They do have an option with the pro version of downloading the prices to excel, not sure if you can place the bets via excel, Unitab have phased out there auto bet platform but i believe you can still use XML to place bets, as for NSW/Vic the only option you have until your tun over reaches 25k is the expert bet feature, you can upload a file that could be generated via excedl.

Learning to program and a good option, but yes it is time consuming getting your head around things.

It will be a pain in tatts api goes away. Its one of the better ones to use out there for getting some info.

Forgot to mention,
www.bettordata.com is where majority of real time odds come from under some licence agreement.
It's subscription but you get the raw data to build programs with. You can download samples and the data engine they provide ,which is needed to work with the firebird server.

I'm pretty sure that the tattsbet site will still stay, but then again when they took over the tasracing tote, they closed it down and promised to supply all the important back data that went back years, now every year, they chop off a year. i.e. we only have access to data from 1/01/2011, 2010 has disappeared (archived) away from us.

Automated Punting
 

ET,

As others have noted it is possible to do what you have outlined, and I am doing it myself (except the scraping aspect) every day and have been for nearly 15 years.

I am fortunate to be a punter and a programmer so I understand my own requirements and can translate that to code and functioning programs.

Bettordata used to be my data feed of choice for tote prices as it had all 3 totes and the APN (on course prices). At the end of 2015 TAB stopped access to their prices so it now only has the Tatts and APN, and the latter only when there are 2 or more bookies at the track.

Historically the TasTote api was by a very big margin the best way to bet into any TAB in Australia. Now the TABCORP api is very feature rich and allows a user to get any information that is on the website.

Tatts have a new json based api that is well documented and simple to work with (if you are a programmer). WA has a very basic system of sending bets and there is no api as such.

BF is a whole different ball game and is for expert programmers only. I know Pinnacle has an API as does the new entrant on the scene, Global Tote. The latter is relatively straight forward.

Don't be deluded that you can "learn" programming and create betting bots in a small time frame. The concepts are the same for all betting shops, but the design, naming conventions and so on are ALL different.

If you are young and enthusiastic, plan on punting for a long time by all means learn to program along side your punting. For anyone going down that path there are shortcuts you can take that make the learning and development quicker. Stick with well documented languages like vb.net, c# or python. There a many user groups that have paved the way and been down the path you want to go on so you can follow their lead (and their code examples)

All that said, when a tap breaks I pay a plumber, when the power shorts out I call an electrician. You get what you pay for - if you have a half decent system that makes money the investment (say around $2000 for a custom betting application) will pay for itself in no time.

Hi UB, how long would it take the average person to learn a programming language and which one is the easiest. I know there are a few different languages out there.

Cheers Mike.

You culd learn enough in one of those 21 day books to be able to do what you need. Grab example code from

http://docs.developer.betfair.com/d...pleApplications

I suggest python, Java or VBA.

Thanks mate,

I'll take a look at the link and see if I can find one of those 21 day books.

Cheers,
Mike.