Office Sports

Reversing the X or Y Axis in Charts

Want to emphasize different elements of your data by displaying that data along a reverse axis? Now you can in Calc 2.4.

1. Double click the chart to open Edit mode.
2. Select Format > Axis and then choose either X Axis or Y Axis.
3. Select the Scale tab and check the box next to Reverse direction. (See Figure 5.)
4. Click OK.

Figure 6 provides an example of a chart as it would appear when first created. Figure 7 shows what happens when the Y axis is reversed, thus emphasizing the months in which a company faced net losses.

Each of the six additional new charting features involve data labels and let you make your charts look more professional and display your data more effectively. To access the new features, double click your chart to open Edit mode, then select Insert > Data Labels from the menu.

New Selection Capabilities in Writer

One of my favorite new features in Writer is the ability to make a block selection of text. Let's say that you have a document in which you've listed employee names and phone numbers. When you created the list, you simply typed the person's full name, pressed the Tab key, then entered the phone extension. Your list looks something like this:

Robert Adams 419
Jeff Alexander 420
Suzanne Arnold 421
Chris Brown 422
Sarah Buckley 423

Now, let's say you need to make another quick list that includes only the names of the employees. In the past, you couldn't select only the column of names because it wasn't a table. But now, you can select just the name column. This feature is particularly handy when you want to copy something from an OCR scan or log file. To make a block selection:

1. Open the document from which you want to copy.
2. In the status bar at the bottom of the screen, click STD until it reads BLK.
3. Highlight the area you'd like to select. As you can see from (See Figure 8), you are able to select just the names in the list.
4. Copy and paste the list as desired.

Converting Text to Columns in Calc

Another useful feature is the ability to take delimited data in Calc and place it into columns. You may, for example, have a table that displays the last names, a comma, then the first names of all of your employees in one column. (See Figure 9) To make this information more useful for any number of reasons, it would be nice to have the first and last names appear in separate columns. (See Figure 10) Here's how to make the change:

1. Make sure the column to the right of the column at issue is clear. In this example, column B must be empty so that the first names can be moved there.
2. Highlight the complete range of cells.
3. Click Data > Text to Columns.
4. Check the box next to Comma. You'll see how the data after a comma is moved to a new field in the bottom of the dialog box. (See Figure 11)
5. Click OK.

This feature is invaluable in many scenarios, involving different types of delimiters and even in some nondelimited data.