I don't want to make people unnecessarily excited prematurely, but several days ago I promised to put together a rough "road map" for the next version of MF Pro.
Here's what we've stopped at so far.
1. Comprehensive Market Search
There will be a separate module, a form, for entering the criteria for the markets that you want to add to MF Pro. It will include basic market properties, such as the name, sports type, number of selections, start time, in-play / not in-play, country, volume etc., as well as more complex ones, like price range of selections.
This module will be fully incorporated into the market scheduler, i.e. will seek and add the specified markets automatically.
2. Triggers
2.1. There will be an ability to execute two or more actions on the same conditions. I.e. you won't have to add multiple triggers with the same condition list to, say, bet and set a variable. Instead you will just key in two actions into the same trigger.
2.2. User constants. The users of X-Feeder are already acquainted with this simple and efficient way of defining variables that are used only once, or for initialising normal user variables. Each constant will take very small place in the window, and certainly won't require adding a whole trigger with numerous fields to fill.
These constants will not be protected in a protected trigger file, so this will be an ideal way to let users adjust the strategies hidden behind the protected triggers.
2.3. Enhanced and improved trigger editor. I must admit that the present editor only fits for small trigger blocks, consisting of 1 to 10 triggers. Adding and managing more can be a nightmare. So we will make sure a big number of triggers can be loaded and handled fast and easy.
The editor will be available offline, i.e. you will be able to view and edit triggers without opening MF Pro and logging in. Moreover each trigger file will be associated with MF Pro, which means you'll double-click on it, and it will be automatically opened inside the trigger editor.
The triggers will be printable, so that you could contemplate them on a sheet of paper in spare time.
2.4. The conditions editor will be polished too: such obvious functions as copying, pasting, moving, switching conditions will be available in a user-friendly interface.
Having said all that, we will see to it that the new trigger interface is fully compatible with the old trigger files, so you won't have to rework them.
3. Trends and Charts
3.1. We will add the standard BetFair price / volume chart to the chart window.
3.2. Apart from the usual charts we will introduce trend charts that will show the tendencies in price (and other market parameters) changes. These trends will be reflected in trigger variables, so it'll be possible to use them in your triggers for the analysis of market conditions.
4. Settings Profiles.
We will finally get rid of the warning to Vista users not to install MF Pro in program files, because all settings will be stored in special profiles that Windows won't frown upon.
Plus you will be able to easily load pre-saved settings into the program for they will be saved under specified names as your settings profile. This should be a massive help to those who run two and more copies of MF Pro on the same computer, as well as to those who will make use of VPS servers in future.
5. Log Files - not so scary any more
5.1. We will create a special log viewer where you'll easily get access to the log messages you need. They will be filtered, sorted and marked in a convenient way. The log viewer will be a separate application loadable without MF Pro.
5.2. Log files will (most probably) be archived. At any rate they won't take so much drive space.
5.3. There will be an option to immediately see what's the ultimate reason for a trigger not to be executed at any given moment. So you'll basically click on a special button and will see something like "Condition Market Volume is greater than 10000 is not satisfied" and will immediately understand that the matter is in the market's volume, instead of rummaging through tons of log file records.
6. Minor things
The prices in MF Pro will be displayed exactly as they are displayed at the BF web site.
There will be an up/down arrow control next to the price of each unmatched bet in the betting interface, to make it easier changing the price by ticks.
The sorting of markets in "My Markets" will take less time.
There will be an option not to load market's selections until certain time before the event's beginning.
The program will be compatible with MS Excel 2010.
7. General code improvements
We will revise the whole code of the program in search for bugs, memory leaks and other problems not noticed before. We will design even more comprehensive unit tests to cover most unexpected situations. Every effort will be aimed at making MF Pro faster and more reliable.
I may have omitted something intentionally or unintentionally. I think something might come up or be discarded as we develop the project. We don't make any guarantees, we're just sharing our plans with you, as we value any feedback you may give us at this (or any other point).
As we envision massive changes in the code, we will allocate enough time for free beta testing before we can call it an official release.
Then as the new version is brought to life, we will organise the second Trigger Battle with more substantial prizes.