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Chart Options
'Chart Type and Font' tab: choose the kind of chart to display by clicking on the appropriate button. The image will change to confirm your choice. Now select the number of items to have in a set. If you select one item per set for a barchart, it will be drawn as a series of single bars separated by spaces. Otherwise, the barchart will show the specified number of bars grouped together as a set, with spaces separating sets. The check box allows you to choose either 2D or 3D versions. (For evaluation versions, there are fewer choices and the check box is not used.)
For pie charts, there is always only one item per set.
In this window, you can click on the 'Font' button to select the font to be used for the labels on the chart's axes.
'Title and Subtitle' tab. This will allow you to enter a title and a subtitle for the chart, and choose a font for each. The title and subtitle can each consist of two lines of text. With two lines, the second line will be centred on the first.
'Chart Settings' tab. This tab controls settings to the layout of the chart as a whole, namely the amount of height and width to apply to 3D charts, or the spacing between bars of bar charts. (The controls shown in this tab will depend of course on the kind of chart selected.) For pie charts, you can alter the amount of 3D height, and change the relative length of the lines linking captions to sectors. Increasing these line lengths makes the pie itself smaller, as the size of the chart is not changed. Drag the scroll wheels vertically or horizontally to suitable settings. The sample chart on this tab will change to reflect your settings, but it cannot give an exact representation of the effects on your chart. For precise setting, hold down the Shift key while dragging the scroll wheels. This will result in smaller changes being made as you drag.
'Colours and Labels' tab: For bar charts and line charts, you can specify a label for each bar or line in a set (provided that there are at least two items in the set). For pie charts, or if there is only one item per set, the label is specified as the Caption in the data entry window.
For every type of chart, you can select the colour for each item in a set. Select an by clicking on the appropriate column. A small marker will appear above the column to indicate your choice. You can now change the colour for the corresponding bar, line, ribbon, pie segment or stacked bar region.
For bar charts, you can add hatching to the bars. Hatching is particularly useful if the final chart is to be printed and photocopied in black and white.
For line charts, you can change the line styles.
'Legend Box' tab: allows you to choose how many columns the legend will be shown in. Select 1 column for a vertical list, or as many columns as there are items in a set for a horizontal list. You can also choose the thickness of any border around the legend, and select the font to be used for the text. The legend will be displayed in this tab subject to constraints of space. The legends are drawn in the left to right order in which they appear in bar charts, or going round anticlockwise for pie charts. They are drawn in top to bottom order for line charts, tape charts and stacked bar charts. In the latter case, when legends are shown in a single column, their order is automatically reversed so that they mimic the sections of the stacked bars.
Click on OK when done to apply the changes, or on Cancel to ignore any changes.