Working with Properties

The Properties tab lists the properties for the selected graph component. Components that have properties include graph elements, cells, axes, legends, and the entire graph. Properties enable you to control the overall appearance of your graph, from the graph’s background color to the tick value interval on the axis. Report designers can override some properties in their report.

To change the properties for a graph object, cell, graph element, legend, or one or more axes, select the item, and make your changes on the Properties tab.

The color schemes and visual attributes for a graph come from the active report theme, which is a named collection of style elements. Each style element contains attributes such as fill color, marker symbol, line style, font face, and many others. Each part of a graph element, such as a marker, a bar, a line, or a label, derives its visual attributes from a specific style element from the active report theme. Similarly, the attributes for axes and legends come from a style element.

The style elements are developed to produce effective graphics without changing the default settings. However, you can change the default settings by changing style properties on the Properties tab. When you specify a style property, such as a color or font style, you are changing the style element that is applied to the graph component.

The following display shows the available style elements for bar chart labels. The list of style elements is displayed when you click beside the Data label font color drop-down list on the Properties tab.

Each color is shown in the list beside its style element. Automatic indicates the default value for the graph element. Automatic enables the graph element to cycle through a list of colors provided for group colors and multi-response colors.

Visual attributes that are referenced by a style element provide consistency within the report theme. If you later change the report theme, the graph element is compatible with the new theme. In addition, some of the properties that you specify can be overridden by report designers when they use your graph objects in their reports.

The overview axes that you create in the graph builder are similar to the overview axes that you create in the designer. In addition, you can do the following:

When you apply a group role to your graph element, by default, the graph builder rotates through predefined style elements to determine how to present each unique group value. This type of rotation also occurs when multiple response roles are assigned to the graph element or when graph elements are overlaid.

When the graph element is rendered, the attributes for colors, line patterns, and marker symbols are rotated for the values in your group. Whether you change the attributes or keep the default attribute values, the manner in which the attributes are combined is determined by the attribute rotation priority.

If you change the rotation pattern, and specify Rotate all attributes for the attribute rotation priority, the contrasting colors and line patterns are rotated at the same time.

A red dotted-line pattern is applied to the first group crossing. Then, a green solid-line pattern is applied to the second crossing, a blue dotted-line pattern is applied to the third crossing, and so on.