OptionVue 5 can primarily be operated using a mouse, but there are some keys that need to be used for certain operations. There are also a number of special keys, often referred to as “hot keys” that execute operations and make using your program easier and more efficient. Some of the operations can only be done through the use of the keyboard, while others just offer an alternative to the mouse.
To add a new row, simply click anywhere in the row you want to add a new row above, and press the [Insert] key. To delete a row, select the row you want to get rid of by clicking on it and press the [Delete] key. Pressing the “down arrow” key when you are at the bottom of the page will open up more blank rows.
Adding and deleting columns in the Quotes Display works much the same way. To insert a column, select the heading of the column you want to add a column in front of, and press the [Insert] key on your keyboard. To remove a column, select the column heading and press the [Delete] key.
You use the [Delete] key to clear a field within the program. First select the field (the field will turn dark) and then press [Delete] to clear the entire contents of the field. In the Transaction Log, you may clear any individual field except the date. If you press the [Delete] key with the date field selected you will delete the entire line.
Keys can also be used to move around within the program. In the Matrix and any other “grids”, you can use the arrow keys to move from cell to cell. The [Home] key brings your focus to the far left side of the grid. [End] will jump the focus to the far right side. Among individual fields, you can use the [Tab] and Back Tab (which is holding down the [Shift] and [Tab] keys down simultaneously) to move from field to field.
The arrow keys can also be used to navigate from cell to cell, or within item lists, throughout many sections of the program. In the Price Charts, Volatility Charts, and Graphic Analysis, once you click within the chart to get a wand, the arrow keys can be used to move the wand left or right one unit per click.
After [Insert] and [Delete], the next most important keys to know are the Control [Ctrl] and [Shift] keys. First, they can be used to select multiple files or items in the program in exactly the same way as they are used in the standard Windows file system. One example would be when you are cleaning up your asset files. After choosing File | Delete in the main menu to view your asset files, you could simply delete the files one at a time, or use one of the choices at the bottom of the window.
But if you want to select multiple asset files, hold down the [Ctrl] key while selecting the individual asset files you wish to delete. The files selected will remain highlighted. When you press [Delete], all the selected files will be gone. To delete a range of files, select (click-on) the first one you want to delete. Then, holding down the [Shift] key, select the last file in the range you want to delete. The entire group will now be highlighted, and pressing delete will remove the entire highlighted group.
Another useful tip for the asset file windows is that, after selecting any symbol, you can then press any letter on your keyboard to bring you to the first asset file starting with that letter. So if you have 500 asset files, and want to find Wal-Mart, rather than scrolling through all those files, simply pressing “W” on your keyboard will bring you to the first asset file beginning with the letter “W”.
The [Ctrl] and [Shift] keys can also be used to transfer multiple assets into the Quotes Display from the Survey feature, from the Edit | Look up dialog, or from any OpScan report. Select the first item you want by clicking in the list. Holding down the [Ctrl] key allows you to choose multiple assets one at a time. Hold down [Shift] if you want to block out a section (or all) of the report to insert. Then click the Insert button to add the highlighted items to the Quotes Display. You can also right-click and choose what group on the Quotes Display you want these items added to from the pop-up menu.
The [Ctrl] and [Shift] keys can also be used to select multiple trades to analyze from the Trade finder. Once you have a list of recommendations, you can highlight any of the trades you want to see by left-clicking with your mouse on each recommendation while holding down the [Ctrl] key (or using [Shift] to highlight a range). Then just click the Analyze button.
All trades involving the same underlying asset will go in as separate cases to a single Graphic Analysis window. You can use the yellow arrows to browse through them, superimpose them, and use the red “X” to get rid of trades you are not interested in. When the selected trades involve different assets, multiple Graphic Analysis windows will open, one for each underlying asset.
The [Ctrl] and [Shift] keys also have many important functions when used in conjunction with other keys. When discussing key combinations, the convention is to show the two keys with a dash (-) between them, and without brackets.
