Apache OpenOffice (AOO) Bugzilla – Full Text Issue Listing |
Summary: | Improve the user interface for series, chart selection, giving more control | ||||||||
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Product: | General | Reporter: | mestech <robin.laing> | ||||||
Component: | chart | Assignee: | IngridvdM | ||||||
Status: | CLOSED NOT_AN_OOO_ISSUE | QA Contact: | issues@graphics <issues> | ||||||
Severity: | Trivial | ||||||||
Priority: | P3 | CC: | bjoern.milcke, issues, tony.galmiche.ooo | ||||||
Version: | 3.3.0 or older (OOo) | ||||||||
Target Milestone: | --- | ||||||||
Hardware: | All | ||||||||
OS: | All | ||||||||
Issue Type: | ENHANCEMENT | Latest Confirmation in: | --- | ||||||
Developer Difficulty: | --- | ||||||||
Attachments: |
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Description
mestech
2006-07-18 20:38:22 UTC
->mestech: Is it possible that you forgot to attach the pdf? ;-) Created attachment 37890 [details]
Intro to graphing with Quattro Pro 8
I was going to just as the servers went down as scheduled. They were not back up before I left work and I just arrived back. I just missed the shutoff by about 1 minute. Just attached it. Sorry if that caused any problems. Have a good one. ->mestech: No problem. I just thought you might have forgotten. For the issue about selecting the ranges in the spreadsheet for each data series separately, see Issue 3997. This issue is already addressed in the re-implementation of the chart. If you are interested in the new chart, you can evaluate a Developer's snapshot. For download visit the page http://graphics.openoffice.org/chart/chart.html . Note, that currently in the dialog for selecting ranges there are buttons which suppose to allow you to select a cell range in Calc. These actually don't work yet, due to technical problems. But you might get an idea. Changing the chart type is also nicer in the new chart, but it is still via a dialog "ChartType". I don't see an advantage of one dialog for everything, especially as many of our dialogs themselves have already tabs. And another thing: It is easier for everyone if Issues are as specific as possible. There is not much use in an issue that is just a summary of other issues. And an issue that says "Do it more like the competitor" does also not help very much (we already have some of those). The attached document is interesting, but I don't see a big difference in how a chart is created in the UI. If you have an idea how OOo could be improved by a particular feature or enhancement, then please suggest this as clear as possible. We will not copy the UI of QP, but we might adapt some ideas if they make sense in OOo. Thanks for the link to issue 3997. This points to my biggest problem with OOo as all my work is scientific in nature and charting the data is a major headache. I have downloaded and did a quick glance at the documentation for the New Chart. I am downloading the tar.gz file and I will see if I can figure it out. Now looking at the specifications in FlexibleSourceRangeSelection.sxw, I see that they still don't want to show the X series (except for scatter charts). This is a problem as there are many times that I want to reverse the X<>Y series for X/Y line charts. I do like the ability to change the order of the series with simple up/down arrows. The nice feature of the QP dialog with all the series displayed is you can quickly compare between the different series when there are problems. Now I don't see how to edit the Titles in the selection dialog. Many charts that I do are split or only sections of the whole table. The titles are in individual cells or can be manually entered. I don't see any place to change the titles when I edit a chart. Looking at the specifications for the chart wizard, what can I say. It isn't that much better than what we have now. I don't see the individual series listed. I don't see legend selection. I don't see X2 or Y2 Axis lables. Now it has been awhile since I have used QP but the "Wizard" and the "Chart properties" dialogs are the same. Once I selected the series I wanted, the chart properties dialog opened. This was the same interface and saved learning two different tools. Also allowed fine tuning for customized charts so you didn't have to go back and change properties. Isn't the Wizard supposed to make life easier and quicker? With a limited Wizard, then there is the need to go back and change properties that the user is not allowed ot change in the Wizard. Editting properties is a major time consuming task for me. Now if details are required. I submitted the QP document as a tool for those that seem so Excell focussed. I hated Excell and I really don't like OOos charting either. It showed a different approach to charting. The document is a quick tuturial to using QP. It uses a simple chart which is no different to what most charting programs do. The biggest point is the UI when you go to create the chart. As I said before the Wizard allows much more control over the chart. It doesn't leave me wanting. Page 3 of the pdf shows this in detail. Select the ranges as in both Calc and QP and go to create the chart. In QP I get a dialog that allow me to confirm the series or make custom changes. I can quickly see my X and Y series. In OOo, I have to look through a single line of series to confirm my data. Now as I have experienced, this can be really difficult when there are large data sets, especially when the data is not in adjoining columns (simple example). I can now simplily delete the unwanted series. To expand, lets say I have a chart that uses data in Columns C, F, G, J, L. In OOo, I could select the individual columns to use the Wizard but if the data is over thousands of rows, this can be a real pain. In QP, I can select columns C through L and then when the Wizard opens up, I can delete D, E, H, I and K. Now this has just saved me minutes of selecting. And yes, I have many spreadsheets that I am working with that have thousands