This New User Orientation information will help you get started using QCharts and introduce you to the various resources you have available as a QCharts customer. You'll likely find the information on this page invaluable during your first few months of service, so you might want to add this link to your favorites and refer back here often.

Downloading the Software

Follow the directions at www.qcharts.com to download QCharts and install it on your computer. Make sure your computer meets the minimum requirements for running QCharts before you download it.

If you are currently using an older version of QCharts, an upgrade is first recommended. Download the latest version.

Downloading the QCharts software is very easy. Simply complete the steps listed below.

1. Go to the Download page and click the "Download" link.
2. Choose "Run" when the dialogue box appears. (Once the file transfer is complete, the installation procedure will begin automatically.)
3. Enter your username and password when prompted. If you do not have those yet, you can enter them later when launching QCharts. You will have other options to consider during the installation, but, in the majority of cases, you can simply leave the default choice as is and hit "Next", and you'll eventually reach "Finish".

You are now ready to start using QCharts. Simply look for the QCharts icon on your desktop to start the program.

Note: On those rare occasions when you do run into a problem while installing, alternatively, you can choose "Save" when the installer dialog box appears. Our installer will load the compressed QCharts program into an executable file and download to your PC. This takes 10 - 20 seconds on a high-speed connection and up to 45 minutes with a dial-up connection. Once this file has successfully loaded onto your PC, you simply double click to start the installer and walk through step 3 as listed above.

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How to Log On

Once an account is set up, and the QCharts software is installed, you can log in to QCharts.

If a QCharts icon was placed on the desktop, move the mouse pointer over it, double click on it and QCharts will start. The following screen will appear:

In the "User Name" box, type in the user name you entered when you registered. In the "Password" box, type the password you entered when you registered. Normally, these will be filled in automatically for you.

Below the "Password" box is the "On Connect" box. This tells QCharts what to do after a connection.

Once you have entered the user name and password and made a selection in the "On Connect" box, move the pointer over the "Connect" button and click on it, or press the "Enter" key on the keyboard.

The log-in window will go away, and a new window that says, "Synchronizing Files please standy..." will appear for a brief time. During this time, your computer is connecting to one of our servers. Once the connection to is established, QCharts will load the requested workspace. The "Tip of the day" screen may appear. Click on the "Close" button to continue to your workspace.

Identifying Parts of the Screen
The QCharts application consists of a large central area in which to display a workspace and various toolbars, status bars and menus around the workspace area as shown below. There may be toolbars located in different areas and maybe more toolbars than shown in this picture.

Note that some of the toolbars are grayed out. This is because some of the toolbars are active only when a chart is selected. If you do not have a chart selected, these toolbars are grayed out.

Take special note of where the menu is (upper left corner). Several operations will instruct you to click on menu entries.

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Workspaces

If this is the first time you have run QCharts after installing it, a screen that looks similar to the picture shown below should appear. Do not worry if your screen does not look exactly the same as what is shown here. A different background may be displayed. The charts and quote sheets may use up more or less of the screen space, depending on your screen resolution.

If you have no idea what a chart or quote sheet is, don't worry. That will be explained in later sections as you learn how to use the various windows in the workspace.

What Are Workspaces?
A workspace is a collection of charts, quote sheets, browser windows, and so forth, that you arrange in a way that is useful to you. You can have multiple workspaces saved on your computer, but you can only view one workspace at a time.

Think of workspaces as pages in a book. There are lots of pages in a book, but you only view them one at a time. You can easily change to other pages and even bookmark a page.

In a similar manner, you can easily change between workspaces and even "bookmark" ones used the most.

QCharts comes with several pre-made workspaces. The first time QCharts is started, the "Welcome to QCharts" workspace is loaded. You can either use this workspace or choose to open a new one.

How to Open an Existing Workspace
There are two ways to open a workspace. One way of opening a workspace is to move your pointer over the "Open Workspace" icon and click on it, as shown below. This icon is located on the QCharts toolbar.

Just move the arrow pointer over the icon and click on it.

Click this icon to open a workspace

The second way to open a workspace is as follows:

• Go to the menu at the upper left corner of the screen and click on the word "File". A new menu will appear.
• On the new menu, move the pointer over "Open Workspace..." and click on it.

With either method, an "Open" dialog box will appear, as shown in the picture below.

To open one of the workspaces listed, do the following:

• Move the pointer over the workspace you want to open, and click on it. (In this example, move the pointer over the workspace labeled "Buffett Watch.qcw" and click on it. The workspace name will change to a blue background to show it’s selected.)
  
  
  
  
• Then, move the pointer over the "Open" button and click on it to open the workspace.

A workspace, similar to what is shown below, will appear. Note that the numbers and graphs shown on your screen will be different because stock prices change!

This workspace contains a quote sheet, two Time and Sales windows, and two bar charts as shown below.

Congratulations! You have opened your first workspace.

