Thread: "Bring to Front" Data Labels?

I have a chart that has lots of data labels, so many that some of the labels
become partially obscured. I have a routine that runs whenever a label is
clicked upon, and one of the things I'd *Like* to do is to mimic a drawing
object "Bring to Front" function. Is this possible?

The way the chart is constructed might help (or hurt) my chances: I am
graphing a tree chart, instantiated as an xlXYScatterLines Chart, and each
"node" in the tree is represented by a series with two points (node and
parent node). Each series gets one datalabel (at the node, i.e. the first
point in the series gets a label, the second doesn't).

I guess it's possible that I could re-order the series collection when the
label is selected, so that the series selected is last (and thus, I presume,
the datalabel is drawn last). I don't know if this would work, but I'd
really like to avoid this since it takes a couple of seconds to redraw the
chart, and that could get annoying...

Thanks!
Rob

Rob -

You could dispense with the regular labels, and use a utility like Tushar Mehta's
Chart Hover Label add-in (http://tushar-mehta.com), which pops up a custom label as
you mouse over items in the chart.

- Jon
-------
Jon Peltier, Microsoft Excel MVP
Peltier Technical Services
Tutorials and Custom Solutions
http://PeltierTech.com/
_______

Rob wrote:

> I have a chart that has lots of data labels, so many that some of the labels
> become partially obscured. I have a routine that runs whenever a label is
> clicked upon, and one of the things I'd *Like* to do is to mimic a drawing
> object "Bring to Front" function. Is this possible?
>
> The way the chart is constructed might help (or hurt) my chances: I am
> graphing a tree chart, instantiated as an xlXYScatterLines Chart, and each
> "node" in the tree is represented by a series with two points (node and
> parent node). Each series gets one datalabel (at the node, i.e. the first
> point in the series gets a label, the second doesn't).
>
> I guess it's possible that I could re-order the series collection when the
> label is selected, so that the series selected is last (and thus, I presume,
> the datalabel is drawn last). I don't know if this would work, but I'd
> really like to avoid this since it takes a couple of seconds to redraw the
> chart, and that could get annoying...
>
> Thanks!
> Rob

I've seen that tool, but it doesn't do the trick. The series names are bilt
programmatically, and this app doesn't let you do that. I could fix that, but
as you know the code is protected.

I was able to get a satisfactory solution by using the MouseMove event and
building (or rebuilding) a "last series" whenever the mouse is over a label.

Thanks.

"Jon Peltier" wrote:

> Rob -
>
> You could dispense with the regular labels, and use a utility like Tushar Mehta's
> Chart Hover Label add-in (http://tushar-mehta.com), which pops up a custom label as
> you mouse over items in the chart.
>
> - Jon
> -------
> Jon Peltier, Microsoft Excel MVP
> Peltier Technical Services
> Tutorials and Custom Solutions
> http://PeltierTech.com/
> _______
>
> Rob wrote:
>
> > I have a chart that has lots of data labels, so many that some of the labels
> > become partially obscured. I have a routine that runs whenever a label is
> > clicked upon, and one of the things I'd *Like* to do is to mimic a drawing
> > object "Bring to Front" function. Is this possible?
> >
> > The way the chart is constructed might help (or hurt) my chances: I am
> > graphing a tree chart, instantiated as an xlXYScatterLines Chart, and each
> > "node" in the tree is represented by a series with two points (node and
> > parent node). Each series gets one datalabel (at the node, i.e. the first
> > point in the series gets a label, the second doesn't).
> >
> > I guess it's possible that I could re-order the series collection when the
> > label is selected, so that the series selected is last (and thus, I presume,
> > the datalabel is drawn last). I don't know if this would work, but I'd
> > really like to avoid this since it takes a couple of seconds to redraw the
> > chart, and that could get annoying...
> >
> > Thanks!
> > Rob
>
>