Bubble chart basics

[Guest]

Using 2000 I am trying to come up with a meaningful sample of a bubble chart
for the charting class I teach and I'm having a really tough time. I know
nothing of bubble charts. I have been searching the group and web for some
time now trying to figure out where I'm going wrong.

Here's my data:

Region Avg Stay Patients
North 1.8 1208
East 2.3 2304
South 1.1 961
West 3.4 1936

Here's what I want to get when I use the bubble chart - the region names as
the X axis values, the average stay as the y axis and the bubble size
indicating the number of patients.

What I GET is the numbers 1 through 6 as the X axis values instead of the
region names. The size of the bubbles is correct as is the Y axis - just the
bottom axis is not what I expect.

If I put the data label values on the series I get the region names - but
I'm thinking they should be part of the bottom axis.

Where am I going wrong??

Lauri S.

 

[Del Cotter]

Using 2000 I am trying to come up with a meaningful sample of a bubble chart
for the charting class I teach and I'm having a really tough time.

If I put the data label values on the series I get the region names - but
I'm thinking they should be part of the bottom axis.

The X axis in a bubble chart is an interval axis, as in a scatter chart,
not a category axis, as in a bar chart.

The only way to get the region names where you want them will be to
create a dummy bubble series, give the bubbles the region names as data
labels, then format the bubbles to be invisible. Which is probably not a
set of operations you want to have to explain to your class.

 

[Jon Peltier]

IMO this would be a better chart if you plotted patients as X and average
stay as Y (or switch X and Y, see what looks best), and use one of the
following utilities to label the points with the region:

Rob Bovey's Chart Labeler, http://appspro.com
John Walkenbach's Chart Tools, http://j-walk.com

- Jon