At the very top left of the window, QCharts displays the name of the workspace. If the directions given on this page were followed, it will show "Buffett Watch".

How to Get a New Workspace
What if none of the pre-made workspaces include what you want?

Make a new workspace following these steps:

• Move the pointer to the menu at the top left of the screen and click on the word "File". A new menu will appear.
• On the new menu, move the pointer over the word "New" and hold it there. A sub-menu will appear.
• On the sub-menu, move the pointer over the word "Workspace" (all the way at the bottom of the "New" sub-menu) and click on it.

It's okay if everything disappeared. When you request a new workspace, an empty workspace is provided, which can be filled with whatever you want.

Directions for adding things to the workspace are given in the following sections.

How to Add a Quote Sheet to Your Workspace
Quote sheets display the current prices for stocks, options or futures. There are two ways to add a new quote sheet.

One way is to move the pointer over the "New Quote Sheet" icon, and click on it, as shown below.

The second way to add a new quote sheet to your workspace is to do the following:

• Move the pointer to the menu at the top left side of the screen, and click on the word "File". A new menu will appear.
• On the new menu, move the pointer over the word "New" and hold it there. A sub-menu will appear.
• On the sub-menu that appears, move the pointer over the "Quote Sheet" line and click on it.

With either method, a new default quote sheet will appear in the middle of your workspace area, and it will look similar to what is shown below.

Do not worry if the column headings are different from what is in the picture. That just means your default quote sheet settings are a little different from what is shown.

How to Add Symbols to a Quote Sheet
Initially, the quote sheet will be empty.

To add symbols to a quote sheet, do the following:

• Move the pointer to an empty row and click anywhere on the row.
• Type the letters for a stock, option or futures symbol. (For example the letters "CSCO" are for the stock symbol for Cisco Systems, Incorporated. As you type, the box under "Symbol" will turn white, and the letters being typed will appear.)
• When you are done typing the stock symbol, press the "Enter" key on your keyboard.

After you press the "Enter" key, QCharts will look up what company the stock symbol "CSCO" stands for. Once the symbol is found, the current stock price and the company name will be displayed on the quote sheet. If the symbol could not be found, the "Title" column will display what was typed, followed by "(Not Found)", or "(Looking Up)".

If the name in the "Symbol" column is followed by "{D}", it means the data shown is delayed. This is because when you subscribed to QCharts, you did not elect to receive real-time data for the exchange that symbol is traded on. The "Title" column will indicate how many minutes the data is delayed by adding a number after the "D". For example, {D15} would indicate the data is delayed 15 minutes.

Prices may, occasionally, show a yellow background for a second (the color is set to yellow by default). This indicates the price has been updated. If you are viewing the quote sheet during market hours, you are seeing real-time changes in the stock price.

The Net and Net% columns will have green backgrounds if the current price is higher than yesterday’s closing price, and they will have red backgrounds if the current price is lower than yesterday’s closing price.

To add other stock, option or futures symbols to the quote sheet, pick an empty row, click on it, type the symbol and press the "Enter" key.

How to Add a Chart to Your Workspace
Quote sheets are great for showing the current price of a stock, but what if you want to see historical prices, or see how the price is changing today? That is what charts are for.

Charts provide a graphical view of how the price has changed over time. There are two ways to add a new chart to your workspace.

The first is to move the pointer over the "New Chart" icon and click on it as shown below. This icon is on the QCharts toolbar, which is normally at the top of the screen in the middle.

The second way to add a new chart to your workspace is to do the following:

• Move the pointer over the menu at the top left of the screen and click on the word "File". A new menu will appear.
• On the new menu, move the pointer over the word "New" and hold it there. A sub-menu will appear.
• On the sub-menu, move the pointer over the "Bar Chart" line, and click on it.

With either method, a new chart with the default settings will appear, as shown below. If your chart looks different from this, it just means you have different default chart settings than shown here.

Note that this chart is displaying a symbol that has its data delayed by 20 minutes.

How to Change the Chart Data Display
Data can be displayed using one of four ways on a chart: Bars, Candlesticks, Lines or Histogram.

Select one of these from the chart toolbar. The chart toolbar is usually on the left side of the QCharts display, near the top. If the toolbar is grayed out, it means you do not have a chart selected. A portion of this toolbar is shown in the picture below.

To select a chart, move the pointer anywhere over a chart and click the left mouse button once.

To change the chart data display, move the pointer over one of the icons shown above and click on it. The data display change will only occur on the chart you have selected.

The bar and candlestick charts will show the open, high, low and close values for the bar. A line chart will only show a line of the closing values. A histogram chart will display the highs of the bar in a histogram format.

Try clicking on each of the display types to see how they change the view in the chart window. In the remaining sections, candlestick charts will be used in the examples, but you can use whichever type of chart you prefer.

How to Add a Time and Sales Sheet



Clicking this button will bring up a new default Time and Sales sheet for the symbol displayed in the "Symbol Entry" box. The Time and Sales sheet will display individual trades and quotes for a symbol, along with the time of those trades or quotes.

