Terry,

Depending on whether you are an Apple or non-Apple lover I use Microsoft OneDrive. I only make the Apple disclaimer because I don’t use Apple products, so I can’t give any comment on how well OneDrive works with Apple, I can only give a perspective from the Microsoft angle.

I run my TWS and API and all my trading from a server computer in the US even though I am based in Australia. It has OneDrive installed there and I also have it on my computer here in Australia. Anything to do with my trading I work on in either location, I don’t save to the local computer itself, I always save it to the OneDrive location. Or if I’m lazy and do save something to my local desktop on this computer here, after I’m done I always do the right thing and cut from desktop then go paste it into the right spot in my OneDrive folder. I have Amibroker and Norgate Data Updater installed in both locations and will often do backtests and system building and analysis in both locations day or night. I access the US computer using Microsoft Remote Desktop Protocol. It is the US based computer that I only run the API and TWS for placing the trades though (I only trade US markets, I don’t seem to be able to make Australian markets work very well for what I am trying to do).

The good thing about this setup is that it also syncs everything to the Microsoft OneDrive cloud. So even if both of these computers in both locations go kaput/stolen or even if I cannot access them for some reason, or if I need to get to the files to restore to new computers at some point in future then I can do so from the content saved on the cloud OneDrive.

I have all the systems I develop in Amibroker AFL files, daily trade sheets, record keeping, spreadsheets, custom indicators, watchlists, business record keeping and anything else critical in there. I don’t have any scheduled backup software backing up the entire harddrive on the US server into the OneDrive, but I could if I really wanted to. I don’t do this because I have found that setting up new computers from scratch almost always requires fresh installs or something a little different to what have may existed on the machine that was entirely backed up and restoring backups of entire systems then become unusable. So long as I can have the critical documents, files, data etc able to be accessed I can easily enough set up a new computer in a few hours from scratch and once that’s done then set up the OneDrive on that new computer and hey presto all my files are again immediately available to use. This goes for whether I am setting up a new server in the US or a new laptop that I have bought today.

The reason I chose Microsoft OneDrive is because it integrates well into Windows so once you are in the habit of using it it is just like any other folder on your computer to save to or work within (so long as you have a good internet connection) and also Microsoft has a pretty good relationship with Chinese Authorities. I spend a bit of time in China and Microsoft services are freely accessible there. Things like google and others are not freely available there, so using such services and expecting easy access in a place like that is a challenge. I know that when I was living in China Dropbox was also difficult to access/use. This same logic is why I use Microsoft Remote Desktop Protocol to access my computer in the US. Systems like TeamViewer don’t always work from China.

I have never used/accessed the OneDrive app on my phone because I don’t do any trading/analysis from my phone, so no real need to do so, but I guess I could easily enough access the files from there if I really wanted to.

I entertained using Google Drive but again, the China problem.

Finally, because I have an Office365 licence/subscription to Microsoft for my small business which I use for trading (about $30 AUD a month for office applications, outlook email etc) it comes with OneDrive, so it is pretty much a no-brainer for my situation to use.

The only drawback of all this is the online/offline thing. If you don’t have an internet connection you can still work on the locally stored versions of the files and they will sync up to OneDrive once you get an internet connection again, but in the meantime you may be limited if files that are newer/updated are available on your other machines and you don’t have any internet connection right now. You can still work on the files on your local computer of course, it just means they may end up being not the latest versions if other changes/data is happening to your files in the other locations whilst you are offline. I generally don’t do analysis or need this stuff offline anyway and it is otherwise a scheduling issue on how you run your life/trading. If I know I’m going to be at 30,000 feet for 24 hours or deep sea fishing for a week then OneDrive is not the fault in not being able to analyse/work/trade in real time (and why would you want/need to work in these offline circumstances anyway, disconnecting at the right times is a necessity for sanity).

Also I know it’s off topic, but if you do this remote server computer for trading idea, I suggest also getting a two-factor authentication system for logging into it from afar. I have set up Duo which works well. It is just like the two factor authentication system that is needed for logging into TWS. Knowing I have two-factor to get into the trading computer itself and then another two-factor to get into TWS to trade is good for peace of mind.

Cheers,
Matt