[libreoffice-users] Re: Calc chart x-axis labels

Brian Barker wrote
> At 11:05 02/12/2014 -0700, Jerry Vonly Bonly wrote:
> > I have a table containing data on my credit card. Left-most column 
> > is the monthly statement dates, (oldest to newest, top to bottom) 
> > which are not always the same. The next column to the right is the 
> > monthly balance. When I create a Column Type chart from these two 
> > columns of data, I have the balances as the Y data, and the dates as 
> > the X column labels. For the X column labels, Calc always sets the 
> > dates to the first day of the month, not the real (table) date.
> >
> > I have checked the "Format Axis..." settings, and on the Numbers 
> > tab, "Source Format" is checked. I think this means that it is 
> > supposed to set the x-axis labels to the format of the cells in the 
> > table. But, this is not happening. All of the x-axis labels are set 
> > to the first day of the month, i.e. 01/01/14, instead of 01/24/14 
> > (the date in the table).
> >
> > I have tried all of the other chart types, none of them source the 
> > dates correctly. Is this a bug, or am I missing something?
>
> I think this is probably by design. When you plot a chart, you don't 
> normally put individual data values on the axes, but merely label the 
> axis with round, equally spaced values. Since your data is roughly 
> monthly, having x-values labelled once per month sounds sensible. 
> Note that the y-axis is not labelled with your actual balance amounts 
> but likewise with suitably round, equally spaced values. 

I never thought about it this way, makes sense though.


> A column chart appears to set out the columns somewhat regularly, not 
> exactly according to the x-value for each column. Perhaps that is 
> because such charts are normally used for non-parametric statistics, 
> where this makes sense. And you shouldn't really want your equally 
> spaced columns to be labelled with unequally spaced vales.

Correct, but I thought with "Source Format" selected it would use the source
format as is.


> So what can you do? One possibility is to use a chart of type "X-Y 
> (Scatter)", where the x-axis labels will still be equally spaced, but 
> the data points will be displaced into their appropriate place within 
> each month. But I suspect a better solution, if you really want a 
> column chart, is to label your columns with just the relevant month - 
> discarding the day information. You can do this either by changing 
> the format of your column of statement dates and keeping your "Source 
> format" option, or - probably more sensibly - to keep the original 
> dates showing in your table but to untick "Source format" in the 
> x-Axis dialogue and set a suitable date format there. How about 
> something like "MM/YY" (12/14) or "MMM YY" (Dec 14)?

I tried the "X-Y Scatter" chart type; it still didn't give me what I wanted,
and I don't like the "graph" line.


> Alternatively, you can use Insert Data Labels to create labels on the 
> columns themselves. Use Format Data Labels... to adjust them; you can 
> choose "Show category" to place the date values instead of the 
> balance amounts on the columns. Format the dates as you wish (they 
> inherit the Number format from the x-Axis dialogue), possibly 
> rotating them to fit the columns. Once you have the data labels as 
> you want them - perhaps "D MMM YYYY" (2 Dec 2014) - you can choose to 
> delete the x-axis entirely, so you just have columns labelled with 
> the actual dates.

Lots of good ideas Brian, thank you for your input.


> I trust this helps.
>
> Brian Barker
>
>
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