Chart Columns

Chuck Muirhead

Notice in the attached picture that I have a chart that shows how much reimbursement a specific client received last year and as of the current date the client has received almost half of that.  The issue is that the FY1718 (Red) column appears too small for the actual result.  Visually, shouldn't it be about half the height of the blue column?

Sasan

Chuck,

In order to optimize the chart, the minimum value for the scale is auto-set to nearest rounded number to your lowest value ($200,000.00).  This helps in optimizing your chart widget surface area to give you more real-estate within your dashboard for other widgets.  Would also recommend formatting your data points within the sheet without decimal points, so that they appear on the chart as whole numbers.  Fractions of a dollar in the context of annual reimbursements in half/quarter of a million dollars may not be as valuable to your audience.  Thanks for you feedback.

Sasan

Chuck Muirhead

Hi Sasan,

 

Thank you for the response, but it does not make sense that this saves real estate. Also, this is not how other BI Software we use works.  These are visuals, which should stand alone from the data points.  If I took out the Date Labels, the client would visually see that they are not doing very well, when in fact they are almost 50% of last year.  If you tell me that they need to look at the vertical legend, you have just defeated the purpose of Charts.

Also, Thank you for pointing out the decimals, but I am still creating charts and had not got to aesthetics.

Chuck Muirhead

The more I work with the new feature, the more disappointed I am getting with it.  I have had to make manual changes to my sheets to get the data columns in a specific consecutive order for this feature. And now to learn that the vertical axis modifies based on the lowest data point, may just push me over the edge of not using this.

I went back to my other BI software and it always baselines on zero for the vertical axis (attached)....This way your columns are visually accurate to the data being displayed.  I am at a loss right now....what is the point of visuals if they do not relate the other visual data? 

Again, if I gave your dashboard to a client without data labels, how do you think the client would interpret the chart?  They would say they are about 10% of last year, when in reality they are 46% of last year. 

Sasan

Chuck,

Completely understood.  Couple of points that I've picked up from your feedback is easier data selection and ability to set scale at 0 as default and/or configure minimum values for the chart.  We greatly appreciate the feedback and will incorporate throughout the evolution of the product.

Thanks

Sasan

Sasan

Chuck,

We just update the Charts widget to always include zero (0) in the scale going forward.  To include zero on previously created charts, edit the chart, go to either Horizontal/Vertical Axis tab (depending on your chart type, bar/column) and uncheck "Scale to data values".  Hope this helps.  

Thanks 

Sasan