Scaling

[sungen99]

In my attached example you can see how a traditional bar chart will automatically alter its scale to make the data more appealing.

I have created a infographic type chart as you can see with three sets of data. Only as you can see the effect is less than appealing.

I am desperately trying to figure out how to have the data auto scaled. The way it works now is that whatever of the three numbers is the biggest will be 100% of the swish. I now need to figure out how to make the other two fall into a more desirable position than they are now.

Is this just MATH????? And if so- I am utterly clueless on what the formula would be. I ASSUME it would be the difference between the high and the low…… and split it up????

Utterly frustrated.

[MrShorty]

I'm not sure what is poorly communicated by these charts. The "swish" chart shows that all three values are very similar.

The column chart tells me that estimate is about 99.4% of this report, and last year is 98.8% of this report. I can see that the total span covered by the chart is 1.8%, so all three values are quite similar, but I can also readily see that last year is smaller than estimate which is smaller than this report. The only thing the column chart does not tell me is what 100% represents (10.356 ).

I don't know that the question is a math question so much as it is a generic charting question -- what do you want to communicate to your reader? I have told you what I see from the charts. Did I understand what you wanted me to see, or is there something I was supposed to see but did not?

[sungen99]

MrShorty- you are correct is seeing what is being represented in my example. However, unlike the simple bar chart example I believe the “swish” is doing a poor job of showing the “scale” of the difference between the 3 items of data.

You are correct as the largest number, in this case the 10.356, would represent the “full” 100% of the swish. What I would like to be able to do with the other two is properly adjust the other two using the (again you are correct with the 1.8% span) to magnify the difference.

That is why I believe it might be a math equation. Perhaps I am overthinking this? Perhaps I am not explaining what i would like the end result to depict?

[MrShorty]

However, unlike the simple bar chart example I believe the “swish” is doing a poor job of showing the “scale” of the difference between the 3 items of data.

I guess this could be a matter of opinion. From what I can see, all three values are very similar (differing by at most about 1.2%), so the swish is doing a very good job of showing that all three values are almost the same.

What I would like to be able to do with the other two is properly adjust the other two using the (again you are correct with the 1.8% span) to magnify the difference.

One concern with trying to "magnify" the difference is that it can be easy to obscure or misrepresent the data. It is, therefore, important to carefully think through what you want to show, and come up with a suitable metric that will allow to accurately represent the differences. Since you have not really explained in any detail what your data are or what they represent or anything (other than you want to "magnify" the difference between the three values), it is difficult to make a good recommendation.

Reading between the lines, I do see one possibly interesting and meaningful metric. It looks to me as if you have last years value, and you are trying to emphasize and communicate how much growth has occurred this year. One interesting way of showing this would be relative or per cent growth (value-lastyear)/lastyear. Using this metric, one can show that you estimated to grow about 0.8%. Actual numbers are showing 1.2% growth (is that 50% more than estimated? you decide). Those two values could easily be shown on a chart (column or line or "swish" or whatever), and should accurately show how much growth was expected to occur and how much more growth was actually realized.

Even if that is not reflective of what you are really doing, it should show you some idea of the thought process that might go into this.

[sungen99]

Thank you for your suggestions, i will take it under advisement.