Incorrect Date and/or Time Display, Missing Historical Intraday Data, Chart Not Updating

Introduction

This page explains setting the Date and Time related settings in Sierra Chart and on your computer system. It explains correcting your computers clock and setting it accurately.

An incorrect Date-Time setting on your computer and/or an incorrect time zone setting on your computer or within Sierra Chart, can cause missing historical Intraday data in a chart or prevent an Intraday chart from updating.

Date-Time Issues and Settings to Check

1. If the times displayed in Charts and Quote Lines on a Spreadsheet or Quote Board are incorrect or not what you require, then the Time Zone setting in Sierra Chart may be incorrect. Select Global Settings >> Time Zone on the menu to change this.
   
   Set the Time Zone control to the time zone you want times displayed in. For complete details and instructions to use the Time Zone control, refer to the Time Zone documentation page.
   
   The time zone can be set differently for individual charts. Refer to Using Different Time Zone in Individual Charts.
2. With some Data and Trading services, time stamping of real-time data and the timestamp that is needed for historical data requests is based upon your computer's clock.
   
   In these cases, it is critical that both your computer's Date-Time and Time Zone are set correctly. Follow the instructions in the Setting Computer System Date-Time and Time Zone section to correct these.
   
   After setting the Date-Time on your computer, you will need to re-download the Intraday data in Intraday charts which have incorrect timestamps, by going to each Intraday chart and selecting Edit >> Delete All Data And Download. You only need to use this command once on an Intraday chart for each symbol. You do not need to do it twice for the same symbol.
3. Check the Timestamp Using Local Computer Clock setting, if available.
4. Make certain that the Time Zone setting in Windows is correct. Refer to the Setting Computer System Date-Time and Time Zone section for instructions.
5. An incorrect Sierra Chart Time Zone setting can also cause data to appear to be missing from the chart. It can also cause a chart to not update. More information about these issues can be found in Incorrect Computer Date/Time Settings and help topic 3.3 respectively.
6. When connecting to a Data or Trading service that uses the FIX protocol, generally if your computers clock is off by more than 30 seconds, the connection will not succeed.
   
   Therefore, you need to make sure that your computer's clock is set reasonably accurately when the FIX protocol is used. Refer to the Setting Computer System Date-Time and Time Zone section for instructions.

Setting Computer System Date-Time and Time Zone

It is essential when using Sierra Chart that your computers clock is set accurately. For instructions, refer to Set System Date-Time from Server. Those instructions also explain what to do if you encounter an error when setting the computer's Date-Time.

The Time Zone setting in Windows must also be correct. For example, if your computers clock is set to US Eastern time, then the Time Zone setting in Windows needs to be US Eastern. Otherwise, data could be time stamped incorrectly and this could also cause data to be missing from the charts. To change the Time Zone in Windows, go to the Date and Time program in Windows Control Panel. For further details, refer to How to Change the Time Zone in Windows 10 (https://www.tenforums.com).

When setting the Time Zone in Windows make certain that the Automatically adjust clock for daylight savings time changes option is enabled if it is available for the time zone you will be using. After enabling this option and applying it, verify that the clock setting is still correct. And if it is not correct, correct it.

After making changes to your computers Date and Time, you should definitely Delete and Re-download the data in your Intraday charts where there is incorrect Date-Time values or missing data. This only needs to be done once per symbol.

Main Window Title Bar Date and Time

The Date and Time on the main Sierra Chart window is derived from your local computer clock. It is adjusted by the Time Zone setting in Sierra Chart.

Therefore, if it is not accurate it means your computer's clock is not set accurately or the time zone setting on the computer is not correct.

Using Local System Clock for Timestamping

Select Global Settings >> Data/Trade Service Settings. You may see an option named Timestamp Using Local Computer Clock in the Service Settings on the left. If you set this option to No/False, then the timestamp provided by the Data or Trading service will be used for real-time received data.

If this option does not exist for the particular Data or Trading service you are using, then the time stamping will be done using the external service unless you are using the Interactive Brokers Trading service.

If Timestamp Using Local Computer Clock is set to Yes/True, then your computer systems clock will be used for time stamping real-time received data. Although the local computer date-time is first converted to UTC for time stamping.

Whether using the external service or the local computer clock, one is not necessarily better than the other. If you maintain a very accurate computer clock which is periodically synchronized to an accurate timeserver, then typically it is better to use your local computer clock for timestamp stability and to avoid out of order timestamps.

After changing this setting, you may want to Re-download the Intraday data in the Intraday charts. This only needs to be done once per symbol.