Regardless of what anyone may think of eSignal's charting (specifically), in general, they certainly set the bar very high when it came to the following chart/GUI elements which just about every other charting package on the market has been playing catch-up on for the past few years. I've been using these things for 4 years now in my trading and they're real timesavers:
1. Symbol linking (option embedded in the title bar, color-coded) 2. Interval linking (option embedded in the title bar, color-coded) 3. Cursor tracking. On a per-chart basis one can set whether or not the X movements (tracking time), denoted by vertical lines, sync-up with other chart windows. I can have a tick/volume charts, 2 min chart, 5 min chart, 30 min chart, etc. etc. all with cursor tracking turned on and each of X movements will match up with the specific price bar in each timeframe. It's a fantastic way to see how the same futures contract/security is acting among the different timeframes -or- how multiple symbols are moving in comparision to one another through the same or multiple timeframes. 4. Title bars can be completely collapsed into just a thick-ribbed line to save screen space while still being able to do #1 and #2 above. It's a good thing that none of these "inventions" were ever patented like that static price DOM trading ladder idea or we would all less off for it. One other thing about popping charts out of the main chart window so they can float about onto other monitors: eSignal still has the coolest implementation of this. It's all managed from the title bar window of each chart and is super-intuitive. Why all of the other charting packages just don't directly copy this idea is beyond me. But, like the saying goes, if it that easy to implement, everyone would be doing it. Regardless, it must have been very time consuming to implement and have everything so fluid for the user to manipulate.