of rows of data. Now this also expands into editting charts. In many cases, I will create a massive chart for general over view of data. Then I want just parts of the whole chart. I want to do this on the fly with the current chart configuration, not a new chart where I have to edit all the different parts again. I will then copy the chart and edit the series. At present I have a real nightmare going through the single series dialog. It will be better in Chart 2 with the series on different displays does not make it easy to edit each one individually. I have to remember offsets and or copy and past and edit the series. This is easy if all the rows series line up per rows but if they don't, then I have to do allot of post playing going between the spreadsheet and the properties dialog. I hope this explains the benefit of all the series, including the X-series being displayed at the same time. It makes it easy to customize and select parts of a pre-created chart on the fly. If I see something in an overall chart, I can then quickly edit a chart to create a "zoom" of something that may be important. If the developers can create one very useful dialog that will work as both the Wizard and the edit properties, then some work can be saved. It also makes it easier for the user. I have lost many settings when I go to change the data range with the present chart as I have to "create" a new chart, not edit the range of the present chart and undo would not recover so I had to exit and start again. One example of this is secondary "Y" axis which doesn't have a label property. Also, selecting a line in the graph, the properties should bring me the data series as one of the properties. I hope I have answered the questions but if there are more, please post and I will try to expand. I believe in simple tools, not complicated menus or dialogs that require 10 clicks to get something done. I guess the easiest is for someone to actually use QP with some scientific data sets and see the difference. I will see if I can clean up some of my data sets to upload as examples. Well I ran the prototype chart and the first thing I noticed is I cannot edit the X series. This is similiar to what I normally work with. X series should be A14:A19 Y1 series C10:C16 Y2 series E17:E22 I must select all the rows and columns to get the series loaded. I can then delete columns B and D. But I cannot change the X series to fit my data range of only 6 cells. In our work, we may have data on multiple pages that we want to chart in a single chart. I tried to just select the first series of data for X and then add the other series. No luck. Putting it simply, this is not good. I talked to my supervisor and another co-worker about this issue. My supervisor doesn't even try to use Excel or OOo for charting. My co-worker fights with Excel but cannot even touch OOo for charting as the X-axis needs to be editable. I am working on an actual data series to upload of the type of data that I work with on a daily basis. It may take two or three days to remove sensitive data. Created attachment 37898 [details]
Representative scientific spread sheet.
Due to the 1M limit for uploads, I found it easier to just create a small spreadsheet to represent some of the data that I work with. It is raw data in the exact format that I receive it. No processing has occured. There are three sets of raw data. Columns A, E and I are time counts. They have no bearing on T=0 and each one has a different T=0 Columns B, F, J is the data that needs to be charted. The series beginnings and ends are all dependent on T=0 and will start at three cells before the T=0 mark in each respective column. Columns C, G, K are for other information which isn't important in this example. This is the procedure that I would follow. Set X, Y1, Y2 and Y3 series and chart the data to find the T=0 point for each series. I would then adjust each series to represent T=0-three time counts. I would then find which series now gives me the longest time base for signal. I then would adjust that series to its length plus 50 time counts. I would count the number of rows for that series and adjust the other series (X and Y) to represent the require number of steps. After this chart is created, I would then copy the chart and edit the series (X and Y) to focus (zoom) in on different pieces of data that look interesting. The point is from a single set of data, multiple charts are created that require different data sets. But they are all based on the original chart once the X and T=0 is adjusted for each series. This is why I would find a UI that allows all series sets to be viewed at one time instead of seperate selections as per Chart 2 download that I tried. Also the ability to select non-adjacent data sets as well as define the X-axis set is important. ----- I am going to reference this issue on issue 3997 as well as they are associated but not duplicates. We have x-values only for scatter charts. But scatter charts can also have lines. Maybe we should change the UI here. The line-chart always has categories and no numerical x-values. BTW., Excel has the same distinction, but they have an automatism that changes a line-chart to scatter-chart when the categories are numbers. I don't generally like automatisms like this as they are not obvious to the user, but in this case it helps a lot of users getting the right thing. Of course it would have been better to improve the UI instead of having an automatism that knows better than the user. This way, OOo looks always worse just because the automatism misses. The spec for Issue 3997 is http://specs.openoffice.org/chart/dataselection/FlexibleSourceRangeSelection.odt . I removed the .sxw version as it is outdated. To take titles from spreadsheet cells is covered by Issue 8099 . Usually in specs we have a section "Future Tasks". Maybe we should mention this there. The new chart wizard has one page in its roadmap to select the ranges for series (the same as in the