Libtrading is an open source API that implements network protocols used for communicating with exchanges, dark pools, and other trading venues. For a list of supported protocols, see the Supported Protocols section.
- No memory allocation on the RX and TX paths
- Single-threaded, non-blocking I/O philosophy
- SystemTap/DTrace probes
It is pretty easy to start working with FIX. One just need to create and initialize a FIX session properly. Once session is initialized a user is immediately able to send and receive messages. Therefore, a typical FIX work cycle consists of three principal stages: create a session, do basic logic, destroy a session.
To run a new session one just need to invoke a function
struct fix_session *fix_session_new(struct fix_session_cfg *cfg);which accepts a desirable configuration as an input argument and returns a new session in case of success. Configuration structure is just a set of particular parameters applicable to the newly created session. Among these are socket descriptor used for communication, SenderCompID and TargetCompID, Heartbeat interval etc
The heart of FIX protocol is a FIX message. FIX message is a key instrument used for communication. No wonder that libtrading introduces a special entity to represent a message.
struct fix_message;FIX messages consist of FIX fields which fully determine the type of the messages and are used to transfer data between counterparties. There are a few mandatory fields that must be in every transferred FIX message. Such fields can be directly addressed within struct fix_message. All the remaining fields are currently held in a simple linear array.
struct fix_message {
/*
* These are required fields.
*/
const char *begin_string;
unsigned long body_length;
const char *msg_type;
const char *sender_comp_id;
const char *target_comp_id;
unsigned long msg_seq_num;
unsigned long nr_fields;
struct fix_field *fields;
};The code snippet above demonstrates that BeginString, BodyLength, MsgType, SenderCompID, TargetCompID and MsgSeqNum occupy separate fields within a structure while all the remaining fields and their values are stored in a fields array.
There are two principal actions one can perform with messages: transmit and receive. To receive a message fix_session_recv() function is to be used
struct fix_message *fix_session_recv(struct fix_session *self, int flags)Its input arguments speak for themselves: an active FIX session returned by fix_session_new() and flags which specify input options. A pointer to the received message is returned upon success and NULL in case of failure.
A general function to send a message looks like the following
int fix_session_send(struct fix_session *self, struct fix_message *msg, int flags);Its input arguments include an active FIX session returned by fix_session_new(), a pointer to the message to be sent and input options as a third argument. Libtrading provides a bunch of functions to send messages of different types. These functions are essentially wrappers around general fix_session_send().
int fix_session_logon(struct fix_session *session);
int fix_session_test_request(struct fix_session *session);
int fix_session_logout(struct fix_session *session, const char *text);
int fix_session_heartbeat(struct fix_session *session, const char *test_req_id);The functions above may be used to send Logon and Logout, HeartBeat and TestRequest messages.
FIX field is just a pair of Tag and Value which appears in the message as "Tag=Value" followed by the FIX standard trailer. In order to parse a Value properly we should know what type it belongs to. It could be one of the datatypes defined in the FIX specification i.e. char, int, float etc Once datatype is known the whole FIX field could be parsed.
We would say that a particular Tag is known if we can parse the corresponding Value. A set of knows Tags is called a dialect. In other words, a dialect is the set of FIX fields we could parse properly.
We need dialects to support different flavours of FIX that are used in real life. Trading venues could run various versions of FIX protocol. Moreover custom fields could also be used. Libtrading provides the way to handle this smoothly.
struct fix_dialect {
enum fix_version version;
enum fix_type (*tag_type)(int tag);
};The structure above represents a dialect. Version is an indetification field e.g. FIX_4_4 is a FIX version 4.4 dialect. We have already discussed that in order to parse a FIX field we should know what datatype this field is. The function tag_type is intended to match the input Tag argument with the type of the FIX field i.e. the type of the Value. A user is free to develop its own dialect or use one of the already existed
struct fix_dialect fix_dialects[];The choosen dialect is stored within a session structure and passed through configuration parameters. Each time a FIX message is being received a tag_type function is invoked. Known fields are parsed in accordance with their datatypes, unknow fields are stored as strings.
