QXGRAPH v1.1

QUANTXT Graphing Utility — IBM PC/XT CGA Time-Series Visualizer

A stand-alone DOS graphing tool for the IBM PC/XT that renders financial and macroeconomic time-series data in CGA Mode 6 (640×200 monochrome). Built as a companion utility to the QuanTXT research platform. Also supports general-purpose columnar time-series data including stock market and technical indicator datasets.

Link to Latest Release Here

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Overview

QXGRAPH reads plain-text scenario files and renders each parameter as a scrollable, scalable line graph directly on CGA hardware. Parameters cycle manually or automatically via carousel mode. No mouse, no EGA, no extended memory — runs clean on a stock 8088 XT with CGA card.

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Requirements

• IBM PC/XT or compatible (8088/8086)
• CGA graphics card
• 8087 math coprocessor (required — compiled with -fpi87)
• DOS 3.x or later
• Compiled with Open Watcom 1.9 (-ml large model)

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Building

wmake -f QXGRAPH.mk -h -e QXGRAPH.exe

Compiler flags used:

wcc *.C -i="C:\WATCOM/h" -i="<source_dir>" -w4 -e25 -zq -od -d2 -fpi87 -bt=dos -fo=.obj -ml

Note: include path must point to your local source directory so the correct QXGRAPH.H is found during compilation.

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Usage

1. Place one or more .TXT data files in the working directory
2. Run QXGRAPH.EXE
3. Select a file from the picker
4. Browse parameters and adjust scaling

Controls

Key	Action
LEFT / RIGHT	Switch parameter
UP / DOWN	Scroll time window
A	Cycle scale mode
C	Toggle carousel auto-advance
+ / =	Carousel faster (minimum 1 second)
-	Carousel slower (maximum 60 seconds)
ESC	Exit

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Scale Modes

Cycle with the A key. Current mode shown in title bar.

Mode	Behavior
Tight	Exact min/max of visible window
Padded	10% padding above and below range
Fixed	User-defined min/max
Centered	Symmetric range around the mean — best for slowly trending or narrow-variance data

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Carousel Mode

Press C to start automatic parameter cycling. The footer changes to show carousel status and current delay in seconds. Use + and - to adjust the rotation speed while carousel is running. Press C again to stop.

Carousel uses the BIOS tick counter at 0000:046C (~18.2 ticks/second) for timing — no DOS timer calls, accurate at 4.77MHz.

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Data File Format

Plain text, space-delimited. Supports two optional header lines before the column name line. First column of each data row is a row label (date, scenario name, etc.) and is skipped during parsing.

# ticker SPX
# name open high low close volume rsi macd
2026-05-01 5204.30 5228.60 5192.10 5218.90 3284000000 53.8 18.60
2026-05-02 5218.90 5245.20 5208.40 5231.60 3156000000 55.2 19.10

• # ticker line — optional, sets the ticker symbol shown in the title bar as [SPX]
• # name line — defines column labels; must contain name as first token after #
• Lines beginning with # that are not ticker or name lines are treated as comments
• Blank lines and \r\n DOS line endings are handled correctly
• Maximum 256 rows, 19 parameters per file
• Files with no header fall back to auto-named columns col_1, col_2 etc.

QuanTXT Scenario Format

#US_MARKET_FISCAL_30D REPORT 5/17/2026
#
# name int_rev debt_gdp usd_reserve_share cbo_deficit xdate sahm tail_risk liq_gap ofr hy_spread dxy_mom oil_price ai_capex lagged_ai geopolitical_risk investor_sentiment infl unemp gdp

day_01 22.10 70.10 65.0 3.05 90 0.20 1.25 1.02 0.96 0.0605 5.1 81 1.02 0.0 0.52 0.39 0.032 0.042 0.020

Stock / Technical Indicator Format

# ticker AAPL
# name open high low close volume vwap rsi macd macd_sig macd_hist sma20 sma50 bb_upper bb_lower atr obv stoch_k stoch_d
2026-05-01 189.20 191.40 188.60 190.80 52400000 190.10 58.2 1.24 0.98 0.26 188.40 184.20 194.60 182.20 1.84 52400000 62.4 58.1

