Analytica 4.0 offers a rich array of new styles and options for graphs. If you are familiar only with previous releases, you will find it helpful at least to skim through these options.

Overview

When you display the Result of a variable, it shows it as a table or graph, according to how you last viewed it. The first time you view a Result, it shows as a Graph, unless you changed the Default result view in the Preferences dialog.

When displaying a graph, Analytica uses the default graphing settings, unless you have selected other settings for it. You can modify these with the Graph setup dialog.

[Analytica 4.0 no longer offers direct graphing in Excel, since almost all those options are now available from within Analytica.]

Graph setup dialog

To open the Graph setup dialog for a graph, select Graph Setup... from the Result menu, or simply double click on the graph window.

The graph setup dialog has six tabs. All tabs show the template panel and these three buttons:

Apply: Apply any changes to settings to the current graph, and close the dialog.

Set Default: Save any changed settings on the current tab as the default for all graphs, and close the dialog. It does not affect any settings that you have not changed since you opened the Graph setup dialog. Changing a default will affect all graphs that use the default, but not graphs for you override the default (in the past or future).

Cancel: Close the dialog without changing or saving anything.

Chart Type tab

This tab shows options for modifying the style and arrangement of the graph:

Line style:

Straight line segments join the data points
Straight line segments, with a symbol at each data point.
No lines, with a symbol at each data point.
No lines, with a pixel at each data point.
A vertical line and horizontal line from each data point to the next.
A bar for each discrete x value, with height showing the y value.

Swap horizontal and vertical axes: Check this box to exchange the x and y axes, so that x axis is vertical and y axis is horizontal. For bar graphs with long labels for each x element, it is often helpful to swap axes so that these labels will fit horizontally.

3-D effects: Check to use three-dimensional style to view graphs. for bar graph line style, it will offer the choice of Box or Cylindrical shapes for the bars.

Line style settings:

Area fill: Check to fill in the area beneath each line with a solid color. If there are multiple lines, the Graph will have a Key index. The fill areas are drawn from last to first element of the Key index -- which works well if the y values are sorted from smallest to largest over the key index. Otherwise, some values will obscure others.
Transparency: Drag the cursor to change transparency of fill colors between opaque and transparent. Some transparency lets you see fill lines and areas that might be behind others.
Line thickness: Select the thickness of lines to display. (Does not apply for styles without lines.)
Use separate color/symbol keys: Check if to get two key indexes, one indicated by color and the second by symbol type or size.
Allow variable symbol size: Check to have symbol size vary with y value.
Symbol size: Enter a number in typographic points to specify size of symbols.
Min symbol size and Max symbol size: If you check Allow variable symbol size, specify the range of symbol sizes (in typographic points) for the smallest and largest.

Bar graph settings:

Stacked bars: Check to show bars stacked one on top of the other over the Key index, instead of side by side. The values for each bar are cumulated over the Key index.
Variable origin: Check if you want to set the origin (starting point) for each bar other than zero (the default). The graph will then display a Bar Origin menu to let you select the Bar origin.
Bar overlap: With stacked bars, they overlap 100%. You can specify partial overlap between 0 and 100%.

Axis Ranges tab

This tab lets you control the appearance of each axis.

Autoscale: Uncheck this box if you want to specify the range for the axis, instead of letting Analytica select the range automatically to include all values.
Max and Min: The maximum and minimum values of the range to use when you have unchecked Autoscale.
Include zero: Check if you want to include the origin (zero) in the range.
Approx. # ticks: Specify the number of tick marks displayed along the axis. Analytica may not match the number exactly, in the interests of clarity.
Reverse order: Check if you want to show the values ordered from large to small instead of the default small to large.
Categorical: Treat this axis as categorical. Usually, Analytica figures out the quantity is categorical without help. Occasionally, if the values are numerical, you may want to control it yourself.
Log scale: Check if you want to display this on a log scale. This is useful for numbers that vary by several orders of magnitude. It uses a "double log" scale with zero if the values include negative and positive numbers.

Set default: If you have changed settings for an axis that is an index (not the main variable), clicking this button will apply these settings for that index for all graphs that use that index. For example, if the scale is the Index Time, you can use this to change the Time scale (e.g. start and end time) for all graphs that display a value over Time.

Style tab

Grid: Select the radio button to control the display of the grid over the graphing area. You can also select the color.

Frame: Select the radio button to control the display of the lines framing the graphing area. You can also select the color for the frame. It usually looks best to have the Frame the same color as the Grid, or a darker shade of the same color.

Tick marks: The top radio buttons control where to show tick marks. The lower ones control how they are displayed.

Display key: Select radio button to control where to display the Key on the graph. Select the Border check box to display an outline rectangle around the key.

Fonts tab

This tab lets you select the font, size, style, and color for four types of text on the graph, the Axis titles, the Axis labels (i.e. text labeling along the graph), the Key title and the key labels (i.e. text appearing in the key). Graphic designers recommend that you use the same font and color for all text on a graph, and vary only the size.

