Difference between revisions of "Chart2"

Revision as of 11:00, 22 February 2008

Chart2 is the re-implementation of the charting component of OpenOffice.org. It is integrated in OOo 2.3.

Charts are used to illustrate data sets e.g. from spreadsheets to get a better understanding of the data. A lot of different two and three dimensional chart types are available to choose from.

This page gathers information about the new chart implementation of OpenOffice.org. It is especially written to help newcomers to the process of developing for the new OOo chart module.

If you would like to participate, if you have comments or questions related to the chart you are welcome on the graphics mailing lists: (users,dev,features,bugs,cvs)@graphics.openoffice.org. See also the side-box with some useful Links.

Helping with the Chart

Example Chart made with OpenOffice.org 2.3 (ods-file see File:ProgrammingLanguages.ods)

Development

If you like to help developing the chart, you can find useful information here.

• Since SRC680.m213, the master build contains the module chart2, so the procedure for developing code for the chart is the same as for every other project. For help on this see the Main Page.
• See the programming contribution page for details on how to start.
• C++ Coding Standards for developing OOo code.
• FAQ about Chart API Compatibility If you have problems with Macros or extensions that use the com.sun.star.chart API you may find answers or ask questions on this page.
• UNO API of the new Chart (chart2) (version of OOG680.m2, August 2007) Note, that the new API is not published yet. Do not use it for your regular work! For macros, use the API in namespace chart.
• The file format used for OpenOffice.org is the ODF format. Currently, ODF 1.1 is in use. The upcoming format ODF 1.2 is still in progress (see open action items).

To find a concrete task to work on, check the issue queries of open chart bugs and features. Maybe there is something that catches your interest:

• Open chart bugs (defects and tasks)
• Requested chart features (enhancements and features)
• Chart Issues in other components. Component is not Chart, but the summary contains the words diagram or chart.

Also check the easy-to-dev issue list to see whether there are currently development opportunities for newbies: Easy to develop issues

Roadmap

Child-workspaces after OOo 2.3

Testing

If you want to help the QA team have a look at the QA contribution page. You can help a lot with identifying new problems or verifying fixed and integrated issues!

Download the latest developer snapshot and give it a try. When you find a bug please check whether someone else already did submit an issue for that problem. The following issue list can help you with the research:

• Open chart bugs.
• Fixed issues that have not been verified or closed yet
• Verified issues that have not been closed yet (checked in the master)
• Or create your own query.

There is also a spreadsheet document containing the open chart issues. It is nice for sorting and filtering, but it is not up-to-date. Have a look at the first line to find out when the query was done.

If the problem is unknown you are welcome to submit a new issue. Thanks a lot for your help!

Other Contributions

For other kinds of contributions like graphics, documentation, translation, marketing take a look at this page.

Chart Features

Chart features per release:

• Additional Features in OOo 3.0 compared to OOo 2.0

Further feature requests grouped by category:

• Chart-Types
• Legend
• Data Labels
• Axis
• Chart formatting
• Trend lines and error bars
• Range and data series
• Chart annotation
• Miscellaneous

This list is based primarily on the List of wished enhancements for Charts.

Technical Articles

Here you can find some technical articles about the chart, that may help for future development.

• There still some architectural issues left that have to be solved. (article by Björn Milcke)

• Why not implement everything in OOo (article by Leonard Mada)

People

• working permanently on the code
  • Björn Milcke (Sun Microsystems)
  • Ingrid Halama (Sun Microsystems)

• code contributors
  • Daniel Rentz (Sun Microsystems, Calc)
  • Niklas Nebel (Sun Microsystems, Calc)
  • Thomas Lange (Sun Microsystems, Writer)
  • Regina Henschel (splines, online-help, testing)
  • Li Yuan (Redflag CH2000)
  • Wei Zhao (Redflag CH2000)
  • Mao Yonggang (Redflag CH2000)

• working permanently on chart QA
  • Thomas Klarhöfer (Sun Microsystems, QA for chart)
  • Jörg Sievers (Sun Microsystems, Test-tool automation for chart)

• User Experience
  • Matthias Müller-Prove (Sun Microsystems)

• Documentation
  • Uwe Fischer (Sun Microsystems)

• other contributors
  • Tony Galmiche (feature document, Wiki, testing)
  • Pierre-André Galmes (StarXpert, testing, Wiki)
  • Jörg Wartenberg (specification)
  • Leonard Mada (Wiki)

Note: if anybody thinks he is missing on this list or a comment is not complete, please drop me a note or modify this page

Some useful information

• Chart Project Page: http://graphics.openoffice.org/chart/chart.html
• Chart Specifications: http://specs.openoffice.org/chart/index.html
• IRC channel: #chart2.openoffice.org on freenode
• Chart-related Entries on OOo Sun Developers Weblog: GullFOSS
• OOo Community Forum, Subforum on Charts