How to Add a Tabular Bar Sheet



Clicking this button will bring up a new Tabular Bar sheet for the symbol displayed in the "Symbol Entry" box. The Tabular Bar contains the open, high, low and close prices, along with volume data for the symbol, in a spreadsheet format. The current time interval will be used for each line of data. If the time interval is "Daily", each line will represent one day’s activity. If the time interval is 5 minutes, each line will represent 5 minutes of activity.

How to Add a SingleQuote Sheet



Clicking this button will bring up a new SingleQuote sheet for the symbol displayed in the "Symbol Entry" box. The picture shown below is of a SingleQuote sheet for COMCAST Corporation.

How to Display a Hot List



Clicking this button will bring up a Hot List selection dialog box, which contains a list of different Hot Lists. Hot Lists are groups of stocks that meet some predefined conditions. For example, stocks that had the biggest point moves during the day will be on the "US Stocks Point Gainers" list.

The stocks contained in the list will change from day to day depending on their price movement. There are lots of different Hot Lists to choose from.

This is something you can safely play around with on your own. Move the pointer over one of the items in the dialog box and double click on it. A new quote sheet will be opened that contains the stocks in that Hot List, sorted from highest to lowest.

How to Add an Option Montage





Clicking this button will bring up the Option Montage window. This requires the "QCharts Plus" subscription level. Changing the symbol will cause an option montage to be displayed for the new symbol. Note that each option symbol counts as a symbol being used and is added to your total symbol count. Displaying several option chains at once could cause you to exceed your symbol limit.

How to Display Market Depth





Clicking this button will bring up a new Market Depth window for the symbol displayed in the Symbol Entry box. Changing the symbol will cause Market Depth data to be displayed for the new symbol.

Saving Your Workspace
You now have a workspace that contains a quote sheet and a chart. It is time to save what you have done so far. There are two ways to save a workspace.

The fast way is to click the "Save" icon on the QCharts toolbar (as shown in this picture). It is usually near the top of the screen on the right side.

The second way is to do the following:

• Move the pointer to the menu in the upper left corner, and click on the word "File". A new menu will appear.
• Move the pointer over the "Save Workspace" line and click on it.

If you have already given the workspace a name, QCharts will just save it, and it will not look as though anything happened. You just have to trust that your workspace has been saved.

If you have not given this workspace a name before, the "Save As..." dialog box will appear as shown below.

To save a workspace you haven’t named before, do the following:

• Move the pointer over the "File name:" edit box and click in it.
• Type in a name for the workspace. (You can name workspaces whatever you want. For example, you could type in the name "My First Workspace" [without the quotation marks].)
• When you are done typing in the workspace name, move the pointer over the "Save" button and click on it.

Your workspace will be saved with the name you gave it, and with a file extension of ".qcw".

How to Save an Existing Workspace Using a Different Name
What if you have been playing with "My First Workspace" and have made changes to how it looks? You can save it as "My Changed Workspace" by doing the following:

• Move the pointer to the menu at the top left of the screen and click on the word "File". A new menu will appear.
• On the new menu, move the pointer over the "Save Workspace As..." line and click on it.
• The "Save As..." dialog box will appear as discussed in the previous section.
• Move the pointer over the "File name:" box and click in the box.
• Type in the new name you want for this workspace. For example, "My Changed Workspace" (without the quotation marks, of course) in the "File name:" box.
• When you are done typing, move the pointer over the "Save" button and click on it.

You will now have two new workspaces, the original "My First Workspace" and "My Changed Workspace". You can open either one using the directions given in "How to Open an Existing Workspace".

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Account Management / Billing

QCharts offers online Account Maintenance for those who wish to manage their own account(s). Account Maintenance provides 24 / 7 access to your account information, as well as many other benefits:

Add / delete services (exchanges, etc.)
Pay your bill
Change passwords
Restart an account
View billing history
Update credit card

For additional information on Account Maintenance, along with General Billing inquiries, please visit our Service FAQs.

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QCharts KnowledgeBase

There's a wealth of information stored in the QCharts KnowledgeBase (KB), so, whenever you have a question or can't figure something out, try searching the KB. We add more content daily, and, due to built-in intelligence, the KB gets smarter each day as new searches are attempted.

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QCharts Forums

The Forums area is a powerful tool for learning about QCharts and interacting with other traders. The Forums are a great place to talk about new trading strategies, how to get the most out of QCharts and much more. It's an essential communication tool to stay on top of current events and take advantage of our community of users. To read and respond to all posts, you’ll need to take a minute to register. Registration is free.

By registering for our Forums, you’ll automatically be registered for our handy File Share area. File Share is a cross between a public library and a private storage room. You can use the File Share area to post screen shots or charts to share or as a way to save important files in case you need to access them while traveling.

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QCharts Customer Service and Technical Support

To contact QCharts Technical Support or Customer Service, please visit our Contact Us page.