Chart a time series?

[SueWithQuestion]

Attached is a sample data file. This sample file has only 15 rows, but my real data has anywhere from 30 to 10,000 rows, and once in a while, as many as 50,000 rows.

The Date Sold column is formatted as a date field. I want to create a chart showing number of records per month. I tried playing with creating a Pivot Chart to do this, but without luck.

My immediate need is to just show something like a line chart of the number of records on a monthly basis between whatever the date range is within the data. However, I can also envision wanting to do the same thing for records with a particular Profit Interval, or a particular Region. I want the chart labels to just be the month/year values.

I've been searching through the forums and on-line, and I still can't quite figure this out. I hope I'm just making this harder than it is.

Can someone help me with this?

[Andy Pope]

A pivot table and chart are probably you best bet as it will allow you to summarize and group your data.

[SueWithQuestion]

A pivot table and chart are probably you best bet as it will allow you to summarize and group your data.

THANK You!

One chart problem: The chart is not correctly showing data for 2010 versus 2011.

How can I correct that?

One personal problem: I don't know how you got only the names of the months to show up. Ideally, I'd like the labels to be something like ... Nov10, Dec10, Jan11, Feb11...

How can I do that?

I'm also not very pivot chart savvy, so any tips you can give me on how you did that would be great, too.

Can you help me, yet again?

[Andy Pope]

Right click the Row field in the pivot table and pick Group.
Add Years to the currently selected Month grouping.

See the pviot table info here
http://www.contextures.com/tiptech.html#P

[SueWithQuestion]

Andy,

Thank you for your continued help.

The chart is not right - it is not distinguishing between 2010 and 2011 in the date field. How can I correct that, and is there a way to have the labels be clearer, but not overly cluttered, to show the month and year?

Right click the Row field in the pivot table and pick Group.
Add Years to the currently selected Month grouping.

See the pviot table info here
http://www.contextures.com/tiptech.html#P

[SueWithQuestion]

Andy,

Thank you for your continued help.

The chart is not right - it is not distinguishing between 2010 and 2011 in the date field. How can I correct that, and is there a way to have the labels be clearer, but not overly cluttered, to show the month and year?

Andy,

Never mind - I got it. I realized you already told me how to Group in a Pivot Table, so I just added another Group for year.

Thank you again for your help. You are fantastic!

[Andy Pope]

seems okay to me.

included is a creen shot of how the revised group dialog should be.