If I have a specific setup that i like that involves about 15-20 bars and wanted to constantly scan every stock out there for this pattern, and then trigger an order, how hard would it be to do that? And how can you possibly code that up? Its not ever going to look exactly the same. Each time the bar height is going to be different, the open/close is going to be a little different, the number of bars involved is going to be a little different, etc.. Is it easier than i think?
I use finviz to do a first run scan to narrow the field of stocks to look at. But that is for end of day charts.
i remember trade ideas from back in the day when i was flipping stocks on my ameritrade account. i suppose they are doing well since they've stuck around. they are all canned setups though i believe..
If you trade with chart geometrics, turning the work of trading over to a computer is a fascinating area to venture into, simply fascinating... It can be real torture to try to get a script to splash a drawing up on a screen that I can draw with a mouse without further thought.. I've had an ongoing battle in one area and after weeks I find that I still cannot explain to myself clearly enough how I place a particular drawing.. I know it when I see it for sure, I draw it with the mouse all day every day but putting it into the extremely literal terms that the computer needs, wow, whole 'nuther area of thought.. I'm an analog trader venturing into a digital world to trade some irrational markets.. If I don't make it out tell my fav Galpal I love her!
If you can identify the elements of your pattern (i.e. simpler "sub patterns", e.g. say an "Up bar, followed by a higher Up bar, then a Down bar that closes between the High and Low of the first Up bar...." etc) and the order in which they should appear, then you can move a search window through your data, and scan for the simpler sub-patterns. If your sub-patterns appear within the search window, and in the correct order, then you have found your pattern ...