Training Guide¶

Welcome to the EduMatcher self-study training programme. This hands-on guide takes you from a cold start to confidently operating every major feature of the exchange, one exercise at a time, with a checkpoint after each step.


Who it is for	Students, self-learners and classes who learn best by doing
What it assumes	Basic command-line and YAML skills. No finance background is needed
How it relates to the other books	Each chapter links to the Participant Guide, Operator's Guide or Protocols and Clients for the explanation, and to the Reference Manual for details — the exercises do not repeat them

If you are new to finance, first read How an Exchange Works, a non-technical introduction to what an exchange does. If you have not run EduMatcher at all yet, the Quick Start Guide is the gentler first hour; this guide then goes deeper.

How to use this guide¶

The 29 chapters (00–28) form one sequence. Each chapter's Prerequisites section names what it needs, and for almost every chapter that is everything before it: later exercises reuse the configuration, the processes and the orders that earlier ones set up. Work through the chapters in order and stop when you have covered what you need — Choose your path below shows where. Three chapters can be taken early:

18 — Exchange Observer Processes needs only chapters 00–03. Taking it straight after chapter 03 gives you the viewers and monitors for every later chapter.
25 — Market Index needs only chapters 00–03 (plus pm-stats from chapter 15 for Exercise 9).
28 — IPO Valuation needs only chapter 00 for its first six exercises; the last also needs 00–03 and 07.

What you need¶

EduMatcher installed. Any of the routes in the Operator's Guide Installation chapter works; chapter 00 walks through them and helps you pick.
Several terminals. The exchange is a set of processes, and this guide asks you to watch them side by side. A multiplexer (tmux, screen) or split panes helps, but separate windows are fine.

The two consoles¶

This is the one thing worth knowing before chapter 00, because mixing them up is the most common early mistake:

	`pm-alf-console`	`pm-admin`
You are	a trader	the exchange operator
Prompt shown in this guide	`[TRADER01]>`	`[GW_ADMIN\\|ADMIN]>`
Typical commands	`NEW`, `AMEND`, `CANCEL`, `STATUS`, `ORDERS`, `POS`, `QUOTE`, `QLEGS`	`BOOK`, `HALT_SYM`, `CANCEL_SYM`, `KILL\\|GW=`, `SESSION\\|STATE=`, `GATEWAYS`
Can see the whole order book	No	Yes

A prompt containing |ADMIN]> always means the pm-admin terminal. Anything else is a trader console. Commands are not interchangeable between them — a BOOK typed into a trader console just answers Unknown command.

The configuration you build in chapter 01 calls the operator GW_ADMIN. The integration chapters 22–27 each generate a fresh configuration whose operator is OPS01, the same name the bundled example configurations and the Quick Start use. The role, ADMIN, is what matters.

Keeping the market open¶

Your configuration has sessions enabled, so the engine starts every run in CLOSED and rejects orders until the trading day is opened. Chapter 01 shows how to open it by hand from the operator console — SESSION|STATE=PRE_OPEN, then SESSION|STATE=CONTINUOUS — and the exercises assume you do this after every engine restart. If an order comes back REJECTED … code=MARKET_CLOSED, this is why.

Conventions¶

[TRADER01]> — type this at that trader console's prompt.
[GW_ADMIN|ADMIN]> — type this at the operator console's prompt.
A plain $ or a bare command — type this in a normal shell.
[output] — expected output; exact wording may vary between versions.
— a checkpoint. Verify it before moving on; if it fails, the next exercise will not behave as described.

Choose your path¶

flowchart LR
    Start(["Why are you\nhere?"]) --> Trader["Learn to trade"]
    Start --> Operator["Run or operate a\nclassroom exchange"]
    Start --> Everything["Cover it all,\nincluding external\nprotocols"]

    Trader --> T1["Parts I–II\nchapters 00 → 08"]
    T1 --> TDone(["Placing, amending,\ncancelling orders;\nauctions and TIFs"])

    Operator --> O1["Parts I–IV\nchapters 00 → 19"]
    O1 --> ODone(["Liquidity, risk\ncontrols, P&L, a full\nsession, admin tools"])

    Everything --> E1["Parts I–V\nchapters 00 → 28"]
    E1 --> EDone(["Everything above, plus\nALF, BALF, CALF, RALF,\nREST/WebSocket, the index\nand IPO valuation"])

    style Start fill:#4a5568,stroke:#2d3748,color:#fff
    style TDone fill:#2f855a,stroke:#276749,color:#fff
    style ODone fill:#2f855a,stroke:#276749,color:#fff
    style EDone fill:#2f855a,stroke:#276749,color:#fff

Your goal	Work through	What you'll have
Learn to trade — place, amend, and cancel orders; understand fills, TIFs, order types, and auctions	Parts I–II (00–08)	Everything a working trader needs day to day
Run or operate a classroom exchange — liquidity, risk controls, P&L, a full session, admin tools	Parts I–IV (00–19)	Everything above, plus the operator's toolkit
Cover everything, including external protocols	Parts I–V (00–28)	The full training programme

Training plan¶

The five parts follow the chapter numbers, so reading the book front to back is reading the chapters in order.

