Chart Setup

Chart Setup

ASP.NET Report Maker supports simple charting. Note that current version only supports one series of data in each chart and that negative values cannot be plotted. However, it is possible to create more than one charts for each report.

Note: The chart is a SWF file, Flash Player 8 or later is required on the client side to view the chart.

After loading the database, the database objects (tables, views, custom views and reports) will be shown in the left pane (the database pane). Click on any database object to go to the Chart Setup Page for that object at any time. The Chart Setup Page is next to the Field Setup page, if the active page is Field Setup Page, click the [Chart] tab to switch to the Chart Setup Page.

The Chart Setup pages consists of two section. The left section is a list showing all charts for the report. The right section is a panel showing various properties of the selected chart.

In the left section, the toolbar has the following buttons:

	Add a new chart
	Remove selected chart
	Move the selected chart up. The sequence determines the displaying order of the charts in the generated script and in the menu.
	Move the selected chart down. The sequence determines the displaying order of the charts in the generated script and in the menu.
	Duplicate the selected chart as a new chart and copy the chart properties. Since each chart has many properties, this feature enables you to create a new chart faster.

To setup chart properties, select a chart in the left section first, then you can modify its properties in the right panel.

You should become familiar with the charting terminology so that you'll know what to look for when you want to edit a chart.

A basic chart offers a pictorial view of data, with the y-axis (usually vertical) indicating the amount or quantity of the information in the chart, and the x-axis (usually horizontal) showing the categories. For example, the quarters in a year might be the category for a company or a division of a corporation.

Date point is an individually plotted value associated with a specific category. It can be a column in column chart, a bar in a bar point, a point in line chart or a piece in a pie chart.

Available properties are:

Name	The name of the chart. This is an internal name of the chart for referencing the chart, make sure the chart names for each report are unique. This is analogous to field name of a field in a database table.
Caption	The caption of the chart. This is the actual caption to be displayed on the chart and is analogous to field caption of a field in a database table.
Show	Show or hide the chart in the report page.
Position	The position of the chart in the report. Possible values are: Top Bottom Left Right Default is Bottom. Note that by default the dimension of each chart is 550px(W) x 450px(H), if you put the chart on left or right of the report, the user may to need to scroll horizontally to view the chart.
Type	The type of the chart. Possible values are: Column - has vertical bars and plots as separate points over time (noncontiguous), good for showing value amounts and quantities over time Bar - similar to a column chart but it plots the bars in a horizontal format as separate points Line - serve well for measuring or plotting continuously over time Pie - for showing a percentage of the whole The series of data can be presented in one of above type. It is also possible to change the type at runtime using the Flash context menu.
Sort Type	Specifies how to sort the data for charting. Possible values are: NO SORT - default, data sorted as in report X ASC - sort by category labels in ascending order X DESC - sort by category labels in descending order Y ASC - sort by values in ascending order Y DESC - sort by values in descending order
Category (X) Axis
Field Name	The field that contains the categories of the chart
Title	X-axis (category) title. Displays the category of the plotted data.
Title rotated	Rotates the title by 90 degrees. (For bar chart only.) For chart type other than bar chart, the category labels are shown on the horizontal axis, this setting has no effect. However, when the data series is plotted as bar chart, the category labels are shown on the vertical axis, you would want to rotate the title by 90 degrees. If this option is not selected, the title will be split into multiple lines with one character in a line so that the title can be shown vertically. Note: Rotated text for double bytes characters and some non alphanumerical characters are not supported.
Category max length	Max number of characters to be shown for each category label. If the category labels are long, the labels may overlap each other. You wound want to limit the max number of characters, "..." will be appended to the truncated category labels.
Category rotation	Number of degree to rotate the category labels. If the category labels are not too long, you would not want to truncate the labels, you can tilt the labels so they can still be displayed without overlapping each other. Note: Rotated text for double bytes characters and some non alphanumerical characters are not supported.
Value (Y) Axis
Field Name	The field that contains the values of the chart
Title	Y-axis (value) title. Displays a description for the scale of values against which the data is plotted.
Title rotated	Rotates the title by 90 degrees. (For Column and Line chart only) For bar chart, the values are shown on the horizontal axis, this setting has no effect. However, for column and line chart, the values are shown on the vertical axis, you would want to rotate the title by 90 degrees. If this option is not selected, the title will be split into multiple lines with one character in a line so that the title can be shown vertically. Note: Rotated text for double bytes characters and some non alphanumerical characters are not supported.
Min value	The max value of the value axis. Default is 0, which mean auto.
Max value	The min value of the value axis. Default is 0, which means auto.
Border color
Left	Color of the left border of the total area of the chart. You can select different colors for the four sides to create a flat look or 3D look of the area.
Right	Color of the right border of the total area of the chart. You can select different colors for the four sides to create a flat look or 3D look of the area.
Top	Color of the top border of the total area of the chart. You can select different colors for the four sides to create a flat look or 3D look of the area.
Bottom	Color of the bottom border of the total area of the chart. You can select different colors for the four sides to create a flat look or 3D look of the area.
Width	Width of the total area of the chart (Width of the Flash object). Default is 550 (pixels).
Height	Height of the total area of the chart (Height of the Flash object). Default is 450 (pixels).
Background color	The background color of total area of the chart
Chart background color	The background color of the area in the chart where data series are plotted.
Chart border color	The border color of the area in the chart where data series are plotted.
Grid line color	The color of the grid lines in the area in the chart where data series are plotted. Grid lines as guide markers for visual comparison.
No. of grid lines	The number of grid lines for the y-axis (value). Grid lines for the x-axis (category) are not supported.
Show labels	Show labels on the (usually horizontal) axis that displays the category labels for all the data series.
Show values	Show values as data labels at data points to indicate the specific value or category.
Show hover	Show hovering box when the user moves the mouse cursor over the data point. The hovering box shows the label and value of the data point.
Transparency (%)	Transparency of the data point. 0% is transparent, 100% is opaque.
Color palette	Colors of the data points. You can choose your own color palette by clicking [...] button and change the colors.
Use global text styles	Specifies if the chart use the global stylesheet The text styles (font and size) in the chart is designed to be displayed in the chart's original dimensions, that is, 550px(W) x 450px(H). By default the charts uses a common global stylesheet (named ewchart.css) which contain the text styles used in the chart. If you reduce or the enlarge the chart dimensions, you may want to adjust the text styles accordingly. In such cases, you can unselect this option so a separate stylesheet for the chart (named as <chart name>.css) will be generated. You can then adjust the text styles in the stylesheet without affecting the text styles in other charts.