webwiz
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Post by webwiz on Mar 3, 2016 12:28:54 GMT
Thanks to those who posted constructive ideas. Some very clever but beyond my capabilities so I am still using a sheet of paper and am open to non-technical suggestions.
Mods: Sorry that it was my thread that got troll-jacked, but not really my fault.
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Post by GSV3MIaC on Mar 3, 2016 16:26:45 GMT
If you can type you should be able to use SL75's. Suggestions, if you can remember them.
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webwiz
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Post by webwiz on Mar 3, 2016 16:34:41 GMT
If you can type you should be able to use SL75's. Suggestions, if you can remember them. I must have overlooked them in the spat that my thread descended into. SL75 if you are listening please repeat.
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alanp
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Post by alanp on Mar 3, 2016 17:44:43 GMT
Missed all of this - I must stop having a life beyond the web Ignoring the descent into anarchy which sounds like where it ended up - What was the main point of the thread please?
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Post by GSV3MIaC on Mar 3, 2016 17:58:27 GMT
The point / question was how do people keep track of what loans they want to buy into on the SM (and how much), given you only have seconds (usually) to decide whether to play captcha or not. Some folks use post-its, some folks have PC programs to assist, SL75 had a neat 'add on javascript bookmarked page' trick, etc. I suggested SS might like to keep the prefund 'how much do you want' box around for the life of the loan (what I'd really like is for them to autobuy until I get there!) .. as mentioned on another thread about the release of later tranches of existing loans, a continuing 'I want £x in this one' database field at SS's end would permit fair-sharing of those extra tranches, rather than dumping the whole mess onto the SM for FFF.
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adrianc
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Post by adrianc on Mar 3, 2016 19:39:44 GMT
The point / question was how do people keep track of what loans they want to buy into on the SM (and how much), given you only have seconds (usually) to decide whether to play captcha or not. Some folks use post-its, some folks have PC programs to assist, SL75 had a neat 'add on javascript bookmarked page' trick, etc. I suggested SS might like to keep the prefund 'how much do you want' box around for the life of the loan (what I'd really like is for them to autobuy until I get there!) .. as mentioned on another thread about the release of later tranches of existing loans, a continuing 'I want £x in this one' database field at SS's end would permit fair-sharing of those extra tranches, rather than dumping the whole mess onto the SM for FFF. Coo-ee... sl75
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sl75
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Post by sl75 on Mar 4, 2016 8:45:33 GMT
The point / question was how do people keep track of what loans they want to buy into on the SM (and how much), given you only have seconds (usually) to decide whether to play captcha or not. Some folks use post-its, some folks have PC programs to assist, SL75 had a neat 'add on javascript bookmarked page' trick, etc. I suggested SS might like to keep the prefund 'how much do you want' box around for the life of the loan (what I'd really like is for them to autobuy until I get there!) .. as mentioned on another thread about the release of later tranches of existing loans, a continuing 'I want £x in this one' database field at SS's end would permit fair-sharing of those extra tranches, rather than dumping the whole mess onto the SM for FFF. Coo-ee... sl75 They say a picture speaks 1000 words... Since the previous post, I decided it was worth re-organising my portfolio a little (I'm a little over-exposed to borrowers with multiple loans, so now want to increase exposure on single loans), so this is what (a part of one of) my screen(s) looks like during a buying session. The "back" window has check4change auto-refreshing it every 30 seconds when the market is idle, or every 10 seconds when it's active (can be done manually if you prefer), and the "front" window has the buying page for any loan you want. When I spot a loan appear on the list, I'll glance up at the toolbar, and see if it's on the list, and if so, click on the relevant link in the front window. The links in firefox's "bookmarks toolbar" are javascript "bookmarklets", so rather than going to a new page, they modify the current page, and in particular they change the form on the RHS, both filling in the amount to buy, and also changing the target of the form, so it buys parts of a different loan. You still need to click "Invest" and "OK", and verify the captcha as normal... but you can have a quicker reaction time, as the captcha can be completed IN ADVANCE (but as it expires after about 1-2 minutes, you need to click a lot of trees, boats, lakes, rivers, street signs/names/numbers, etc. during a buying session...). This is only likely to be productive during "busy periods" when a lot of loan parts are changing hands. The version of the bookmark I posted before was javascript:(function(){document.invest.action="/invest/182";document.invest.amount.value="100"})() (this would be for buying £100 of PBL084, which has a 182 in its URL) All the bookmarks differ from each other only in those 2 numbers. Often you'll see someone selling down a batch of several different loans in sequence, each being taken up within a few seconds. In such cases it can be possible to figure out which one of your targets will be next, in which case, you can initialise the form by clicking the relevant link, press the "Invest" button, and be hovering over "ok" for when the loan next appears. In a sense, this is equivalent to the technique that has been discussed before where, when you see the amount available drop to zero, you can leave the browser window hanging around for the NEXT time it shows a non-zero amount... except that you can easily switch the same form to buy ANY loan. If I succeed in buying the full amount of the target, I'll just delete the relevant bookmark. Otherwise, during the next quiet period, I'll edit the link to reduce the target amount. Pence can easily be included with a decimal point, as they don't take any longer to "type" by this method.
