Charts allow you to visualize data you collect effectively in a variety of ways such as pie, bar and line charts. mWater's charts are interactive which means you can relationships between them.
When designing a chart, think about which data you want to visualize so you choose the right options.
As long as chart widgets share the same data source, you can cross-filter them. So when you filter one widget, the other(s) filter too. This can be very powerful in analysing what you have collected to understand it well.
Basic Steps to create a chart
1) Drag the Chart widget from the palette to your dashboard canvas
2) Click into the Chart widget and select your Chart Type.This can be very powerful in analysing what you have collected to understand it well.
3) Select yourData Source. This can be your survey, sites, issues or something more advanced.
4) Select your data axis.
5) Adjust your chart details
Step 1) Drag the Chart widget to your dashboard
Steps 2, 3, and 4
Example chart
Here we will build a bar chart showing water points by type.
Steps:
1) Create the chart widget by dragging from the palette
2) Select Bar Chart as the type
3) Select Water Points as the Data Source
4) Select Type as the Horizontal Axis
5) Add a Filter so that Date Added is this year
6) Select Set Individual Colors and assign color to the bar charts
7) Add a Y Threshold Line
8) Switch the bar to a Horizontal one
Chart type overview
Bar charts are the best option for very many charts. They are clear and easy to understand. For comparing data.
Pie charts are good for showing relative proportions of a couple of elements. For example: Functional, Partly functional and Non-functional. They are not good for large amounts of elements.
Line charts are good for visualizing regular longitudinal data such as coverage over time.
Scatter charts are good when you want to visualize the relationship between two variables. Such as time and distance.
Split Axis and Multiple Series
If you want to compare data from more than one dimension side by side, two easy approaches are Split Axis and Multiple Series.
If you have a field in your data source, such as a question in your survey, that splits the data for example by Baseline and Endline, you can use the Split Axis option for that field. Then you will see Baseline data next to Endline data in the same chart.
If you have data in two or more surveys, you can first create the chart for one data source and then Add a new Series from the bottom of the chart options. You can pick a wholly new data source and mix the results, as long as the main axis is shared. So for example both series should use Dates or Locations as the horizontal axis in a basic case.
