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Platform build version

The compiled release running on a machine, versioned apart from the broker's server: what a mismatch changes, and why written instructions go stale.

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38 of 68 in Platforms & Tools

A platform build version is the specific compiled release of the trading software running on a machine, and it is not the same thing as the broker's server version. Both are numbered independently, both are updated on their own schedule, and behaviour a reader observes is a property of the pair rather than of the platform in the abstract. A mismatch is usually not silent for long: some servers refuse a login from a terminal older than they will accept and push an update instead. Quieter is the case where the terminal connects but a feature behaves differently — how an order type is handled, what a programming interface exposes, which settings exist at all. That is what makes a build number worth recording before anything else in a bug report, and what makes a screenshot or a written instruction go stale without anyone noticing: the menu it describes may simply not be in the build the reader has.

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