I have 2 data series, which records how much a user is meditating/attentive (out of 100) plotted onto a graph. The x axis is the number of seconds since the start of the experiment, and the y axis shows the value for meditation/attention at that point of time.
I have a 3rd set of data that is a series of key timestamps during the experiment (not exactly matching the timestamps from attention/meditation values).
I want to create a graph where you can compare how the attention/meditation values change at the key points
Whether the key points are highlighted by a line or dots I don't care. I tried adding the 3rd data set as a secondary axis, but it still uses the original x-axis of the main graph and I don't know how to make excel do what I want.
Thanks in advance
You should use an XY Scatter chart, not a line chart. A line chart ignores any numerical value in the X values, treats each X value as a text label, and uses the X values from the first series as X values for all series.
You can format the first two series so that they use lines and not markers, and the third so it uses markers without lines.
You may find this link helpful: superuser.com/questions/825692 You don't need to use the secondary axis, just add another series with tag times and constant 45 value, then format vertical error bars to 100% and horizontal to 0%.
Related
Below is an Excel Chart for the data shown in column A (x-coordinates--dates) and column B (y-coordinates--test results). There's no problem with the column B data. But note that the horizontal axis shows quite a few more dates than are contained in column A.
Is there any way to have only the actual x-coordinates shown on the horizontal axis with a scale that matches those values?
I kind of get it. Excel deliberately scales the horizontal axis to match as best it can the data in column A. But I don't want that. Beneath each "corner" point of the graph, I'd like to see the date that is associated with the test result in column B.
In other words, there is clearly a point with y-coordinate 154.5. I'd like to see 2/13/2018 directly below that point since that is the data in row 5. Note that the x-axis contains the "correct" date for the first plotted point: (2/9/2017, 70). But for the point with y-coordinate 80, it looks as if that test result occurred on 6/9/2017 rather than 6/16/2018.
So I'd like the graph to appear as shown in the second image, which likely would be impossible because of the "crowding" of x-coordinate values at the right-hand end, but just displaying whichever of the three dates would fit would be good enough, as would just showing one of the two dates in other "crowded" areas. That is to say that something like the third image would be fine.
I suppose I could write VBA code to make it happen, but I'd prefer that Excel do it.
(What crosses my mind is, "Are exact dates really this important?" And the jury is still out on this point. There are arguments both ways. I guess a hung jury goes to the judge, Excel.)
By inserting the points to be plotted into two arrays, datesArr and scaledArr, and putting those values into columns A and B (see worksheet) and in code saying ...
Set ch = ActiveChart
Set s = ch.SeriesCollection
s(1).Values = scaledArray
s(1).XValues = datesArr
... I got exactly what I wanted. Now granted that's not exactly built-in, but we're programmers, yes? And this was downright easy. Well, once I learned a few tricks, especially being able to set angle of dates to 45 degrees.
You need to plot two sets of data, the actual values, and a set of zeros, then smoke and mirrors make it work.
Data below left, make a line chart (top left chart). Add data labels to the second series; I colored the labels orange to match the points, for clarity in this description. Default labels show Y values, which are all zero (top right). Format the data labels to show category values (i.e., dates), below the points, rotated upwards (bottom left). Format format format (bottom right). Axis labels: none. Format second series with medium gray lines and medium gray cross markers. Drag bottom of plot area upwards to make room for the date labels. Hide legend.
Please have a look at This Excel chart. Here is a screenshot:
Here is the data:
There is a scatter series of blue of dots (plus a trendline) and a green area series. The chart data are contained within the series.
The problem I have is that the x-axis values of the two series are not aligned. For example, the second and third blue dots at x = 3.1 and x = 3.8 are in the correct place along the x-axis, but in the green area series they appear to be above x = 2.0 and x = 3.3. How to fix this?
Change the Scatter to a Line Chart, then format Line Color so that there is "No Line". Add trendline.
There may be another way to do this while retaining the Scatterplot, I'm not sure, but this seems to be visually what you're looking for, but I think you will need to use a Line Chart for this unfortunately. The problem is summarized in this similar Q on SuperUser:
https://superuser.com/questions/964264/aligning-stacked-bar-chart-w-scatter-plot-data
The short answer is that your combining (unsuccessfully) a categorical series (the columns) with interval/ratio series (the line charts). So, Excel doesn't know how to plot your categories (columns) on an interval scale (the current X axis).
You can verify this by selecting Chart > Layout > Axes > Secondary Horizontal Axis > More Secondary Horizontal Axis Options. Without making any changes to the axes configuration, the second X-axis will now appear along the bottom of the chart, and you can see it is scaled differently from your Scatter data.
I.e., in the Scatter series, the data is X/Y pairs. But in your Area chart, it treats the X-values as categorical, and in this context "1.1" is no different than "Bob" -- it is a cardinal representation of the data rather than an ordinal representation.
The problem I have is that the x-axis values of the two series are not aligned.
So even though the two series appear to share the same set of X-Values, the Chart is simply incapable of treating those as the same type of data. The x-axes are not aligned because they are not the same data or even the same type of data!
