Excell Graphs

someday_maybe

Hi guys,

Anyone help with a graph/data q?

I have a set of data which I am trying to represent in a graph - but I cant fathom it out...

I have 3 data series - days of the week, time of the day (allocated in 10 blocks) and a numeric value which correlates to the day/time. The numeric is representative of temperature, allocated in 5 blocks.

What I want to be able to show is days of the week on the vertical, time blocks on the horizontal and the each day to show its own fluctuations along a straight line across the graph - so i end up in effect with 7 lines running from L-R (days of the week) each showing its own fluctuations but not touching other days IYSWIM?

One could then compare a weeks worth of daily fluctuations and visually look for correlations between times of day and temps. I dont want to do each day on a single graph because whilst I have just 4 weeks data at present, by the time i have a years worth there will be 365 graphs which you cannot see on 1 page and so the data is worthless!

In my head it all makes sense, but not sure it is possible! Anyone?

TIA

SM:D

googler

How is the data arranged in the worksheet?

CRH71

If you're using Excel 2007, have you tried building a "Pivot Chart" from the data on the sheet you wish to analyse? That's the only way I can think of that would achieve your purpose.

AlwaysSomething

If you use up the X-axis for hours, and the Y-axis for days, then you are left with the Z-axis for temperature - a 3D graph. Take a look at this pic. I only used 4 days, and 8 temperatures per day, but it illustrates the idea.



This works okay for 4 days, but is going to get very hard to read once you have a month of data. If you want to keep it 2D, and have a series of lines, you have to space them out so they don't cross.

I did this by fiddling the numbers - adding 10 degrees to each day's temperature to keep it above the previous day's. That's why I took off the Y axis. This gives you the illustration you described, but prevents the user going to the axis to get real numbers from the chart. If you want to keep the axes, you can make a single, small graph for each day's data, and add a new graph to your spreadsheet every day.
Let me know what you would like to do, and I will help with the buttons to press.
Oh, and let me know which version of excel you are using please (old, 2007, 2010)