Custom color question + smooth chart curves question

[Gern Blanston]

I have prepared a large number of Excel templates that have charts I
pre-defined for the user. Each of the user-defined charts I set up uses
colors that are non-standard (I added them into the color palette using RGB
values). These custom colors conform to a corporate palette.

These Excel templates were set up so that users could develop charts that
they would paste into a Word template that had also been set up to conform
to many of the same colors. Within Excel, I actually added the custom
swatches to the palette, along the bottom row, which has room for such
user-defined colors.

The intent was to have the users paste linked MS Excel Chart or Table
objects and give them the option to set Links to these charts to update
Manually, Automatically or, if they wanted, to break the links entirely.

My supervisor on this project is telling me that suddenly the charts are
coming in with the colors all wrong, after updating the Links. I don't have
all of the information, but one action he did SOME of the time was to move
copies of entire worksheets from one Excel document into another.

Can anyone confirm issues with custom colors being knocked back to defaults?
problems with custom colors in charts and tables in general? problems with
linking? any viruses that could interfere with these operations? (my files
contain NO macros...) ANYthing that could be fingered as a suspicious
contributor to this problem?

The second point he made was that the formerly smooth curves of the pie
charts he pasted from Excel were suddenly jagged. I realize this is a
separate issue, but I am tired and am hoping for information on both of
these issues.

Many thanks,

Bill

 

[Jon Peltier]

Bill -

Custom Colors:

Custom colors are set for each workbook. If you copy the workbook, the
colors of the old become those of the new. If you copy a sheet or chart
from one workbook into another workbook, the copied object takes on the
colors of its new parent workbook. A color palette can be readily
copied from one workbook to another, from Tools menu > Options... >
Color tab > Copy Colors From dropdown.

Jagged Outlines:

Microsoft has a knowledge base article addressing this problem. It
suggests a few workarounds which seem to me to be more trouble than
they're worth. It includes charts (especially pie charts) pasted into
PowerPoint.
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;Q189938

If you're breaking the links altogether, you might try copying as a
picture (Hold Shift while selecting Copy Picture from the Edit menu, use
the On Screen and Picture options, not Bitmap), and pasting where you
want the chart. Perhaps the picture behaves better than the chart itself.

- Jon

 

[Gern Blanston]

Jon,

Thanks for your assistance!

Bill

Bill -

Custom Colors:

Custom colors are set for each workbook. If you copy the workbook, the
colors of the old become those of the new. If you copy a sheet or chart
from one workbook into another workbook, the copied object takes on the
colors of its new parent workbook. A color palette can be readily
copied from one workbook to another, from Tools menu > Options... >
Color tab > Copy Colors From dropdown.

Jagged Outlines:

Microsoft has a knowledge base article addressing this problem. It
suggests a few workarounds which seem to me to be more trouble than
they're worth. It includes charts (especially pie charts) pasted into
PowerPoint.
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;Q189938

If you're breaking the links altogether, you might try copying as a
picture (Hold Shift while selecting Copy Picture from the Edit menu, use
the On Screen and Picture options, not Bitmap), and pasting where you
want the chart. Perhaps the picture behaves better than the chart itself.

- Jon