Part I — Foundations¶

#	Chapter	You will be able to	Background reading
00	Installation & Setup	Install EduMatcher and know where its files live	Installation, Quick Start Guide
01	Configuring & Starting Up	Author, verify, deploy a configuration; start the engine, scheduler and both consoles	The Configuration Workflow, Config Verifier, Running the Exchange
02	Setting Up Market-Maker Liquidity	Seed a two-sided book so there is something to trade against	Market Making, Market-Maker Bot
03	The First Trade	Submit orders, read fills, follow an order's lifecycle	ALF Console, Order Types

Part II — Trading mechanics¶

#	Chapter	You will be able to	Background reading
04	Amending Orders	Change price and quantity, and predict the effect on queue priority	Order Amendment
05	Order Types Deep Dive	Use MARKET, STOP, STOP_LIMIT, FOK, IOC, ICEBERG and TRAILING_STOP	Order Types
06	Time-in-Force & Sessions	Choose a TIF and predict how each session phase treats it	Auctions & Scheduling
07	Auctions	Run an auction and compute the equilibrium price by hand	Auctions & Scheduling — Equilibrium price
08	Cancelling & Managing Orders	Inspect and cancel resting orders; use the operator's bulk-cancel tools	ALF Console, The Admin Console and Exchange Commands

Part III — Liquidity, risk and results¶

#	Chapter	You will be able to	Background reading
09	Market Making	Run a two-sided quote by hand and inspect its legs	Market Making
10	Combo Orders	Submit multi-leg and OCO orders, and reason about leg risk	Combo Orders
11	Risk Controls	Configure and trigger collars, circuit breakers, halts and the kill switch	Risk Controls
12	P&L & Clearing	Read positions, VWAP cost and realized/unrealized P&L	Positions and P&L
13	Market Data & Drop Copy	Explain the market-data and drop-copy feeds and watch them	Drop Copy, DC Gateway
14	AI Traders & News	Run an AI market with a hidden true value and move it with news	AI Traders

Part IV — Running a full session¶

#	Chapter	You will be able to	Background reading
15	Statistics & Reporting	Query OHLCV, trades and snapshots for analysis	Statistics and Reporting
16	Persistence & Recovery	Say what survives a restart, and verify it	Persistence, Audit Trail
17	Capstone Scenario	Run a full session end to end, combining everything above	Running the Exchange
18	Exchange Observer Processes	Compare the book, tape, order monitor, audit trail, stats and clearing views side by side	Processes, Environment and Ports
19	Advanced Admin Operations	Use `KICK`, `QCANCEL`, `CANCEL_SYM` and manual session overrides	The Admin Console and Exchange Commands

Part V — Integration and advanced topics¶

Chapters 20, 22–24, 26 and 27 connect other software to the exchange over its wire protocols and APIs; 21 automates the operator, 25 adds a market index and 28 prices an IPO.

#	Chapter	You will be able to	Background reading
20	Drop-Copy Replay & Recovery	Detect sequence gaps and recover a consumer	Drop Copy — Replay
21	Automation & MM Bot Tuning	Script operator workflows and tune `pm-mm-bot`	The Admin Console and Exchange Commands, Market-Maker Bot
22	RALF Post-Trade Protocol	Write a clearing, drop-copy or audit consumer	RALF Gateway, RALF Protocol
23	CALF Market-Data Protocol	Write a market-data consumer with snapshots and replay	CALF Gateway, CALF Protocol
24	API Gateway REST/WebSocket	Trade and query over REST, and stream over WebSocket	API Gateway, REST API Reference
25	Market Index (`pm-index`)	Run an index and apply corporate actions without disturbing its level	Market Index, Index Administration (`pm-index-admin-cli`)
26	ALF TCP Gateway	Speak ALF over a raw socket	ALF Gateway, ALF Protocol
27	BALF TCP Gateway	Speak the binary order-entry protocol	BALF Gateway, BALF Protocol
28	IPO Valuation	Price an IPO, then list it and let the opening auction judge the price	IPO Valuation, Listing a New Symbol

After the training¶

Use the Participant Guide, the Operator's Guide, the Reference Manual and the Glossary for day-to-day reference.