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Help with Graphing problem

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Lemon, John S.

Help with Graphing problem

Dear all

I have a problem in producing a nice graph axis from some data I have; the data contains events ( e.g. when a student starts to us an IT facility ) happening on particular dates throughout the year. The data has been collected from 1^st August 2008 and is ongoing. “Management” want comparisons between years to see if this year is showing different pattern from last year and so on for future years; the problem arises in that they want the origin / left hand end of the X axis to be the start of the data collection year ( i.e. 1^st August ) – I have created a ‘year’ variable which allows me to ‘categorise’ the chart and produce different lines for each year and by cumbersome syntax I have managed to get the scale starting at the required point – BUT – the labels show the day within the year as a number and I can’t see a way of getting a set of meaningful labels on the axis. I’ve tried using value labels for the day within the year / time period ( 1 = “1^st Aug” / 2 = “1^st Sep” etc. ) but this has no effect.

I have included the syntax that I use to generate the chart in the hope that someone has some bright ideas on this – if they don’t it will be a lovely puzzle to pose at Directions in November !!! There is no immediate rush for this as I can produce the charts but “management” want better looking charts to pass on to “senior management” !

Best Wishes

John S. Lemon

Student Liaison Officer

Directorate of Information Technology (DIT) - University of Aberdeen

Edward Wright Building: Room G51

Tel: +44 1224 273350

Fax: +44 1224 273372

Diary ( Free / Busy )

* Date and Time Wizard: Day_of_Year.

COMPUTE Day_of_Year=XDATE.JDAY(wdateon).

VARIABLE LABELS Day_of_Year "Day within Year ( 1st August to 31st July )".

VARIABLE LEVEL Day_of_Year(SCALE).

FORMATS Day_of_Year(F5.0).

VARIABLE WIDTH Day_of_Year(5).

DO IF ( ( XDATE.JDAY(wdateon) ) LE 212 ).

COMPUTE Day_of_Year = 365 + Day_of_Year - 212.

ELSE IF ( ( XDATE.JDAY(wdateon) ) GT 212 ).

COMPUTE Day_of_Year = Day_of_Year - 212 .

END IF.

DATASET ACTIVATE DataSet1.

* Chart Builder.

GGRAPH

/GRAPHDATASET NAME="graphdataset" VARIABLES=Day_of_Year COUNT()[name="COUNT"] yeer

MISSING=LISTWISE REPORTMISSING=NO

/GRAPHSPEC SOURCE=INLINE

TEMPLATE=[

"D:\UserStats\Analysis_Detailed\Wireless\Sessions_by_Year.sgt"].

BEGIN GPL

SOURCE: s=userSource(id("graphdataset"))

DATA: Day_of_Year=col(source(s), name("Day_of_Year"))

DATA: COUNT=col(source(s), name("COUNT"))

DATA: yeer=col(source(s), name("yeer"), unit.category())

GUIDE: axis(dim(1), label("Day within Year ( 1st August to 31st July )"))

GUIDE: axis(dim(2), label("Count"))

GUIDE: legend(aesthetic(aesthetic.color.interior), label(" Year ( from 1st August to 31st July ) ",

""))

SCALE: cat(aesthetic(aesthetic.color.interior), include("1", "2"))

ELEMENT: line(position(Day_of_Year*COUNT), color.interior(yeer), missing.wings())

END GPL.

The University of Aberdeen is a charity registered in Scotland, No SC013683.

ViAnn Beadle

Re: Help with Graphing problem

Here are a couple of ideas:

Use the sort.data function. Help indicates that this is used for categorical data so it might not work.

Try the origin function on the X axis. Typically it’s used to create floating bars or areas on the y axis.

When I have some time later this week, I’ll play with this. It would help if I had an example of the data.

From: SPSSX(r) Discussion [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Lemon, John S.
Sent: Monday, October 19, 2009 5:13 AM
To: [hidden email]
Subject: Help with Graphing problem