In this section we will outline key fragments of a simple FIX-client implementation. The full code is available under the tools/fix/ subdirectory.
The full code may be broken into the following parts:
- Prepare and initialize configuration parameters
struct fix_session_cfg cfg;
cfg.dialect = &fix_dialects[version];
if (!sender_comp_id) {
strncpy(cfg.sender_comp_id, "BUYSIDE", ARRAY_SIZE(cfg.sender_comp_id));
} else {
strncpy(cfg.sender_comp_id, sender_comp_id, ARRAY_SIZE(cfg.sender_comp_id));
}
if (!target_comp_id) {
strncpy(cfg.target_comp_id, "SELLSIDE", ARRAY_SIZE(cfg.target_comp_id));
} else {
strncpy(cfg.target_comp_id, target_comp_id, ARRAY_SIZE(cfg.target_comp_id));
}
cfg.sockfd = socket(he->h_addrtype, SOCK_STREAM, IPPROTO_TCP);
cfg.heartbtint = 15;- Create and configure a FIX session
session = fix_session_new(cfg);
if (!session) {
fprintf(stderr, "FIX session cannot be created\\n");
goto exit;
}- Log on the server and start receiving the messages
ret = fix_session_logon(session);
if (ret) {
fprintf(stderr, "Client Logon FAILED\\n");
goto exit;
}
fprintf(stdout, "Client Logon OK\\n");- Receive and process the messages in accordance with FIX specification
while (!stop && session->active) {
msg = fix_session_recv(session, 0);
if (msg) {
if (fix_session_admin(session, msg))
continue;
}
}- Perform log out safely and destroy a session
if (session->active) {
ret = fix_session_logout(session, NULL);
if (ret) {
fprintf(stderr, "Client Logout FAILED\\n");
goto exit;
}
}
fix_session_free(session);The are only subtle differences between the way one can deal with FAST and the way one can work with FIX protocol. Libtrading provides a single approach for both. In order to start working with FAST one should create and initialize a FAST session and parse a template file. Therefore, a typical FAST work cycle consists of four principal stages: create a session, parse a template file, do basic logic, destroy a session.
To run a new session one just need to invoke a function
struct fast_session *fast_session_new(struct fast_session_cfg *cfg)which accepts a desirable configuration as an input argument and returns a new session in case of success. Configuration structure is just a set of particular parameters applicable to the newly created session.
To parse a template file one should use a function
int fast_parse_template(struct fast_session *self, const char *xml);which accepts a session to which a template file is applicable and a path to the xml template file.
Libtrading provides a particular structure to represent a FAST message.
struct fast_message;There are two ways to access a field within a message. Hash table can be used to access a field given the name and linear array to search by index.
struct fast_message {
unsigned long nr_fields;
struct fast_field *fields;
GHashTable *ghtab;
};To receive and transmit messages fast_session_recv() and fast_session_send() are to be used
struct fast_message *fast_session_recv(struct fast_session *self, int flags);
int fast_session_send(struct fast_session *self, struct fast_message *msg, int flags);In this section we will outline key fragments of a simple FAST parser implementation. The full code is available under the tools/fast/ subdirectory.
The full code may be broken into the following parts:
- Prepare and initialize configuration parameters
struct fast_session_cfg cfg;
cfg.preamble_bytes = preamble;
cfg.reset = reset;
cfg.sockfd = fd;- Create and configure a FAST session
session = fast_session_new(cfg);
if (!session) {
fprintf(stderr, "Parser: FAST session cannot be created\\n");
goto exit;
}- Parse a template file
if (fast_parse_template(session, xml)) {
fprintf(stderr, "Parser: Cannot read template xml file\\n");
goto exit;
}- Listen for input messages and print them out
while (!stop) {
msg = fast_session_recv(session, 0);
if (!msg) {
continue;
} else {
fprintf(stdout, "< tid = %lu:\\n", msg->tid);
fprintmsg(stdout, msg);
if (session->reset)
fast_session_reset(session);
}
}- Destroy a session once finished
fast_session_free(session);Should you have any questions, feel free to contact Marat Stanichenko mstanichenko@gmail.com