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Parameter Descriptions

QuanTXT Macroeconomic Parameters

Key	Description
int_rev	Interest Payments as % of Federal Revenue
debt_gdp	Federal Debt as % of GDP
usd_reserve_share	US Dollar Share of Global FX Reserves
cbo_deficit	CBO Projected Federal Deficit as % of GDP
xdate	Days Until Debt-Ceiling X-Date
sahm	Sahm Rule Recession Indicator
tail_risk	Tail-Risk Index
liq_gap	Liquidity Gap
ofr	OFR Financial Stress Index
hy_spread	High-Yield Credit Spread
dxy_mom	Dollar Index Momentum
oil_price	Spot Price of Crude Oil
ai_capex	AI-Related Capital Expenditure
lagged_ai	Lagged AI Capital Expenditure
geopolitical_risk	Geopolitical Risk Index (0-1)
investor_sentiment	Investor Sentiment Index (0-1)
infl	Inflation Rate
unemp	Unemployment Rate
gdp	GDP Growth Rate

Stock and Technical Indicator Parameters

Key	Description
open	Opening Price
high	Session High
low	Session Low
close	Closing Price
volume	Trading Volume
vwap	Volume Weighted Average Price
adj_close	Adjusted Closing Price
rsi	Relative Strength Index (0-100)
macd	MACD Line
macd_sig	MACD Signal Line
macd_hist	MACD Histogram
sma20	20-Day Simple Moving Average
sma50	50-Day Simple Moving Average
sma200	200-Day Simple Moving Average
ema12	12-Day Exponential Moving Average
ema26	26-Day Exponential Moving Average
bb_upper	Bollinger Band Upper
bb_lower	Bollinger Band Lower
atr	Average True Range
obv	On-Balance Volume
stoch_k	Stochastic Oscillator %K
stoch_d	Stochastic Oscillator %D

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Y-Axis Label Formatting

Values are auto-formatted based on magnitude:

Range	Format	Example
>= 1,000,000	Millions suffix	31393.0M
>= 1,000	Thousands suffix	4.2K
< 0.1	4 decimal places	0.0605
All others	2 decimal places	22.74

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Source Files

File	Purpose
MAIN.C	Entry point, banner, file selection
QXGRAPH.C	CGA renderer, Bresenham line, axes, scaling, label formatting
QXGRAPH.H	Graph structs, scale mode enum, carousel fields, API
QXRUN.C	Data loader, main graph loop, input dispatch, carousel timer
QXRUN.H	run_graph() prototype
TXT_PICK.C	Scrolling file picker
TXT_PICK.H	pick_txt_file() prototype
COLORS.H	CGA/EGA color definitions and semantic aliases

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CGA Implementation Notes

• Mode 6 (640×200, 1bpp monochrome) via _HRESBW
• Direct framebuffer write to B800:0000 — no BIOS calls in render path
• CGA interlaced memory layout: even scan lines at B800:0000, odd scan lines at B800:2000
• Screen clear uses rep stosw inline assembly — full 16KB cleared in a single instruction loop
• Integer Bresenham line algorithm — no floating point in pixel path
• Dotted horizontal gridlines, X-axis tick marks, Y-axis min/mid/max labels
• Midpoint label shows current value at center of visible window

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Known Limitations

• WINDOW size fixed at 30 rows per view; files up to 256 rows supported with UP/DOWN scrolling
• clip_to_graph clamps line endpoints rather than true segment clipping — slope distortion possible at graph boundary on steep segments
• _outtext / _settextposition in graphics mode relies on Watcom mixed-mode text overlay; behaviour may vary on clone CGA cards
• Requires 8087 coprocessor — not compatible with 8088-only systems without recompiling with -fpi software emulation

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License

© 2026 ArchLabWorks. All rights reserved.