I didn't get much joy out of the other script I tried that's floating around here for getting share prices, exchange rates and market indices, so I wrote this quick and dirty script that uses Yahoo financial data.
It's a first-cut and probably needs lots more testing. Works for me, anyway and more importantly works on global markets such as London stock exchange, Vienna, Hong Kong, etc. - see Yahoo market list - and isn't currency specific (not a dollar in sight
).
Run the script every hour, or whatever. It'll announce any price changes +/- over the percentage threshold, but only once for each change (hopefully) on any trading day.
At night stop running it, so you don't get woken up by it. It's VB.NET and the tracking array is static, so it should keep track of what's changed so long as the thread is in memory.
I think it's 100% VB.NET, but I'm still feeling my way into it.
Edit: Small bug I spotted afterwards.
If .Change <> 0 Then
Alert &= "s"
End If
should read:
If .Change <> 1 Then
Alert &= "s"
End If
----
Updated to version 1.4 (7th Feb, 2007)
o Fixed above bug
o Now checks Currencies and Indices for change also
o Cleaned-up code a little
----
Updated to version 1.6 (7th Feb, 2007)
o Fixed a bug due to insufficient testing that showed up on second pass
----
Updated to version 2.0 (7th Feb, 2007)
o Fixed formatting bugs
o Separated announcement pass from data pass
o Added inter-announcement delay
It's a first-cut and probably needs lots more testing. Works for me, anyway and more importantly works on global markets such as London stock exchange, Vienna, Hong Kong, etc. - see Yahoo market list - and isn't currency specific (not a dollar in sight

Run the script every hour, or whatever. It'll announce any price changes +/- over the percentage threshold, but only once for each change (hopefully) on any trading day.
At night stop running it, so you don't get woken up by it. It's VB.NET and the tracking array is static, so it should keep track of what's changed so long as the thread is in memory.
I think it's 100% VB.NET, but I'm still feeling my way into it.
Edit: Small bug I spotted afterwards.
If .Change <> 0 Then
Alert &= "s"
End If
should read:
If .Change <> 1 Then
Alert &= "s"
End If
----
Updated to version 1.4 (7th Feb, 2007)
o Fixed above bug
o Now checks Currencies and Indices for change also
o Cleaned-up code a little
----
Updated to version 1.6 (7th Feb, 2007)
o Fixed a bug due to insufficient testing that showed up on second pass
----
Updated to version 2.0 (7th Feb, 2007)
o Fixed formatting bugs
o Separated announcement pass from data pass
o Added inter-announcement delay