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webwiz
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Post by webwiz on Mar 4, 2016 12:22:08 GMT
Blimey. I can see I just can't compete with you hot shots. I'll just have to stick with my piece of paper. Fortunately I am more or less fully invested and was trying to buy on the SM to improve my diversification.
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mikes1531
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Post by mikes1531 on Mar 4, 2016 13:24:58 GMT
They say a picture speaks 1000 words... sl75: What is the function of the two bookmarks at the left of the toolbar? ('Buy 50' and 'Buy 150')
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cooling_dude
Bye Bye's for the PPI
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Post by cooling_dude on Mar 4, 2016 13:50:49 GMT
I've been playing with around with a new system; should be quite easy for most to use; even oldgrumpy with his Dial Up Internet & 1995 Siemens Nixdorf PC Using the Distill app (an app that alerts you to changes on a web page), I have set it up to alert me when any of the loans that I'm interested in has an amount available to invest in; when this occurs I get a little box on my screen (the Distill app telling me the loan page has updated), I click that box and it takes me straight to the loan page. To achieve the above is really easy; 1. Download and install the Distill app extension (available to Chrome; not sure about the other browsers). You will get a little raindrop icon on your toolbar in Chrome. 2. Go to the loan that you are interested in 3. Click on the raindrop icon 4. Click "select parts of page" and select the remaining amount figure (probably £0.00) 5. Save the selection 6. Set up the alert options (I have it to check the page every 5 secs; make sure you have "Show Notification Popup (for local monitor)" & "Play Audio Clip (for local monitor)" selected Repeat steps 2-6 for all the other loans you are interested in. In fact, if you have the time, you could do it for every loan on SS, and then on the list of updates you could turn off the alerts to loans your want to avoid, but easily turn it on at a later date if you decide you want to start investing in it. I hope that all makes sense
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mikes1531
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Post by mikes1531 on Mar 4, 2016 14:03:09 GMT
6. Set up the alert options (I have it to check the page every 5 secs; cooling_dude: - Do you have to have a tab showing the page for the loan open in your browser for this to work?
- Do you know whether these frequent checks put a load on your PC or your
mobile device (if that's what you're using)? If it requires data transfer this might be a problem for anyone with a limited data allowance from their ISP (or phone company).
- What about the load on the SS server? Might it be an issue? Or is it so small that no one will care?
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SteveT
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Post by SteveT on Mar 4, 2016 14:15:24 GMT
I suspect that could lead to the blocking of your IP address problem that some users previously encountered (for repeatedly polling the SS server)
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cooling_dude
Bye Bye's for the PPI
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Post by cooling_dude on Mar 4, 2016 14:18:15 GMT
6. Set up the alert options (I have it to check the page every 5 secs; cooling_dude : - Do you have to have a tab showing the page for the loan open in your browser for this to work?
- Do you know whether these frequent checks put a load on your PC or your
mobile device (if that's what you're using)? If it requires data transfer this might be a problem for anyone with a limited data allowance from their ISP (or phone company).
- What about the load on the SS server? Might it be an issue? Or is it so small that no one will care?
1. No, I don't need a tab opened for every loan; but I do keep just the one tab open (logged into the SS website, on the available loan page) so that I don't get logged out. You can be doing something completely different on the PC; you will still get the notification box on your screen. Click it and it opens the loan page on chrome. 2. I'm using my laptop, it's not a particularly powerful one and doesn't seem to slow it down at all. 3. As it is only monitoring one part of the page, I don't think it will be an issue. However, this is more GSV3MIaC field.......... poke> poke> GSV3MIaC
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cooling_dude
Bye Bye's for the PPI
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Post by cooling_dude on Mar 4, 2016 14:22:42 GMT
I suspect that could lead to the blocking of your IP address problem that some users previously encountered (for repeatedly polling the SS server) I don't think so. I've been using this method for the last 3 months (but only for the available page), with the entire page being checked every 5secs, and the SS server doesn't seem to mind. Like I said in my previous post; this is not my area of expertise; somebody with more knowledge in this field will have to provide some more info....
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star dust
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Post by star dust on Mar 4, 2016 14:28:53 GMT
To achieve the above is really easy; 1. Download and install the Distill app (available to Chrome; not sure about the other browsers). You will get a little raindrop icon on your toolbar in Chrome. I googled this to see if they had a version for Firefox and found something else you might be interested in "The Distiller App: A Portal to the World of Whiskey ...; and Distiller – Your Personal Liquor Expert" it's available on itunes, and for android, not sure about chrome though
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