Axis Label Rotation: Specify degrees of rotation from -90 to 90 to rotate the labels for either axis. For example, for a bar graph with long labels along its horizontal axis, you can rotate them so that they fit without getting truncated.

Background tab

This tab lets you control the color or pattern that appears on the graph background. The main area covers the entire graph window (exclusive of slicer and index selections). The plot area is the rectangle showing the graph values. If you specify a fill color or pattern for the Main area, the main fill will also be the background for the Plot area and Key if they are set to "None".

Fill: The options are

None: No fill. Default to white background.
Solid: Use a solid fill with the Color selected.
Gradient: Use a gradient of color, going from Color 1 to Color 2, in the direction you select from Gradient style.
Hatch: Use a hatched fill using the selected Hatch Style with Color 1 and Color 2.

Good graphic designers recommend avoiding Hatch backgrounds, and using solid or gradient backgrounds with mild colors, if at all. The data lines, points, and text should not be overwhelmed by the background.

Preview tab

The Preview tab shows the graph with the current settings so that you can easily see the effects of settings for this graph.

XY comparison or XY Coordinate sources

XY comparison lets you plot one variable on vertical (Y) axis against the other on the horizontal (X) axis.

Graph Setting Associations

Graph settings now have a richer set of associations, designed to allow intelligent transitions when multi-dimensional results are pivoted and when the graphing mode (Mid, Bands, PDF, etc) is changed.

For example, axis range settings are associated with a particular index, so if the graph is pivoted, the setting follows the pivot and isn't suddenly applied to a horizontal axis where it no longer makes sense.

Line style settings are associated with a combination of graph view mode and categorical / continuous distinction. Thus, it is possible to have a probability mass plot draw as a bar graph, a sample as a scatter plot, and bands as a line plot, all with a single graph setting.

Associations also impact how how settings transfer when "Set Default" is used.

Graphing Dimensions and Roles

A general and flexible system of graphing dimensions and graphing roles allows a very rich space of chart types to be created using only a few elementary building blocks. The mechanism also allows many dimensions to be reflected on a single graph.

A computed value or an index can serve as a graphing dimension. Graphing dimensions are then assigned to graphing roles, and the user can easily pivot the graphing roles to alter the assignment of dimensions to roles. By assigning graphing dimensions to roles, a user can view many dimensions at once, and compare multiple values on the same graph.

Selectable graphing roles include X-axis, Y-axis, combined Color/Symbol Key, and Bar Origin, and may soon include Symbol Size and separate Color and Symbol Keys.

While Analytica 3.x allowed a single external X-value to be plotted against a result, the new system allows any number of external variables to be included and compared in the same graph.

Selecting Data for Graphing

The structure of data used to create a plot is now much more flexible. A Coordinate Index can be used to plot data that is organized in columns, without having to break the data into multiple variables. Multiple external variables can be merge into the plot as graphing dimensions. In a Scatter Plot, you can pivot both X and Y axes to explore multi-dimensional data from many "angles".

Categorical and Continuous Plots

Analytica 4.0 gives much more attention and consistency to the treatment of Categorical, Continuous and Discrete results.

The Discrete vs. Continuous distinction is determined by the Domain Attribute, and determines whether probability plots are density and cumulative density plots (continuous) or probability mass and cumulative probability (discrete) plots.

The Categorical vs. Continuous distinction determines how a graphing axis is laid out. Continuous dimensions require numeric values. The determination of whether a graphing dimension is categorical or continuous is partially determined by the domain attribute, but the values actually occuring in the dimension, by the chart type (bar or non-bar chart), and by the Categorical checbox in the axis range setting.

Analytica maintains separate line-style settings for categorical and continuous plots. (The running axis of a plot, usually x-axis, determines whether the plot is continuous or categorical). Thus, by pivoting a continuous dimension to the x-axis to replace what was a categorical dimension, a graph may change from a bar graph to line graph, for example.

Richer Plots Types

Using combinations of the above named features, a wide variety of chart styles can be created, which were not possible previously. These include:

Bar Chart variations

Stacked Bars
Segmented Bar charts
Horizontal Tornado Plots
Gantt Charts
Candle bars (High-close-open-low stock charts)

Scatter plot variations

Multi-D depiction of data in columns
Bubble plots

Line plot variations

Standard (continuous) line plots
XY parametric plots
Log Plots (axis log scaling)
Sideways plots

Graph Appearance Settings

Analytica 4.0 exposes many appearance settings to user control, allowing the production of "board room quality" charts. These include:

Control of background fills/patterns (solid, gradient, hatch).
Full control of fonts (color, face, size, bold, etc)
Location of Key.
Grid and tic styles
Axis label rotations
Three-D effects (solid bars, ribbons)
Filled line graphs (w/ transparency control)

Graph Style Templates

Graph style templates let you save the settings for a graph into a named template, so you can reuse it for other graphs. For example, can create templates for your organization to provide a consistent style. Future beta releases of 4.0 will include templates offering a range of selected styles.