Advanced Charting 1

[RBaggerly]

I'm trying to build a chart in access. It's basically a line chart but I want to add an "Mean" line and I also want to be able to show 1 StDev above and below. I know how calculate the information I just don't know how to add all 3 of these elements into one chart in access.

 

[GingerR]

does the query/table that your chart is based on contain that info?

if it does and you are saying that you can't format the chart to look right, try these things. don't know your experience level with charts so forgive me if i give what you might think is lower-level advice:

1) in order to see what you are really working with, instead of the North-South-East-West stuff, run the query/table the chart is based on, copy the resulting dataset, and paste it into the 'template' data over what is there. now you can select each feature and format it and see exactly how it's gonna look.

2) you can choose each item and menu CHART TYPE to make it a column or a line or whatever you want. choose FORMAT SELECTED ITEM for color, line thickness, etc.

3) instead of calculating STD DEV, you could have Access do it: choose the series in question and choose menu item FORMAT + SELECTED DATA SERIES + Y ERROR BARS. i havent used it but Standard Dev is in there. Maybe you can make that work for you instead.

4) format considerations:
a) properties of chart-make size mode STRETCH and re-size it out as big as you want it.
b) for line charts, i suggest NOT using the kind of line that has little dots or diamonds along it unless you really need to for some reason, and it looks really good. sometimes the diamonds/whatever are so smashed together or for other reasons look horrible.
c) in CHART OPTIONS you can show the DATA TABLE. This lays the data out in a spreadsheet-type format underneath the chart. you can then double-click onthe data table to format it because default is BOLD with a huge font.
d) you can select each item (double-click) like the axis, the data labels, the axis labels--and format them however you want.
e) make lines (the lines based on the data i mean, not grid lines, etc) pretty fat if possible. easier to see. also consider color-blindness (i'm serious) when choosing your colors. too many similar colors that are next to each other won't work well.
f) move the legend manually and format the font size so it's nicer than the default.

as you can see, there's a lot of tweeking if you want something nice. I suspect a lot of people just go with the defaults, but after 2 solid years generating some pretty complex charts in Access, I have the routine down pretty good )

let us know how far you get after this...

g

 

[MichaelRed]

Ginger,

A nice explination for the non-programatic approach.


MichaelRed
m.red@att.net

There is never time to do it right but there is always time to do it over

 

[RBaggerly]

Thanks Ginger I'll let you know how it works out.

 

[GingerR]

michael--thanks. what would be the programmatic approach?

 

[MichaelRed]

You CAN set the properties in code. It is possible to set up a set of procedures which return the information on where the chart items are (X, Y, Ht, Wd). Armed w/ this - and a good idea of what you want the final product to look like, you can move the remaining emlements to the position desired, or modify yhr colors, legends etc. It is a LOT of work, and I would not advise it for the occassional user or non-programmer. If there is a more-or-less standard run of charts with some volume and a fair degree of change in the specifics, it is well worth the time.

MichaelRed
m.red@att.net

There is never time to do it right but there is always time to do it over