• 2-sided bar graph? (Office 2003)

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    #440960

    This is another chart that I made years ago, but now can’t remember how to do it. I want a horizontal graph with the 0 point in the middle. Then one set of data bars goes to the right, while another set of data bars goes to the left. For instance, the bars going to the right could indicate Average Yearly Earnings, the matching bars going to the left would be for Years of Education–the point being to show that lower levels of education correspond to lower yearly earnings.

    There are a couple of Custom Types charts with 2 axes, but ithey aren’t quite what I’m looking for.

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    • #1057527

      Please provide more detail. What would be the vertical axis? Perhaps you can give an example of the data you want to chart.

    • #1057528

      You could specify that the second series uses the secondary value axis, then specify that this axis displays its values in reverse order. You’ll have to fiddle with the minimum and maximum scales for the primary and secundary value axes.

      • #1057730

        I’m still not finding what I need, but it’s not all that important, anyway. I looked back through the last 12 years of my powerpoint files and didn’t find an example of it, so maybe I’m having faulty memory about doing this in powerpoint. I know that I first did it using Harvard Graphics, but I switched to powerpoint long ago, and it seems to me that I had re-created it in powerpoint, but maybe not. Thanks for your help

        • #1057732

          Is the attached what you had in mind?

          • #1057737

            yes, thanks! I don’t remember having the negative values in the axis, but I haven’t checked it out enough yet to see how to change it. I also see now where to set the secondary axis–I wasn’t finding that before. Thanks again. (I hope this won’t be too complicated for my students to understand!!)

            • #1057739

              You can set a custom format General; for both value axes. The second section of this format is blank, meaning that negative values will be hidden. See attached version.

            • #1058950

              I still haven’t found the time to look over this in much detail, so I’m still having some problems. When you first set up the chart, which chart type should I select?

            • #1058964

              It’s (not surprisingly) a bar chart, but the second series has been plotted on the secondary Y axis, and the secondary axis has been formatted to plot the values in reverse order, and the minimum and maximum scale have been set explicitly.

            • #1058978

              I didn’t see your reply until after my ‘chart class’ was over for the day. I had them load your original example in and then told them to see if they could replicate it from scratch in PowerPoint. Wth everyone working on it, we’ve pretty much got it figured out to get it exactly the way I want it. Thanks for your help!!

            • #1058979

              Good for you! I actually designed the chart in Excel and pasted it into PowerPoint. I almost always do it that way because I find it much easier to manipulate a chart and its data in Excel.

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