yes, limiting a risk is not a good rule, but calculating pips only is also not good.

other good suggestion I think is to use IBFX rules: http://www.interbankfx.com/ContestRules.php

the winner is defined by percentage increase of equity.
this will allow to compete also longer term strategies as they can stay flat for one month and next month get some descent results.
and you also can make a super prize for the yearly winner.

as for experts with fixed lot size - I think it is not that hard for programmer to modify expert to use simple MM, if he wants to be competetive.

where to post EAs for contest?

Yes you already found this place (I saw your test post).

As to the rules so it may be different rules.

I think (IMHO) MM is a bad idea for the contest purpose.
The winner has to start with the same balance (ex: 5000) and the same lot size (ex: 0.1) without any MM.
The winner is the best EA which makes profits with its strategy.
We can easily add to it MM to go live.

The pure idea behind the EA is the logic of the trading and the MM is coming after not before this.

I can write MM that makes me a winner with a very bad EA and that's not proof anything about my EA.

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I agree with you.

and i do not agree.
in some strategies MM or different lot size management, hedging and so on is the most important part. and when you invest money into something, the most important thing is how much percents can you gain (and also how much loose), but not the hypothetical units (pips in our case).
if you can make any strategy profitable with MM - go for it and make. if it will make money consistently, then this is all what people are loking for on this and similar forums.

Beluck and Codersguru, Please ...

As a normal user i agree with everybody.

We may have different nominations and different contests.

I do not agree only that we should have some limitations. If we take into account the MM etc only so it means that we are working for the rich people only. Personally my real deposit is not big enough to use some MM or different lot size management for example. So all the people with deposit size about 1,000 should have a chance in forex also (not very rich people only). You are two great programmers and you should agree with each other.

Anyway we will see that we will have (and you Beluck and Codersguru will see as well) and after that we will try to clarify everything.

those who think that trading is possible without MM are very wrong and in 99.9% cases they loose all money.
it is possible to follow MM rules even for small accounts like $500 or even $200 - just go to microlots broker.
i am not talking about any limitations - everyone is free to use any wild MM risk, i'm sure it will loose quickly.
and i am OK with any contest rules (contest is not important for me - just for fun) - i am just giving suggestion about correct evaluation of trading strategies (expert advisors).
and I think the contest rules must be announced before it starts and should not be changed until it ends.

You are right.

But people should have a choise what to use:
1. good EA with MM to double deposit in one year (may be) and be happy;
2. or put deposit onto the risk just hoping to increase it more quickly during the some period of time.

I do not have big deposit so I prefer the second one: if I lose my small deposit it will not be a tragedy. But I still have a hope. But to increase $1,000 deposit in one year (or in half a years) to have just $2,000 ...
It is much more better to have 100,000 and to increase it in one year up to 200,000. It's ok. But from 1,000 to 2,000 during the one year...
You know.
So personally i prefer the second one and i fully understand/agree about everything.

But I know that some people want to use EA with big deposit just to have some additional good income: they understand it as investing trying to create some portfolio and will never put deposit into any risk.
They prefer the first one (MM and everything).

It should be a choise.
It should be several nominations.

And this contests did not start yet.

Beluck,

I agree with you that the MM is the key between success and failure in live forex trading.

But, I think the contest is not for the best piece of MM code? Right?

How many MM pieces of code over there? few.

How many strategies? Thousands.

Can I add a MM to any of the thousands of the strategies? Very easy.

Can I use MM to trade? Absolutely.

Maybe we need a contest for the best MM? Maybe not.

__________________
Hope it helps !
Coders' Guru
Senior MQL programmer:
www.xpworx.com/custom.htm