Charts

• Introduction
  • Charting a Result Set
    • Selecting Category Column
    • Selecting Series
    • Chart Type
  • Chart Preferences
    • Appearance Preferences
    • Series Preferences
  • Zooming
  • Export

Introduction

The chart support in DbVisualizer presents data from any result set in a configurable chart displayed in a line, bar, area or pie style. It offers much of the charting support you find in MS Excel and other specialized charting tools. Charts may be exported as an image to file, printed and copied to system clipboard for easy sharing with other tools. Charts are configured and viewed in the SQL Commander and in the Monitor tool which is really powerful, delivering real time charts of many result sets simultaneously.

Here are some sample charts:

Figure: Chart types

Charting a Result Set

The basic setup of a chart is really easy. Just select one or more columns that should appear as series in the chart and what column to use as the category (X-axis). Further refinement of the chart can be made in the chart preferences window.

The normal output view of results in the SQL Editor is in a grid style as shown in the following screenshot. To activate the chart view click the rightmost button in the result tab toolbar:

Figure: Grid view of result set

When switching to the chart view DbVisualizer automatically pick the first date or text column as category and the first numeric column as serie. In the following example it is the datelabel and id columns for this specific result set.

Figure: Grid view of result set

Selecting Category Column

To change category column click the category drop-down and pick what column to use.

Figure: Category drop-down

Let the mouse pointer stay on a column name for a second and tip will show what data type it is.

Selecting Series

Click the serie button to change what series to display in the chart. This drop-down stay on screen while de-selecting and selecting series and the changes are directly propagated in the chart. To close the list either press the ESC button or click outside the list. If only one serie is selected then its name is listed in the button label. If additional series are selected then the number of selected series are listed in parentheses.

Figure: Category drop-down

Tip: Press the ALT key while selecting a serie and all currently selected series will be de-selected.

This is the chart after applying category and 2 series:

Figure: Line chart with two series

Chart Type

A chart can be displayed as Line, Point, Area, Stacked Area, Bar, Stacked Bar and the Pie type. Select what type to use in the Chart Type right-click menu or in the chart toolbar:

Figure: Chart types

For the Pie chart only one Serie can be selected.

Chart Preferences

The chart preferences are used to customize the appearance of the chart such as titles, colors, legend position, etc. It can also be used to set alternative names for the series in the chart. All appearance settings are automatically re-used when running subsequent queries in the SQL Commander during the same DbVisualizer session. If you save a query as a bookmark script then all appearance settings are saved with the chart. Loading the script at a later time will also load the chart settings.

Appearance Preferences

Use the controls in the General tab to customize the layout and style of the chart.

Figure: Look and feel configuration of the chart

Information about the selected setting in the list is displayed at the bottom of the window.

Series Preferences

The default serie name is the column name in the result set.  In the Series tab you can set an alternative label name and also control what series should be visible.

Figure: The Series tab in the Chart Preferences

Changes in the Series tab are propagated directly in the chart.

Zooming

Charts support zooming by selecting a rectangle in the chart area. Selecting another rectangle in that zoomed area will zoom the chart even further, and so on. To unzoom one level, click the Zoom Out button.

Export

Charts can be exported in PNG, GIF or JPG formats.

Figure: Export dialog for charts

The default size of the exported image is the same as it appears on the screen. To change the size, either select a pre-defined paper size in the Size list or enter a size in pixels.

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