New to Excel 2007, unless JP corrects me, is the Picture Selection Pane.
This is a neat little tool which allows quick sorting and editing of the visibility of pictures and other objects on a worksheet. Those other objects includes Charts, Shapes, Word Art, Text Boxes, Pictures and other embedded objects.
Earlier this week on the Chandoo.org/Forums, Ankit asked a question about un-hiding pictures that seemed to disappear from his worksheet.
I responded with a little bit of VBA code which he was able to use to make all his pictures visible.
Sub unhide_pics()
Set DrwObj = ActiveSheet.DrawingObjects
For Each Pict In DrwObj
Pict.Visible = True 'change to False to hide
Next
End SubI later realized that had Ankir been using Excel 2007/10 he could have solved his problem without the need for any code.
How ?
Use the Selection Pane.
Goto a page with an object, hidden or not
Goto the Page Layout, Selection Pane tab.
What Can I Do ?
In the selection pane window you will see a list of objects that are on your worksheet. The list shows visible and non-visible (Hidden) objects.
Visibility
Each Object has a small picture beside it showing either an Eye (Visible) or a Window (see through), this indicates the visible status.
Click on an eye to hide an object,
Click on a blank pane to unhide the object
Depth Order
The location of the objects in the list also shows the position in the Depth Field of the objects. That is Objects at the top of the list are in front of those objects below it in the list.
You can move objects up or down using the re-order buttons which moves objects closer to the front or rear of other objects.
Show All/Hide All
Click on the Show All/Hide All buttons to do exactly that.
Rename Objects
Click on the name of the object and type a new name
Advanced Use
Hold Ctrl and Click on several objects in the selection pane to add them to your selection
The selected objects are highlighted in the selection pane
Right click on the objects to Group/Ungroup them
Grouped Objects are shown in the selection Pane as a group
The group can be hidden/shown or individual members of the group can be hidden/shown
Uses:
Cleanup Web Copy/Paste
If you have ever selected a large amount of text from a web site and pasted it into Excel, you will have inevitably collected several graphical objects along the way, some visible and some hidden
Use the selection Pane to select them all at once and press delete
Change Company Logos
You may have a report which you generate for differing companies
Install all the logos and Hide/Show as required.
Look for Missing Links
I have seen Excel workbooks where people have an external link and they cannot find it.
Links can be attached to Drawing Objects etc and these may be hidden.
The Selection Pane is a quick way to search for those objects without code
18 Responses to “Best Charts to Compare Actual Values with Targets – What is your take?”
Great post. I can't vote, though, because the answer I want to put down is "it depends". As with all visualisations, you've got to take into account your audience, your purpose, technical skills, where it will be viewed, etc.
I'm with Andy: It depends. Some I would use, some I might use, some I won't touch with a barge pole.
Naturally I have comments 🙂
The dial gauge, though familiar, is less easy to read than a linear type of chart (thermometer or bullet). It's really no better than the traffic lights, because all it can really tell you is which category the point falls in: red, yellow, or green.
By the same token, pie charts are so familiar, people don't know they can't read them. Remember how long it takes kids to learn to read an analog clock?
Bullet charts don't show trends.
With any of the charts that have a filled component and a marker or ine component, it makes more sense to use the filled component (area/ column) for target, and the lines or markers for actual.
[...] Best Charts to Compare Actual values with Targets (or Budgets … [...]
I voted for #6 even though I agree with the other comments that it depends.
The majority of the votes are for the #2, thermometer chart. I still have yet to understand what happens when you are above plan/goal, which was brought up in yesterday's post.
Also, I agree with Jon in that it would be better to flip the series and make the filled part the target or goal and the line or marker the actual.
I am also a fan of using text when appropriate if the data is among other metrics in a type of dashboard. Calling it out by saying actual and % achievement is a good option.
Another "it depends" vote. Are you just looking at one or are you comparing a number of targets with actuals? You didn't include a text box. The problem with sentences is that they can get lost in a page of gray text. A text box can call attention to the numbers and line them up effectively.
I'm with Jon: "Some I would use, some I might use, some I won’t touch with a barge pole" and I'm surprised that some of your readers voted for the last group.
Jon says:
With any of the charts that have a filled component and a marker or line component, it makes more sense to use the filled component (area/ column) for target, and the lines or markers for actual.
Why does this make more sense? I like 6 the way it is, although I would use a heavy dash for the plan/target marker.
"It depends" is also my take. What I usually try to drill into my clients dashboard design is the fu ndamental difference between spot results (am I on target for this month) and long term trends.. I always try to create 3 different set of graphs to represent real perormance:
- spot results vs objectives
- cumulative results vs objectives
- long-term trend (moving average) mostly) to see where we're going
[...] Best Charts to Compare Actual Values with Targets – What is your take? (tags: excel charts) [...]
[...] Related: Charting Principles, How to compare actual values with budgets [...]
[...] Excel Charting Alternatives to compare values [...]
Jon says:
With any of the charts that have a filled component and a marker or line component, it makes more sense to use the filled component (area/ column) for target, and the lines or markers for actual.
Why does this make more sense? I like 6 the way it is, although I would use a heavy dash for the plan/target marker.
I totally agree, Bob. I would normally favour a line for the target and a column for the actual, you can see quite easily then which columns break through the line, then.
[...] best charts to compare actual values with targets — den Status mal anders zeigen, z. B. als Tacho [...]
Thermometer charts: "Not appropriate when actual values exceed targets" - this is easily solved by making the "mercury" portion a different color from the border, then you can clearly see where the expected range ends and the actual values keep going.
People seem to knock gauges quite a bit in dashboarding, but trying to show comparison of realtime data between operating sites and targets for each site can easily be done with a bank of gauges that have the optimal operating points at 12 o'clock.
The human eye is great at pattern stripping, and any deviation of a gauge from the expected 12 position will quickly register with an operator and attract his attention. Using a colour background, or meter edge, will also indicate the sensitivity of a particular site.
[…] Best charts to compare actual with target values […]
[…] Best charts to compare actual with target values […]
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I am wondering how will the plotting work, for some of the targets which may have been achieved before time. E.g. for the month of Jul the target was 226 and the actual was 219. So the chart will show a deficit in meeting the target by 7 points but what if this 7 may have been completed earlier in month of June. So ideally it not a deficit.