For example, to edit an individual field, pressing Ctrl-E will put the program into "field edit" mode. The entire field turns dark when it is selected, and then turns light again once field edit mode is turned on. You can then move the cursor anywhere within the field and make changes. In field edit mode, pressing the [Delete] key will remove characters one at a time, while typed characters are inserted at the cursor position. Field edit mode is canceled when you press [Enter] or leave the field.
In the Price Chart, the first three buttons in the upper-left corner, D, W, and M turn the chart into a Daily, Weekly, and Monthly chart, respectively. The same thing can be accomplished by simply typing the letter on your keyboard. Press “W”, for example, and the Price Chart becomes a weekly chart. In the Volatility Chart, pressing “W” will bring up the wand within the chart.
Next on the price chart toolbar is a button to adjust the price chart for stock splits. For this operation, you first need to click in the chart and move the wand to the correct effective date of the stock split. Once the wand is on the correct day, pressing the letter “S” on your keyboard will launch the split adjustment dialog. Simply fill in the correct data and click OK.
The next button is to edit data within the price chart. Again, you need to place the wand on the date you want to edit. Pressing the letter “E” on your keyboard will then launch the Edit Data dialog.
You can set targets right on your price charts for use in the Trade Finder and Graphic Analysis. This feature can be used and adjusted by just using a mouse. When you click the Target button, and you’ll see a blue rectangle appear to the right of the final bar in the price chart. You can drag and re-size this rectangle using your mouse until it reflects your opinion about the future price movement of this asset, in terms of a date range and a price range.
But you can also use the arrow keys on the keyboard to move and resize the target rectangle, which is often better for fine-tuning your targets. Holding down the [Ctrl] key, in conjunction with the arrow keys, lets you move the rectangle. Holding down the [Shift] key, in conjunction with the arrow keys, lets you to re-size it.
A unique feature of OptionVue 5 is its stepper keys. In the upper right corner of the Matrix (next to the Close button), and in the lower part of the Expand window, you can see the “Stepper buttons”.
If you focus on a user-changeable field and click the stepper buttons, this increases or decreases the field contents one step at a time. This can be helpful when you need to try different trade quantities until you find the quantity you can afford, or find the quantity that makes a position delta neutral. With the bottom slide bar to the left the steps are as small as they can be. For moderate or large steps, slide the bar to the middle or far right.
As an alternative to the stepper buttons, you can press the left or right “bracket” keys to step an input field up or down by small, moderate or large intervals. You can step numeric and date fields with this method, using the left and right square bracket keys on your keyboard. Pressing the right bracket key “]“ steps a value up to the next higher position. Pressing the left bracket key “[“ steps a value down to the next lower position.
If you hold down the [Shift] key at the same time, the step will be a larger one. Pressing the right angle key “>” steps a value much higher. Pressing the left angle key “<” steps a value much lower.
Stepper keys can be very useful in the Matrix, where you can use them to step a quantity of contracts up or down quickly to see how many you can afford, or to find a delta neutral position. In date fields, the bracket keys affect the day, holding down the [Shift] key with a bracket key affects the month, and the angle key affects the year.
There are a number of hot keys designed for the Matrix. The OptionVue 5 Matrix is customizable, and there are no column headers that tell you what data is in each column. The is Legend feature can be turned on and off by clicking on the Legend button, or you can use the letter “L” on your keyboard to turn this feature on and off.
Within the Matrix, the “Last” trade price field for the options is special in many ways. If you press the letter “S” while the cursor is in an option’s Last field, you’re telling the program this option does not exist. OptionVue 5 then fills in an “..s..”. This means the same thing as the ‘s’ in the Wall Street Journal: The option does not exist. The program will exclude this option from quotes retrieval and all analysis activities.
Why would you need to do this? Very often a strike price will exist in only some expiration months. For example, there are usually farther out-of-the-money strikes available in the far months than are available in the near months. This setting tells you the option is not available, so you know it is not simply a missing price.
