A couple of questions about placing orders and broker interactions...

1. Are all orders placed as "good till cancelled"? Any convenient way to place a "good till end of day" order without writing code to cancel un-filled orders at the end of day?

2. How can one get the current cash or buying power in a live traded Interactive Brokers (IB) account? I want to make sure I don't order more than I can afford.

Also, excuse me if this is spelled out in documentation. If so, could you also point me in that direction so I won't need to expose my ignorance in the forums here.

Thanks