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Quickstart

From a fresh machine to your first trade. You need the login and password your teacher gave you.

1. Install

Copy the install line for your system from the course site. It installs Python 3.13 if needed, the SDK, the fastboxex command and the terminal UI.

With Python 3.13 or newer already installed, this does the same by hand:

python3 -m venv ~/fastboxex
source ~/fastboxex/bin/activate      # Windows: ~\fastboxex\Scripts\Activate.ps1
pip install --find-links https://exchange.samuel-drapeau.info/wheels fastboxex plotly

2. Save your login

fastboxex setup

It asks for your login and password once and saves them where only you can read them, in ~/.config/fastboxex (%APPDATA%\fastboxex on Windows). Every script then finds them from any folder. On campus or off campus nothing changes: the campus server is tried first, then the Singapore relay.

3. Check everything

fastboxex doctor

server       Campus       202.120.13.117:11001                 reachable
server       Singapore    exchange.samuel-drapeau.info:11001   reachable
runtimes     11 exchange, 21 arena
login        user 6, runtime 11 exchange, in 0.14s
feed         4/4 books, delay p50 5 ms, p95 9 ms above the fastest sample
arena        0/0 arenas in use, 1 traders allowed
doctor       done

One reachable server is enough. See the fastboxex command for what each line means and what to do when one fails.

4. Watch the market

fastboxex run examples/01_hello.py          # who you are, what you can trade
fastboxex run examples/02_market_board.py   # every market, live
fastboxex run examples/03_order_book.py     # the order book of one market

These only read. Ctrl-C stops them.

5. Join the class game

Your teacher opens an arena and gives you a code.

fastboxex run examples/06_class_game/play.py --code THE-CODE

It waits for trading to open, then trades and prints every fill. To compete, edit my_signal in play.py. 05_strategies/ holds two more strategies to start from. Ctrl-C leaves, and the script stops by itself when the teacher ends the game. If it dies, run it again: you return to the same seat.

6. Your own script

import time

from fastboxex import Platform
from fastboxex.price import to_display

platform = Platform.auto_login()
asset_id = platform.asset_by_symbol("JTW")["asset_id"]
market = platform.market()

time.sleep(1)
md = market.get_latest(asset_id)
print(f"bid {to_display(md['bid']):.2f}  ask {to_display(md['ask']):.2f}")

Platform.auto_login() uses what fastboxex setup saved. Pass runtime="arena" to reach arenas.

7. Without a server

SimExchange runs a full order book on your machine, with no account:

from fastboxex import SimExchange, SimConnection

ex = SimExchange(tick_size=100, lot_size=100, reference_price=1_000_000)
ex.add_asset(1)
pid = ex.add_participant("bot", cash=10_000_000_000, inventory=100_000)
for state in ("Suspended", "Auction", "Trade"):
    ex.transition_to(state)

conn = SimConnection(ex, pid)
conn.submit_limit(1, 0, 999_900, 100, client_tag=1)
print(conn.drain_acks())

See the SimExchange guide.

Next steps