Previous Report Builder: Spider Chart

A spider chart is a great graphic way to compare results from different questions and visualize performance, for example between school subjects or departments of a business.

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You can include as many axes as you want, but the most visually appealing and clear would be between three and six axes. The example below uses five axes and personalized results from the survey to show the amount of potential savings for different household categories.

Check out our video taking you through the creation of this graph, or read the step-by-step guide that follows below.

This guide will teach you: 

1. Setting up the widget
2. Widget logic rules

1. Setting up the widget

1.1 Set the data

1.2 Change the settings

1.3 Widget placement and size

This graph basic components are the axes along which the data is plotted, and the lines of data that are drawn onto the axes. Start by clicking add axis to start creating the axes for your data points.

The key building blocks of this graph are the axes (as many as you wish) and the points of data displayed on the graph. Let's see now how to set up these components.

1.1 Set the data

Give each axis a label and continue to add axes until you have the number of axes that you need.

Now it's time to start specifying how the first data series should be constructed. This is the line of points that will be plotted on the axis and connected to form a polygon with a colored line of your choice. 

Note that the number of data points must correspond to the number of axes so that you'll have a data point plotted on each axis. For example in a spider chart of four subjects, there are four axes, so for each data series, there are four data points. 

Data points can be variables or numbers that you choose and can be a mixture of both, or some lines can be variables and some numbers. In our example, the first data series named "Your score" is composed of variables taken from the survey answers, and the other two series, "class average" and "pass mark" are set numbers.

1. Series Label - give a name to the line. This is the name of the line that will be shown in the key under the graph.
2. Series Color - choose the line color by clicking on the color selector. Take care to choose distinctly different colors for each of the lines so it will be easy to tell the difference between them!
3. Serie Visualization - choose line, colored layer, or column to change the display.
4. Data Point Metrics - choose where the data for the graph should be taken from. You can either type in a number or click Variables to access the drop-down menu of variables that you can use. Variables take the data entered during the survey and display it in the graph. Data Point 1 Metric will correspond with Axis Label 1.
5. Add point - click add point until you have added all the points you need to be plotted on your axes.

Click Add series to continue adding as many lines as you would like to be shown on the graph. In the example above, we created three lines.

Take a look at how data series 2 looks in our example, when set values are entered, rather than variables.

1.2 Change the settings

1. Widget name - name your widget for ease of reference
2. Chart title - name your graph, the name will be displayed at the report
3. You can choose to add your own intervals, which are the numbers marking the scale shown on the inside of the graph. Use the arrows to change the axis interval label and choose the number that you want to be shown at each of the intervals. Use the arrows or type in the value that you wish to set for the maximum value on-axis.
4. Display type - choose whether you want your graph to be displayed as a circle or polygon.

1.3 Widget placement and size

Choose how you would like to align your widget. You can choose to align it to one side and have explanatory text or another widget on the other side or center it.

• Left - widget will be aligned to the left side of the page, in a column layout
• Center - widget will be presented centered across the entire page from the left to the right (full width)
• Right - widget will be aligned to the right side of the page, in a column layout

If you would like a widget to appear side-by-side the graph, make sure to set the widget aligned on one side of the page, and the graph on the other. For example, choose to align the text widget to the left, and align the graph to the right.

Use the arrows or enter a value for the graph height and width. If you choose to place the graph on either the left or the right side of the page, the graph will be automatically resized. You can also change the background to be either white or transparent.

Click the Update preview button to see how the widget you've created looks like

Take a look below at some different possibilities.

2. Widget logic rules

If you want to only show this widget under certain conditions, it's time to set the widget logic rules. You can create logic rules so that widgets are only displayed when certain criteria are met. If you want to show a general widget that is visualized every time a PDF report is generated, you can choose not to include a widget logic rule. Learn more about Widget Logic. 

Once you've saved your logic rules, don't forget to save PDF and you're ready to add more widgets!

What's next?

• Conditional Rendering is a way of displaying elements based on a condition. It allows you to create simple conditions inside a widget and reduce the number of widgets and rules. With Conditional Rendering, you can render different UI markups based on certain conditions.
• The custom results by respondent table is a dynamic type of widget that will add records automatically to the table once you have set it up. You can set the maximum number of records to show and set the table to sort records from low to high or high to low.
• The PDF text widget allows you to write and display your content in your report. You can use it to give further information about questions, give feedback or explain a particular answer. This is an absolutely essential building block of your PDF report.