Excel Charts For Dummies
by Ken Bluttman
Excel Charts For Dummies
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Copyright 2005 by Wiley Publishing, Inc., Indianapolis, Indiana
Published by Wiley Publishing, Inc., Indianapolis, Indiana
Published simultaneously in Canada
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Library of Congress Control Number: 2005923418
ISBN-13: 978-0-7645-8473-2
ISBN-10: 0-7645-8473-1
Manufactured in the United States of America
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
1O/RW/QV/QV/IN
About the Author
Ken Bluttman has been working as a software developer for over 15 years. He works with many technologies, including Office/VBA, Visual Basic .NET, SQL Server, as well as ASP.NET and other Web goodies. He is the author of Excel Formulas and Functions For Dummies,Access Hacks, and Developing Microsoft Office Solutions. Ken lives in New York with his wife, son, dog, and assorted amphibians and crustaceans.
Dedication
To my two artists. You bring light and color into our home.
Authors Acknowledgments
Bringing a book from concept to reality is a team effort. I want to thank Elizabeth Kuball for her outstanding project management and editorial work. Thanks to Tom Heine and the wonderful Wiley staff for all the behind-the-scenes activities. And thanks to Doug Klippert for his technical prowess.
Publishers Acknowledgments
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Introduction
C harts are everywhere! In newspapers and magazines, on TV, on roadside billboards, and on your utility bill. Some are gorgeous, and some are dull but functional. Some provide you with useful information, and some pull the wool over your eyes.
Charts have a purpose or two to tell you something useful, and to tell it to you in a way faster than words would. When youre creating a chart, you hope that someone looking at it wont have to take long to figure it out! Let that be a guiding principle in chart design: If it takes too long for someone to figure out what hes looking at, you need to rethink and redesign that chart.
About This Book
This book takes you through the chart-making power of Excel. Charts are an essential part of Excel but perhaps not understood to the degree that number crunching and math are. Often, when someone needs to make a chart, she just opts for a catch-all Line chart or perhaps a Column or Bar chart. Make it a 3-D Column or Bar, and who can complain when they see how beautiful it is? But the fact is that artsy, beautiful charts are not always the best way to present the facts about the data.