Command line price updates

[jb3]

I can update one of 5 portfolios using the following command line arguments:

"C:\Program Files\Fund Manager\fm.exe" "C:\Documents and Settings\xxx\My Documents\Fund Manager\Portfolio1.mm4" /I

When I simply change the name to any one of the other four portfolios, I get a pop-up box requesting the Yahoo historical price retrieve dates and that brings the update process to a screeching halt.

What could cause this?

I am using FM Personal 11.4 and Windows XP.

Thanks.

[Mark]

Hi jb3,

Try opening up your problematic portfolio files and doing an "Edit / Internet Retrieve / Prices" command. Do you get prompted for the date range? I'm guessing you do. This means that either your global default server or one of your investments is set to use the historical server. See "Options / Internet Settings..." and make sure your "Default Quote Server" is not set to a historical one. If this does not fix the problem, then one or more of your investments has their "Investment Properties... / Internet Retrieve / Quote Server" set to a historical quote server. Once you can do a regular price retrieve without getting prompted for dates make sure to save your portfolio and investments and then your command line should work.

[jb3]

That's it.

You nailed it once again.

Thanks, Mark!

[chucksf]

I've been researching why my automatic update via Task Scheduler has been failing and I've discovered that I'm seeing the same prompt related to the Yahoo Historical Quote server.

My problem is that I need to retrieve stock dividends and this information only appears to be available from the Yahoo Historical server (and the Professional version of FM, which I have). Relying on broker transaction download is not a solution as I have watch list portfolios with dividend stocks that I don't own.

Is there any reason FM can't take automatically use the default date when started with the /I switch? Only downside I see is that extra prices might be retrieved,

Thank you.

[Mark]

Hi Chuck,

There is no reason, unless the user wanted to change from the defaults. We can see about changing this behavior in an update. We could possibly add a different command line switch so you could control whether to use the defaults without prompting, or wait for user input on the historical retrieve dialog.

[chucksf]

OK, let me know when you make the change.

For what it is worth, I also have one preferred security that goes to Google Historical because Yahoo does not keep the historical data (AHT-PD). Consequently there are two servers involved in the retrieval. Also dividends are not retrieved for this security.

Not sure it makes sense offer an option for user input when FM has been started from the command line with a switch. I would only use command line for unattended operation.

Thank you

[Mark]

Hi Chuck,

We have you on our mailing list, so you will be notified whenever any new version comes out. We don't have a mechanism for notifying specific people on specific features, but whenever a new version comes out it will contain a link to a list of new features in that version you can check.