Yes, I know Microsoft Office is standard when it comes to professional companies. Or at least they say so. In fact there are a lot of state-owned departmens here in Germany that switched to free alternatives. There is a reason to pay money for software. Maintenance, development and innovation is expensive. That is a good reason to pay for it. And if you prefer to go and download Ninja Trader you can go to ninjatrader.com today and buy a license for $995 if you want to trade with as single broker. You want to trade with more than one broker. Oh no problem, simply pay$1495. There is a reason to pay money for software like this, but you might also have reasons not to do so. Maybe one good reason would be to spend that money on knowledge or a good vacation. Are you with me here? Okay, than it is time to download your version of Metatrader. I prefer Metatrader4, because it is around since 2005 and in last Februrary, when most people thought it might be a dying solution, the guys from Metaquotes polished it and gave the automation language MQL4 a fresh level-upgrade for the next years to come. And if you spend a lot of time away from your desk, there is something that I do use everyday. You can take your account with you on your iPhone or Android device. And you can not only see what is going on, you can actually open or close trades, set up notifications and monitor several accounts. Another good thing is, that most brokers do support Metatrader4 for demo and real accounts, so you have much more freedom when the time comes to choose or change your broker. Metatrader4 works on PC or MAC and you can make it work on an Ubuntu machine in 5 minutes if you use Wine. I also use it on a little first generation 700 MHZ EEE Netbook to trade 22 currency pairs 24/7 around the clock. So if you have a choice I would prefer Metatrader4 above any other kind of trading software right now. That might change someday in the future, but it is pretty much a standard for 10 years now. Lots of documentation, forums and books are available. Metatrader4 has its own Programming Tool called Metaeditor that works seamless and you will enjoy the one feature that is the killer argument in my eyes: The strategy tester, that allows you to test your strategy with historical data to find out how your automated system would have performed in the past. Do you want to get started with a well equipped, full featured and professional trading software that is ready to use for automation? Than follow these steps: Go to Metatrader4.com Find the download button Install the software There is a good reason to pay for software – but the best reason to use a software is to find a solution that will offer all the possibilities that you don’t think of now – but you will need them in 3 to 6 month from now.Automated Trading Tutorial Related Posts:MQL4 Course for your Inbox? Click here... MQL4 Video Bootcamp 2016 – Intro