If there had been a contest between C++ and Java then Java won. Unfortunately, a lot of people who develop software for market trading systems and models have not gotten the news and still use C++.
C++ will always be the language of choice for the narrow class of software applications that are "close to the metal" of the computer system. These applications include device drivers, operating systems and high performance database systems. Out side of this narrow class, Java is currently the only reasonably choice for application implementation.
The reason that Java is the the language of choice has less to do with the language itself than with the massive software base that exits for Java. Java allows the application developer to make use of the largest body of reusable software that has ever been implemented. For decades people have written in the computer science literature about portable, reusable software. In Java this has finally been realized.
This page provides links to resources for building an intra-day trading system in Java. Such a trading system consists of the following components:
A Java application server (e.g., Tomcat) based intra-day trading system.
A intra-day data feed for market transaction data.
A database to record trading information.
A Web based GUI to provide control and information about the trading system.
An infrastructure to support testing ("back testing") of trading algorithms with historic intra-day market data.
Ian Kaplan
Last updated, August, 2008
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