The letter “R” works in a similar way. Pressing the letter “R” on your keyboard while the cursor is in an option’s Last field tells the program the option has not traded today. You should seldom need to do this, since the quotes retrieval activity will puts r’s in the Last field if no price has come over. But its other use is to undo the “S” operation. If an option that did not previously exist now begins to trade, pressing “R” while in the Last field will bring the option back, available to trade and receive quotes.
If you press the letter “T” on your keyboard while the Last field is selected, the program automatically fills in today’s theoretical value for that item. This can be useful in cases when a price is not available, such as when it has not traded all day, or when you believe that the price picked up from your quote service does not accurately reflect the current market in the option.
You can also change multiple Last fields at the same time in the Matrix. Holding down the [Ctrl] key and pressing “T” while in a Matrix will cause the program to copy theoretical values into the Last fields of every option (except those marked with an “..s..”). If you press Ctrl-W, the program copies theoretical values only into those Last fields that do not contain a price or an “..s..”.
If you are connected to a continuous data service, pressing Ctrl-U in the Matrix or Quotes Display executes “fresh quotes” request. You will see the words [Updating…] in the title bar while the process occurs.
When analyzing positions in the Matrix, all options positions are included in an analysis. But you can also selectively include/exclude options positions in a Graphic Analysis by clicking the expiration month headings in the Matrix. For example, if you have positions in both the May and June options of a particular asset, if you click the May heading (turning it a different color) and then click the Analyze button, only the May options will be included in the analysis. If you want to select multiple headings, hold down the [Ctrl] key while clicking further headings. In this same way you can choose what contract is used as the independent variable in the Analysis
Another useful feature that can prevent a lot of manual typing on your part is Ctrl-D. This copies the contents of the adjacent field into the current field. For example, if you are manually creating an asset file, in the Options tab of the Define section you could copy the multiplier. Simply type it in the first line, and then arrow down, hitting Ctrl-D in each box to have the program copy the information down automatically.
The ditto function also works in the LEAPS and Convertible Securities Tab, and can be used in the Variable Basis model to copy just one Measured value into one Use value.
There are also some useful hot keys designed for the Transaction Log. Once you start a Transaction Log, every time you open a Matrix the program automatically reads it to see what your existing positions are in this asset. This information is used to overwrite the previous contents of all the Existing Position and Original Price fields in the Matrix. If no existing positions in the asset are found, the Existing Position and Original Price fields in the Matrix are blanked out. This procedure also takes place any time you view the Transaction Log and change something.
You can choose ClearMatrix from the main menu and clear your existing positions from the Matrix. You can also manually delete one or more existing positions by selecting the Ex.Pos field and pressing [Delete] on your keyboard. To re-establish your existing positions in the Matrix, press the letter “P” on your keyboard. You can also automatically clear out the Transaction Log. Pressing Ctrl-X while in the T.Log will clear all transactions.
The reconcile field of the Transaction Log is used to group transactions together into a single position. Pressing Ctrl-N while the cursor is in the Recon field will automatically assign the next letter in order for that asset. The letters A-Z are available to use for each asset in this field. In other words, you can use ‘A’ for an IBM position, and ‘A’ for a CitiGroup transaction. The program will correctly group the positions for each asset, and not group transactions from different assets together. But if you have a lot of transactions, it can be difficult to figure out what letter you should use next.
Pressing Ctrl-F will launch the Find dialog in certain sections of the program. The Find dialog can be used to locate a particular item in the Transaction Log. Simply click in the column you want to search by (e.g. Asset File) and launch the Find Symbol dialog. The program then asks for the item you want to find, and whether you want to search forward or backward. To find further instances of the same item, you can press [F3] on your keyboard. With Find Next, the direction of the search continues in the same direction you indicated in Find.
Find can also be a valuable tool for those with a large number of assets in the Quotes Display. Simply input the symbol you want to locate, and the program will bring you directly to it on your Quotes Display. Not having to scroll through long lists of symbols saves a lot of wear on your eyes and speeds up your work.