when do you have to resort to loops. All of these strange things make much more sense, if you have a general feeling for the things that TA'ers are trying to do. BTW, AFL is a very good language. If you don't think so look at MetaStock AFL with just ONE control statement - a non-block IF statement. Or eSignals modification of JavaScript - YIKES ! - I ported most of my indicators I wrote from eSig to AFL and the number of lines of code dropped by about a factor of 10 ! Reef Break --- In [email protected], "louies88" <louie...@...> wrote: > > I think Amibroker is great, especially its AFL. Although I don't know enough > about it to claim that it's superior than most other scripting languages out > there, I know for a fact that this is one of the best. That also begs the > question of how a person w/ virtually no programming background can get > started w/ AFL. I followed this forum long enough to note that some of you in > here are excellent coders. The codes that I often see are flawless and > eloquent, which then makes me think how long does it take a coding newbie > such as myself to attain that coding level. > > I look at it this way. Coding a computer language is pretty similar to > learning a foreign language. I remember how my first English class went. I > started out by learning a few basic vocabulary words, then use some of it in > the form of a noun, then a verb, finally an object. Sentence structures, or > in computer language better known as syntax, govern if a sentence is > grammatically correct or if it's not. With that in mind, I also started out > by looking at the AFL Library in Amibroker. I downloaded all of the functions > in the hope of building myself an Amibroker vocabulary and started to put > some of the basic vocabulary words together to make a "sentence." > > However, since there isn't any kind of document FORMALLY teaching the ABC of > coding in Amibroker, I'm left w/ a question how does Amibroker syntax work? > Some of the experienced coders here often compare AFL syntax to that of C++. > But for a person w/ neither background in AFL or C++ or any other computer > langugae, the question remains: How do I get start? Where's the square one? > > Anybody w/ such experience is highly appreciated if he/she's willing to shed > a light on this. > > > Thanks >
