Scatter Graphs

A scatter graph is a graph in which data is represented by the location of data markers.

Standard use of scatter graphs

You use scatter graphs to show correlations between:

Scatter graphs are especially useful when you have a number of data items and you want to see the general relationships.

Example: Standard use of a scatter graph

You could use a scatter graph to plot the length of commute and absenteeism for your work force.

Example scatter graph

If there is a strong correlation between length of commute and frequency of absence, most of the data markers will fall along a diagonal line from the lower-left to the upper-right corner. If not, data markers will not fall into this pattern.

Sample scatter graphs

Available varieties of scatter graphs

The following types of scatter graphs are available:

Graph properties for scatter graphs

The following properties of the Graph object affect scatter graphs:

Data structure of a scatter graph

The following figure shows the data structure of a scatter graph. This graph is a single-Y scatter graph, populated with the Promotional Expense and Sales measures (in that order).

Sample scatter graph

The data structure for scatter graphs is as follows:

Each data marker in a scatter graph represents two values:

Data guidelines for scatter graphs

Scatter graph data has the following guidelines:

Example: Scatter graph data

The following scatter graph is populated with the Sales and Usability expense measures, in that order. For simplicity in this example, each series of data has only one marker in it. Normally, scatter graphs have a number of markers.

Simple scatter graph

The following crosstab shows the same data as the graph. Notice that there are two columns of data for each marker in the graph. This picture assumes that isDataRowShownAsASeries returns true.

Data for previous graph

Handling Problems in Graph Data
Specifying Data for a Graph
Example: Setting JDBC Data on a Scatter Graph
Example: Setting Data from a File on a Scatter Graph