The DOM — depth of market, or the ladder — is the live order book: how many shares are bid and offered at each price right now. It is the only chart that shows intention before execution.
Each row is a price. On one side, resting buy orders (bids); on the other, resting sell orders (offers). The centre is the spread. As market orders consume liquidity and limit orders are placed or pulled, the ladder updates in real time — you are watching the queue itself, not a summary of it.
Large resting size acts like a visible wall — price often stalls into it. But the more informative read is behaviour: does the size hold when tested, reload after being consumed, or vanish the moment price approaches (a pattern associated with spoofing)? Depth that holds under fire is information; depth that evaporates is theatre.
The DOM shows intention (resting orders); the footprint shows commitment (executed volume). Together they answer both halves of the question: who is waiting, and who actually acted. VolumeLens places the DOM ladder next to the footprint chart, with order placement directly from the ladder for broker-connected users.
Standard NSE market data carries 5 levels of depth per side; VolumeLens renders the full available depth stream for supported instruments.
Placing large visible orders with no intention of execution, to create an illusion of pressure, then cancelling them. Watching whether size holds when price tests it is the practical defence.
Yes — broker-connected users can place limit orders by clicking a price on the ladder (chart trading).