38Numbers into pictures
Type the numbers, pick a shape. No spreadsheet, no menus of options — the first line says what kind of chart, the rest is your data.
Find itInsert → Chart from data…
The shape of itFirst line: the chart type. Then any of
title, x, y, series. Then one line per bar, slice or point.Example
bar · title Marks by term · y Score · Term 1, 62 · Term 2, 71More than one lineAdd columns and name them:
series Maths, Science then Term 1, 62, 70. Use stack instead of bar to pile them up.Typesbar, hbar, line, area, stack, scatter, pie, doughnut, funnel, treemap, sunburst, radar, gauge, sankey, boxplot, heatmap. Pick one along the top and a working example appears.
Special formsGauge takes
value 92 and max 100. Sankey takes Lesson > Teaching, 45. Scatter takes two numbers per line. Box plot takes five.ColoursText and axis colour pickers, five palettes, any of the board's fonts, and a size. Match board puts it all back to your surface's ink.
Paste from a spreadsheetCopy a couple of columns from Excel or Sheets and paste them straight in. Tabs, commas and semicolons all work, trailing commas are ignored, and a label containing a comma just needs "quotes around it". If a line cannot be read, that line is reported and the rest still draws.
When the simple form is not enoughEdit as JSON reveals the full chart definition underneath. Change anything, and the preview follows. While JSON is showing it is in charge and the data lines are ignored — press Back to data to return.
Part of the Slate guide — or read the whole guide on one page.