At 21:34 01/07/2007 -0700, Rob Adams wrote:
I downloaded Open Office a few months ago and have few
complaints. I use it every day for word processing and creating
spreadsheets. My problem came when I tried to create a chart based
on data from my spreadsheets.
I'm far from a computer newbie, but when I try to get help in
creating a simple pie chart I feel like I'm trying to access secret
codes from the Pentagon! The chart came out right, but the labels
in the legend were all wrong. After consulting the help page
numerous times, I came to the conclusion that no one in the world
has ever been unhappy with the data in the legend because there's
not a word about it in the help page. It tells me how to change the
font and move the entire legend around, but nothing about changing
the actual data. The legend in my chart just says "Row 36, Row, 37,
Row 38," etc. The chart-making abilities of Open Office leave a LOT
to be desired. They really should be somewhat intuitive.
Not only that, but the colors that Calc chose for my pie chart
were ghastly. Think the help page will explain to me something
simple like changing colors? Nope.
Please help.
It's perhaps worth mentioning that this list - as its name suggests -
is for users, like you and me. We may agree or disagree with
you. If you want to report your complaints so that people can
consider them and possibly make changes, there are other feedback
routes for this. See the OpenOffice web site.
I think the way that legends work in charts is fairly standard for
spreadsheets: the legend items should be included in the spreadsheet
data itself. In your example, for instance, where you appear to have
your data in multiple rows of a single column, you would normally
fill an adjacent column (sensibly the previous one) with the legend
items for your chart. Your legend items might be in rows 36, 37, etc
of column A and your data items in the corresponding rows of column
B. (If necessary, you can duplicate your chart data in another part
of the spreadsheet to facilitate this.) You then select the block of
rows in both columns A and B as the data to be included in the
chart. The first page of the AutoFormat Chart dialogue should appear
with "First column as label" ticked; if not, tick it. Then that
first column is used as legends and not as chart data itself. And
it's all dynamic: if you wish to change the legend items after you
have created the chart, just go back and change them in the spreadsheet column.
You say the colours were "ghastly". Beauty is in the eye of the
beholder! You can change colours in two ways, either for this
particular chart or globally.
o Here's how to change the colours once you have created a
particular chart. Double-click the chart itself to select it - so
that you get the grey border, not the little green squares. Then
double-click a segment of the pie chart; this brings up the Data
Point dialogue. On the Area tab, you can select the colour for this
segment. Repeat for other segments as required.
o Alternatively, if you wish, you can change the default colours for
charts - so that you always get your preferred colours. To do this,
go to Tools | Options... | Charts | Default Colours. The default
colours are listed in order on the left. Select any of these you
wish to change; then select your chosen colour from the table on the right.
I trust this helps.
Brian Barker
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