Home » Products » FF.FIX Engine » FF.FIX Engine Knowledgebase

FF.FIX Engine Knowledgebase

Welcome to FF.FIX Engine Knowledgebase!

FF.FIX Engine Knowledgebase is an overview of things that FIX developers and solution providers can do using FF.FIX Engine™. It aims to familiarize FIX developers with various components and high-level APIs of FF.FIX Engine and help them in conceptualizing the initial architectural design for their FIX compliant products and solutions.

After the initial architectural design, FIX developers can proceed to build their robust, scalable and fast deployable applications using the rich set of well-tested APIs in FF.FIX Engine. The FF.FIX Engine API Guide in FF.FIX Engine includes detailed documentation of these APIs.

Who can use FF.FIX Engine™

FF.FIX Engine is the Software Development Kit from First Futures Software (FFS) for developing FIX Protocol based applications. It is designed to serve three categories of corporate and individual users:

  • Independent developers: This category of users includes corporate bodies with dedicated IT personnel, who intend to build their own in-house FIX compliant application. FF.FIX Engine makes FIX programming an easy and fast achievable task for them. The well-tested API libraries in FF.FIX Engine facilitate the users of this category to concentrate on their core business logic and needs rather than spending their major time in working out the FIX Protocol's intricacies.
  • Business partners and associates: This category of users includes the software vendors, who intend to make their products and solutions FIX compliant or to enhance their functionalities by integrating them with FFS products. FF.FIX Engine APIs provide a mechanism to integrate with virtually any application in financial trading domain.
  • Product developers at FFS: Product developers at First Futures Software use the FF.FIX Engine APIs in FFS own products as a general abstraction layer to leverage an open FIX Protocol based communication layer.

Minimum System Requirements

Before you install FF.FIX Engine, please make sure that your system meets the minimum hardware requirements and has the required software installed on it, as specified below:

Hardware

  • Processor: Intel® Pentium® 4 Processor or any higher and later editions of processors for desktop and notebook computers.
  • Memory: 512 MB minimum, 1 GB recommended for higher performance.
  • Minimum disk space: 2 GB

Software

  • Operating system: Any operating system from Windows® 2000, XP, NT, Server 2003 and Vista.
  • Microsoft .Net Framework: Version 2.0 or higher. Download and install it before using the product.
  • Microsoft Data Access Components (MDAC) 2.8.
  • Database server: FF.FIX Engine uses a flat file or alternatively any relational database technology to store FIX session state and messages. If you wish to use a database based persistence mechanisms for greater flexibility, you must have a standard RDBMS installed on your system. If not, please follow these sample download links:
    • SQL Server® 2005 Express Edition SP2 or SQL Server 2005 Express Edition with Advanced Services SP2 (free download)
    • MySQL® Enterprise (free download)

Note: FF.FIX Engine integrates with Visual Studio® .NET 2005. Installation of Visual Studio is not essential to use the FF.FIX Engine.

Installing FF.FIX Engine

To install FF.FIX Engine on your computer, run the FF.FIX Engine installer and follow the onscreen instructions in the FF.FIX Engine Installation Wizard.

Validating FF.FIX Engine

FF.FIX Engine Validator validates the FF.FIX Engine license and database. You must run FF.FIX Engine Validator after installing FF.FIX Engine and later whenever you change the license file or database server.

To validate FF.FIX Engine

  1. Open the FF.FIX Engine Validator window by clicking Start > All Programs > First Futures > FF.FIX Engine > Tools > FF. FIX Engine Validator (If you chose to launch the FF.FIX Engine Validator automatically during the FF.FIX Engine installation, this window automatically opens after finishing the installation.)
  2. Importing the FF.FIX Engine license:
    1. Click the Import License buttonin the FF.FIX Engine Validator window.
    2. In the Import License File dialog box, click Select. If a license file already exists, the License File Exists notification pops up. To replace the current license file with a new file, click Yes.
    3. In the Select FF.FIX Engine License File dialog box, browse to the license file you wish to import, select it and then click Open. The selected file appears in the License File section of the Import License File dialog box.
    4. Click Close to close the Import License File dialog box.
  3. Configuring FF.FIX Engine persistence:
    1. Click the Configure FF.FIX Engine Persistence buttonin the FF.FIX Engine Validator window. The FF.FIX Engine Persistence Configuration dialog box opens.
    2. In the Data Provider section of the FF.FIX Engine Persistence Configuration dialog box, select the data provider of your choice.
    3. To generate the database connection string, click New Connection. The Choose Data Source dialog box opens (This step is only for SQL Server and MySql database provider).
    4. Conditional. If you have selected the SqlServer option as a choice, select the Microsoft SQL Server option in the Data source section. Then select .NET Framework Data Provider for SQL Server option in the Data provider section. Click OK.
    5. Conditional. If you have selected the MySql option as a choice, select the Microsoft ODBC Data source option in the Data source section. Then select .NET Framework Data Provider for ODBC option in the Data provider section. Click OK.
    6. Conditional. If you have selected the File option as a choice and click Close to exit the dialog.
    7. In the Connection Properties dialog box, enter the required information and then click Test Connection. If the connection fails, repeat the earlier steps with possible changes. On successful connection, click OK. Then the database connection string and the Database Script tab appear in the Install Database Script dialog box.
    8. Select the Database Script tab.
    9. In the DB Script File section, click Select.
    10. In the Select FF.FIX Engine Database Script File dialog box, browse to the {InstallationPath}\FF.FIX Engine\{ProductVersion}\DBScript folder.
    11. Select the required database script (.sql) file: FFFIX_MSSQL.sql for the SqlServer option and FFFIX_MYSQL.sql for MySql option. Then click Open.
    12. Click Run Database Script.
    13. When the Database Script tab displays 100% completed, click Close to close the Install Database Script dialog box.
  4. To validate the license and database, click Validate in the FF.FIX Engine Validator window. After the validation process completes, the indicators for the License Validation and the Database Validation in the FF.FIX Engine Validator window may change to(success) and/or(failure).
  5. If the license validation fails, repeat steps 2 and 4 until the validation succeeds. If the database validation fails, repeat steps 3 and 4 until the validation succeeds. When both validations succeed, click Close.

How to use FF.FIX Engine APIs in your application

  1. Start the Visual Studio® .NET.
  2. Open or create your .NET application.
  3. In the Solution Explorer of your application, right-click References and then click Add Reference.
  4. In the Add Reference dialog box, click Browse and then add references to FF.Fix.dll and FF.Fix.Core.dll files available in the {InstallationPath}\FF.FIX Engine\{ProductVersion}\Lib\ folder.
  5. Import the required namespaces to your application code by adding using directives. For example:

    using FF.Fix;
    using FF.Fix.Core;
    using FF.Fix.Core.Message;
    using FF.Fix.Core.Session;

  6. Start developing your application using FF.FIX Engine.