data-source-dialog). If you would like to show the series differently, please explain what you want to have. I like the idea of selecting data first, and then the chart-type. A good charting program would sugest a fitting chart type fitting your data. This would also avoid the problems with line- and scatter-charts. However, I think the Series-tab of the QP wizard is not very nice. First, it seems to be limited to 6 series (maybe there comes a scrollbar with additional series if you entered data for the first 6 series?). In general, I think you don't need more than 5 series, but I think 10 might also still be realistic. So, why limit where it is not necessary. Second, you have x-axis. These are the category strings if you have e.g. a bar-chart. If you have numbers these are x-values? So, you cannot have numbers as categories? Maybe the concept of categories vs. non-equidistant x-values should not bother the user, but in this dialog I think you don't see what kind of x-axis you have. E.g., on page 8 of the attached pdf, if the years would not all be 10 years apart, but instead of 1990 you would have 2000. Would there be a larger gap on the x-axis? Third, "Legend" seems to mean the names of the series. It looks like you need one contiguous range containing all series names, the series below are unassociated to the legend, whereas in reality they are. Each row/column of measured data has a label, which might be very important. So, I like it better to have the label directly assoziated to the series. At last, but not least, you only have one sequence per data series. This is a limitation we want to get rid of especially with Issue 3997. If two data series have different x-values, the QP dialog cannot handle this. We also have candle-stick charts with "open", "low", "high" and "close" values instead of four series that just have "y-values" and their role has to be guessed by a user. So, a series can have 4 sequences as well. added on CC. How to reply to comments in a linear fashion? Hum. Again, the QP reference is only for reference. It isn't the best but it is better than what either Excel and OOo have at this time. At least in the opinion of 4 different people I work with. BTW, I won't use Excel as a reference for anything good and productive in my experience. If you have not used QP, then it is hard to explain. The menus and UI's are much more intuitive than what either OOo or Excel have to offer. Isn't the idea of using software to make things easy. In regards to automatic creation. This is one of the biggest complaints about MS Office that I hear almost weekly. It won't let the users do what they want as it feels it knows better. I have converted some to OOo just because of this. In research, we need to display information in what some may term "not the normal way of doing things." We need control. This is why many scientists around here will use LaTeX instead of any word processor. Same with external graphing programs because Excel won't allow them to graph the data as needed. Most of my stuff work is line charts. Now to me, if there are links, then it isn't a scatter chart. If there are X-Y values, then to me it requires the editting of the X and Y series. Now the X-values can be numbers or names of what ever, but it is still a series of data. Names are data. The data being plotted are all series and in science, they are not always nice and neat. Even in Bar charts, I may want to change the Base series or the X-axis series to meet the need of the presentation or how I want to represent the data. I may want to have two or three charts based on teh same data set without having to copy or reformat the spread sheet. I may use Column A on one chart with data in B, D, and F but the next chart may use Column C for the X axis and use data from B and F. Same data sets, just minor changes. Most of my supervisors work is line charts. Most of my co-workers work is line charts. As in the example, the X-axis can be almost anything depending on the process and what we are trying to display. As Line Charts are X-Y in most cases, then the ability to edit the X series and select it from wherever it needs to come from is a needed benefit. I spent a year working on some data that required nine graphs of the data for each data set. For three of the charts, it was a simple X-Y line chart. All the data was in nice neat columns X first then Y1 and/or Y2 as needed. The next series of graphs were modified versions of graph 2 and graph 3. I needed to reverse the series in some cases and change the full series. I didn't want to go through all the hassles of having to re-lable everything, put in the formulas, etc. It was just easier to change the order of the series. This wasn't that hard in OOo as the charts were simple. If they were more complicated, then I would have been in trouble. The idea isn't to clone MS but to provide a better product. If you look at 3997, there are allot of people that want an easy ability to edit the series. I want the same thing but with a better UI. The UI in Chart 2.5 is not bad, but I think it could be better. -------- The new chart wizard has one page in its roadmap to select the ranges for series (the same as in the data-source-dialog). If you would like to show the series differently, please explain what you want to have. There is allot of reading in the proposed changes. I have not had time to play with the build that much. I do have other work to do. :) But this is important enough in my books to require the time. I would love to see OOo as a much better product than Office. In my opinion, the chart wizard should be a smart to allow a new user to create a chart of their liking by selecting the series being used and then create a chart to as powerful that the experience user can edit all the various titles (Main Title, Sub Title, X-Axis, X2-axis, Y-Axis, Y2-Axis), legends (for each series), All series, background image, etc. These could be through "Advanced" buttons on the Wizard but