The most important major addition featured in the newly released TDS beta version is the ability to import your own tick data. You can now create custom tick data sources, add custom symbols and import CSV files or other files with a similar structure.

The import process is greatly simplified by providing automatic detection at every step, starting with the number of digits and the symbol name and ending with the actual file format – the CSV column delimiter, the date & time column and format, the ask & bid columns and so on. You can even ask the Tick Data Manager to automatically determine the GMT offset and DST of your source data by comparing the imported data against the existing Dukascopy tick data.

This should make it fairly easy to import data from various sources that are able to export CSV-like files, for instance Metatrader 5. If your broker also offers MT5 and they are using the same liquidity provider for their MT4 and MT5 servers, you can now use the ticks from your broker in your MT4 backtests: simply download the tick data via MT5 then import it using the Tick Data Manager.

Tutorial articles and movies for exporting MT5 data and for importing tick data in the Tick Data Manager will follow during the next few days.

It’s important to note that the code that handles the import and autodetection is rather extensive and very complex. As such, in spite of all the testing that it already went through, it could be that there might still be issues with it so if you see anything that you suspect to be incorrect behavior, please open a support ticket and let me know the details.