How copying works

Fills rarely match exactly across accounts. If the leader's order fills in pieces, or a follower's copy fills differently, Copilink sends extra market orders to bring the follower to its target: the leader's position × its ratio, rounded down. So a follower can show more orders, and different prices, than the leader.

Limit entries are the exception, as the next section explains: Copilink never buys or sells an unfilled limit entry in at market.

When the leader's limit entry fills, a follower's copy of it may still be resting unfilled. Until the copy fills, Copilink holds back that follower's take-profit and stop copies, or makes them smaller, so they never close more than the follower holds.

Entry fill wait sets how long the copy can stay unfilled: 1 to 120 seconds, 10 by default. You set it per profile, in the editor under Follower protection. If the copy hasn't filled by then, or the leader starts closing first, Copilink cancels the unfilled part and the follower sits out the rest of that trade, including adds. A partly filled copy keeps its smaller size and is never topped up.

A follower doesn't get an order when:

• its size rounds down to 0;
• the leader's symbol isn't in Allowed instruments;
• it's switched off or disconnected;
• it joined copying while the leader was already in a trade. It copies the next one;
• its copy of a limit entry didn't fill within the Entry fill wait;
• a risk limit has locked it;
• the broker has restricted it. For Tradovate, a restriction on a follower skips that follower, and a restriction on the leader pauses the whole profile. When Tradovate lifts a leader restriction, disable and re-enable the profile to resume;
• it's a live account and Copilink can't record the trade on this computer, for example because the disk is full. Simulation accounts keep copying;
• two connected accounts report the same account ID, so Copilink can't tell them apart.

Activity explains every skip.

Copilink turns a follower off by itself when:

• the broker rejects a copy for a risk or account reason, such as a loss limit, liquidation, or margin;
• the broker rejects or cancels three copied orders right after they're sent;
• the broker never confirms the result of an order or change Copilink sent. Activity shows broker order outcome unknown;
• Copilink can't confirm with Tradovate how many contracts the follower's order filled;
• it's flattened: by you, by follower protection, or by one of its Copilink risk limits.

It stays off until you turn it back on. Check its position and working orders at your broker first. When you turn it back on, it sits out any trade the leader is already in and copies the next one.

If the broker doesn't answer a copied order or change, Copilink doesn't send it again, because the first request may already have worked. Instead it switches that follower off and reports the uncertain result in Activity. Only cancellations are retried. Check the follower at your broker before you place anything by hand or turn it back on.

When copying restarts (after you reopen Copilink or apply an edit), Copilink matches working copies back to their leader orders and cancels copied orders it can't match safely. It reads each account's position from the broker, and doesn't replay trades that happened while it was stopped. If a leader order was partly filled and still working at the restart, followers whose copy Copilink can't see are left out of that order, and Activity names them.

A short disconnect doesn't restart copying. For what happens when a connection drops, see When a connection drops.

Every flatten pauses copying while it runs (the profile shows Flattening) and cancels copied working orders on the accounts it closes, including copies that were queued but not yet sent. It switches the accounts it closes off as followers, in every profile, and nothing switches them back on by itself. When you turn one back on, it sits out any trade the leader is already in and copies the next one.

If a close fails, Activity marks it critical, and that account can't be turned back on until a later flatten of it succeeds. Check your broker, fix the cause, then flatten it again. A Tradovate flatten the broker rejects, for example outside market hours, fails straight away and shows the broker's reason.