There are investors who live by the technical indicators a stock produces long term as well as daily, hourly and by the minute.  These indicators provide the trading direction whether long, hold, sell and shorting of a stock that the investor who knows how to read and interpret the signals requires to make an intelligent decision. 

To begin with I am not totally convinced I like the technical side of investment except for tracking the price movement and history of a stock.  Too many other things come into play such as frantic buying after good news (or the reverse) and rumors.  I think most experienced investors would say that technicals give great range information meaning a trading range is set and to enter and exit the stock you should stay within the range.  Trading within the range also is dependant on the Relative Strength of the stock.  Movement up and down with little volume creates severe volotility which many investors cannot handle (some call them nervous nellies).  The bottom line... low volume can create larger fluctuations in the stocks price range making it harder to predict. 

The general rule of thumb for using a chart to determine the entry and exit points goes something like this (please feel free to correct me or add something that I may have omitted):

Buy Signal (Ultimate Conditions)

1. Relative Strength Index should sit between 20 and 30 (low strength meaning the stock has meandered for a bit of time)
2. The stock has crossed the lower Bollinger Band (not always the signal you need but for the purposes of providing the ultimate buying opportunity we'll use it)
3. Using two moving averages, 10 day and 50 day, both lines should turn in the upward direction.  An early sign to buy could include the 10 day moving average crossing above the 50 day moving average but this can be a false signal as well)
4. Trend line  should be a guideline of the entry point (Support for purchase and Resistence for sale).  How do you use this? You take the last three support levels on the chart and draw a line joining them together (sort of like join the dots).  This will provide a trend line showing the historic support level (or resistance if you are using the high peaks of the chart) of the stock.  If the stock is bullish the support trend line should be moving upward, and conversly a bearish trend would see the line moving down (some would be trading short under this condition).

These are great tools to use for some stocks, mostly the more stable blue chip and less speculative small cap varieties.  I am wary of using the chart for stocks like Noront or its area plays at this point in time. 

Long on NORONT, SAGE AND AUGUSTA RESOURCES