need to be accessable. Experienced users can then use the Wizard instead of creating a chart and then having to go and edit it. Give the users control of the whole process if they wish. I don't see why there needs to be two steps or even two different UI's for edtitting the chart properties and the wizard. Both achieve the same result, the users charts. You may not like Tabs, but I find them quite useful in my day to day work. They help keep things organized in a busy day. I like the idea of being able to make one click on a chart and be able to change most if not all of the properties, involved with the chart. I spent some time looking through the issues and found many that have to do with selecting and editting charts. I will have to read more before I can comment on them. All that I have read so far could be resolved with an intelligent UI. I guess you have to have a Supervisor that is on your case for some data for a presentation that needs to be formatted just right and exported and on his computer before he leaves work and the country today. And it is 10 minutes before quitting time. Try to change the formatting of all the lines because the presentation is going to be on a big screen instead of being printed. Or change the text of all the Axis because the audience cannot know what the actual names are but only respective names for security reasons. This seems to happen weekly here. ---- Again, the QP reference is only that, an idea. It is better than what is presently available in either OOo or Excel. Lets be better than all three are at this point in time. In regards to the specifics of Legends and series names. I do agree with you on the associations. The issue is, those names are not always with the particular data. I do like the idea of associating an individual cell with the legend or just typing in the legend I want. If I have a chart that has a legend "Secret Chemical X" but I need to have it say "Some chemical" for a particular reason, then I should be able to do this in the chart UI, not have to edit the spread sheet. Control to the user. I do agree with the changes to sequences and data series. Again, the UI should allow you to change this when you need to. I have a chart that uses one data set and I add another. The UI should allow me to do that without having to create a new chart from scratch. I see this as a great tool for on-going research. Todays data is on Sheet 4, I create a chart. The next day I get more data and I put it on Sheet 5 and I can then open the UI for the chart and add that data to the chart. Extend the X-series or add columns to a bar chart or just add more Y-series to work with the present X-series. User control and not being limited by the program thinking it is smarter than me. ---- This is an interesting discussion. I feel that it can be productive. I really doubt that I will get all I want and need but I would like to see OOo charting to be the best of any spreadsheet program out in the public. The UI for the Wizard and properties is the first step. I have gone through many of the issues and I see that these issues are either simliar or related. I feel they could all benefit from an greatly improved UI. Issue 62013 - show data series in Chart Line Object properties dialogue box Issue 20344 - Simplify creation of charts - new Chart Wizard ( Autoformat Chart Dialog) Issue 31670 - Ability to delete data series Issue 35925 - A way to customize / format a data series without selecting it (from the menus, view area, etc.) Issue 64825 - Link series names, data labels and titles from cells with formulas Issue 8099 - Chart title from a cell Issue 4770 - Possibility to change x and y-axis. Issue 4770 did remind me of a problem that has occured in any graphing package that I have worked with. If I want to change the X axis values with another, it is possible but hard. What I would do is copy the X value, paste it into a new series, then copy the Y series that I wanted for an X series and then delete teh old Y series and re-arrange the order if necessary. As time permits, I will play more with the 2.6 build as I do feel it is a good start. @iha: pls take over. ->mestech: This is a mega issue collection that cannot be worked with. So I close it. Please read the basic rules for issue handling http://qa.openoffice.org/issue_handling/basic_rules.html befor submitting new issues. Especially please follow the rule: One problem - one issue! There are many valuable points in the long comments, but you found out yourself already that many points are already addressed in separat issues. If you feel that there is something missing still please make sure that no issue does exist for that problem and write single separat issues for each problem or feature request. Thanks a lot. Your input is welcome but it needs to be in a form that can be handled. close I feel that this is a UI issue that covers other issues and to me it is one issue, the UI. I referenced other issues feeling that they can be fixed by providing a more inclusive UI but if the policy is to put each idea into a seperate issue and leave the developers to pull it all together, then so be it. I will submit all my comments into each of the associated issues as suggested. This is going to take some time. :) Sorry mestech, but if you post all this lengthy comment into each issue than you are effectively blocking development. Please refrain from doing so and instead shorten your comment each to what is relevant for the single issues. Thanks - one of the developers - more needing help than thousand words to read and browse through. Sorry if I confused you. I meant I would post only relevent info to each issue. I have done some stupd stuff in the past but I wouldn't just copy and paste to each issue. I will be making the comments in each issue and will have to refer to other issues as they are related, at least as the way I see it. In some cases, there won't be any need to reference. Ah, thanks a lot. That sounds good! :-) |