## Charts

A chart organizes and graphically presents data in a way that makes it easy for end users to see comparisons, trends, and patterns in data. It represents the report data in a visually straightforward form. A chart is based on the chart platform. On the platform, the chart paper, the legend, and labels make up the chart. You can create a chart that contains only simple DBFields, or a complicated chart that contains DBFields, groups, summaries, and even formulas. Normally, DBFields, summaries, and formulas in a report are represented in a chart using chart data markers, and groups are used to produce category names and data series names. DBFields can also be used as category names.

In JReport, charts are data containers, which means that when a chart is inserted into another data container, you can set up data container link between the chart and its parent according to your requirements (for details, see the section Setting up data container link).

This section describes the following tasks related to charts:

- Chart elements
- Chart types
- How data is represented in a chart
- Inserting a chart
- Modifying a chart
- Formatting chart elements
- Creating dynamic charts in Excel

See an example: The SampleComponents catalog, included with JReport Designer, contains reports that have examples of how each component type could be used in a report. For the chart component example, open `<install_root>\Demo\Reports\SampleComponents\Chart.cls`.