All that said, if you change both series to XY Scatter, it is possible (with some extraordinary effort) to apply shading/coloring below a series or between two series, etc.
http://peltiertech.com/fill-under-between-series-in-excel-chart/
http://chandoo.org/wp/2013/02/13/shaded-line-charts-excel/
What you can do is plot the Area graph on a secondary axis. Then go to Chart -> Layout -> Axes -> Display Secondary Horizontal Axis to see the axis, right click for its properties and change the type of the Axis Type to "Date axis". This (kind of) changes the axis to a numerical type, as opposed to a category type.
However, the area graph will still be placed incorrectly too far to the right because Excel will continue to plot the series as a (kind of) category type, with its data points appearing in the centre of each category as opposed to at the correct x value like in an XY scatter plot.
To get the graphs overlaying the most correctly, you can create a Scaled-up x value series which is, say, 1,000 times the original x-values and use this for the x-values of the area plot. By scaling by 1,000 or 10,000, you eventually get the granularity to a point where it looks more like X-Y plot, but is actually an area plot, and the graphs look like they coincide perfectly.
I have a combination chart with same type of values on both left y-axis scale and right y-axis scale. When I add a target reference line using lines and curves at some point on y-axis scale, I see two reference lines one for left y axis and the other for right y axis. Is there any option to display only one reference line according to scale on my left y-axis ?
Thanks
the way I understand your question is that you...
have a combination chart with multiple axes
are attempting to use the Lines and Curves feature to create a line based on your data
have one line appearing for each axis
would like to have only one line for the entire chart
the short answer is, unfortunately this is not possible when using multiple axes.
I assume that what you are trying to compare is two relative sets of values on different axes, but one of those sets has some kind of benchmark (target reference line) to measure against.
I can suggest two possible workarounds that might still do what you need:
if your benchmark value never changes, you can add a horizontal line with a fixed value. technically, this will draw as many lines as you have axes, but since they will all be the same value, they'll render on top of one another and appear to be the same line.
if the benchmark does change, and you can get the benchmark into a Document Property, you can render it just like the above, but based on the property rather than a fixed value. this would allow the value to be dynamic, but you have to get it in there in the first place.
So I'm not sure whether this can be done or not, but I want to highlight certain scatter plot points on my graph whilst still retaining the original axis labels. This is a little snip of my data:-
(0.5,0.525] 272
(0.925,0.95] 116
(0.975,1] 446
(1,1.025] 2840
(1.975,2] 974
(2,2.025] 1400
I have a scatter plot of the first column as my x-axis and the second column as my y-axis. Currently I'm highlighting the points that I want (such as (1,1.025] 2840by adding it as a new legend entries series, but to get it to align horizontally with the original data I've had to number all the points from 1 onwards and add the horizontal axis labels that way, so that all the points that are highlighted mask the other points behind it that contain the horizontal data labels. Is there a way of overcoming this without formatting the data for the x-axis numerically? Or a way of incorporating the data labels separately?
Just to illustrate the problem, I've attached an image at the end of this post. The columns mzRange and Frequency on the left handside were used to plot the graphs, whilst the columns on the right handside of the graph were used to highlight the points on the bottom graph. However, as the x-axis is labelled with the bin ranges from the column on the left, it goes up in a numerical fashion as seen with the numbers on the left most column, meaning I have to use the position number of the bins to then place the highlighted points (as seen with the column on the right handside of the graph that goes 18,34,36 etc) which in turn hides the information of the m/z bin range. Hope this makes sense.
The data in the mzRange is not numeric. If it is used as the data source for the X axis, it will result in the data points being numbered ascending on the X axis.
The only way to plot over a data point is to use the exact X and Y values as the original data point. You could mark the highlights in a column next to the original mzRange column and then plot the whole column.
See this screenshot:
Note how the X axis has nothing in common with the values of column B, although that was used as the data source for the X axis. The red dot highlights are placed in the rows that determine the position on the X axis. This way, the label that appears when hovering over the data point remains intact.
I have 3 columns of data, eg:
http://i.stack.imgur.com/XjGmu.jpg
When Excel creates a line graph of this, the blue line is what i get.
This is not correct because the time stamp shows the time when something is switched on (255) or off (0) (could also be the current state eg 16:08). So I'd like a graph like this - see the red line (with a time-based X axis off course):
http://i.stack.imgur.com/vNvPk.jpg
Anyone can help? Thanks
As #Jon49 indicated, you need to plot additional data points--two y values for each x value: one to plot the point at y=255 and one to plot y=0.
If the time-span of the data is at least a few days, you can use a line chart. But in your case since the values are within a day, the scatter chart with straight lines is the only option due to the limitations of the scale units for line charts.
The key is the values need to be in the correct order. Each y=255 value needs to be followed by the next time-stamp's 255 value followed by it's 0 value, followed by the next time-stamp's 0 value:
Excel doesn't support this type of discrete value graph (at least not excel 2k3 that I am using); your best bet is to use a bar graph and then go into the settings and set the gap width down to zero.
Not sure what the best way is but I would automate what I describe below on how to do (unless this is a one time deal, then just brute force it):
Separate the 255s from the 0s. Make sure for every 0 time there is a corresponding 255 time. Take the zero times and put in a scatter plot then add a y-error bar and make the fixed value equal to 255. Format to how you like it.
Now for the 255s. Add those to the chart by pairs. Make the chart type for these pairs scatter plot with a line. Format how you would like them to look.
Let me know if that doesn't make sense to you.