I'm testing a strategy (while waiting for 5.1 to come to market).

I'm finding the 5.0 interface to the Strategy Monitor and the Orders window very confusing, versus the old approach. For example, my current Strategy Monitor tells me I've had 8 "trades" today (wait, make that 9), but I can't for the life of me find them listed anywhere.

Perhaps it's because I've got it set to Auto-Stage? I know, the auto-trading is not functional, and apparently the Orders functionality either...

Where would the active alerts -- ie: "Jimmy, Make this trade!!!" -- be found? In the Orders window I would assume... when it's working? Or am I missing something?

The number of trades are the number of theoretical trades that occurred for the Strategy over the Data Range you selected. It's just a reference.

As for finding your Alerts just look at the bottom window. Of course you have to either:

1) highlight the strategy whose Alerts you want to see, or,
2) click the "Show Alerts for all Strategies" button (Alerts pane toolbar).

Be sure to review the User Guide too. Just hit F1 with the SM in focus.

Let me clarify:

YES, I can see all my "alerts" in the Alerts window at bottom. However, given the Dip Buying strategy I'm testing, these are all limit orders waiting to be triggered by stock movements in the current day's trading. In that sense, calling them "alerts" is erroneous.

I consider an alert to be an urgent notice to make a transaction, not "I'm sitting here with my toe in the water to see if any fish bite it." A staged limit order is NOT an alert.

Interestingly, the status bar at top tells me that today I have 12 "Trades" (which I can't find any evidence of anywhere)(and BTW, what I WOULD consider to be "alerts" in the true sense) and 0 "Alerts," even though I started the day with 100 limit orders in the Alerts window -- which I assume are now down to 88, given the 12 "trades." (And this is with Auto-Stage unchecked.)

Are you picking up on the inconsistency here? Your own terminology doesn't seem to understand what an "Alert" is.

Yet I can't find any evidence of which buys have been triggered ("Trades"), which again is what I mean by the term "alerts." In the legacy system, you could see what had been triggered (there were even audio alarms: WHOOP WHOOP WHOOP).

In addition, you saw how each of your limit orders was doing throughout the trading day. (ie: Your staged limit order is 100 CSCO @ 8% off yesterday's close... At 10:15 this morning, CSCO is up 2.3%) I'm not seeing any of this in 5.0.

In other words, I'm running a strategy, but once a buy is triggered -- ZOOM! -- it disappers off the radar screen and I have no idea what the Buy is!!! What good is that?

Maybe I've been coming across as a hopeless newbie, but that ain't the case. I did a few million dollars worth of trades using the legacy system back in 06. 60/40 win-lose ratio, 3.75%/-3.07% profit/loss percentage... I know the power of the Dark Side.

I just can't make heads or tails out of this new-fangled semi-implementation. So far it's great if your primary interest is creating code and running tests... but it doesn't seem to even be out of the gate as an actual trading platform.

QUOTE:
So far it's great if your primary interest is creating code and running tests... but it doesn't seem to even be out of the gate as an actual trading platform.

That "+" tip regarding the User Guide made on the other topic should clear this issue too. "Phased rollout" of WLP5 was already addressed in the User Guide half a year ago. Have to wait for 5.1 for the trading features.

QUOTE:
I consider an alert to be an urgent notice to make a transaction,

There's a glossary in the Reference section, so you should probably see what Wealth-Lab means by the term "Alert" in case you're still considering your own definition.

Anyway "Alert" does in fact mean that you should enter that order right now. Stop and Limit orders have to be waiting in the market for execution to occur. However, if you have hundreds of Alerts, it's best to use the Quotes tool to manage exactly when those Alerts are actually placed in the market, i.e., when they're marketable or near marketable (see Trigger Threshold).

QUOTE:
I'm running a strategy, but once a buy is triggered -- ZOOM! -- it disappers off the radar screen and I have no idea what the Buy is!!!

It will be on the Alerts view, where it can be routed (automatically) to the Orders tool. When 5.1 is released, this will be more clear.

QUOTE:
So far it's great if your primary interest is creating code and running tests... but it doesn't seem to even be out of the gate as an actual trading platform.

Exactly right. Trading isn't implemented until 5.1. Just wait a week.