Add Data Bar in Sales Report

Data bars are small, simple charts that can be used to compare things between different groups or to track changes over time. They convey a lot of information in a little space, and are mostly used in tables and matrices. With data bars, it’s easy to make your tabular data a lot more visual, and thus easier to interpret. They have limited functionality compared to traditional charts. Despite that, they can be more informative than other chart types based on their simplicity.

Since version 2.1.14, Bold Report Designer provides a data bar report item. In this blog post, we will see how to add and design data bar report item in a sales report. To design and visualize the data comparison, first we must embed the required data in the Bold Report Designer. Later, we will bind and customize the data in the data bar report item to achieve the sales indicator report design. You can try out the report designed in this blog on our Bold Report Designer demo site.

Create data set

Create a data set to bind the required data to the data bar report item. Use the following sample query to recreate the report designed for this blog. This sample query runs against the AdventureWorks2016 sample database.

SELECT PC.Name AS ProdCat, PS.Name AS SubCat,
 DATEPART (yy, SOH.OrderDate) AS OrderYear,
'Q' + DATENAME (qq, SOH.OrderDate) AS OrderQtr,
 SUM (SOD.UnitPrice * SOD.OrderQty) AS Sales
FROM Production.ProductSubcategory PS 
INNER JOIN Sales.SalesOrderHeader SOH
INNER JOIN Sales.SalesOrderDetail SOD ON SOH.SalesOrderID = SOD.SalesOrderID 
INNER JOIN Production.Product P ON 
SOD.ProductID = P.ProductID ON 
PS.ProductSubcategoryID = P.ProductSubcategoryID
INNER JOIN Production.ProductCategory PC ON
PS.ProductCategoryID = PC.ProductCategoryID
GROUP BY DATEPART (yy, SOH.OrderDate), PC.Name, PS.Name,
'Q' + DATENAME (qq, SOH.OrderDate), PS.ProductSubcategoryID

Add a data bar to the report

1. You can find the Data Bar report item under the KPI category in the widget panel.

   

2. Drag and drop a Data Bar report item into a table cell and resize it according to your layout.

   

Assign data

1. In the configuration panel, switch to the Data tab.

   

2. In this example, we want to show the sales amount in data bars. So, drag and drop the Sales field into the Y-Value(s)

   

3. The data bar report item will be configured as shown in the following image.

   

Customize data bar appearance

In the Properties panel, you can change data bar properties such as width, height, color palette, background color, and border.

Change chart type

You can change the data bar type based on your data patterns by using the Chart Type property. This property is listed under the Basic Settings category in the Properties panel.

Customize chart series

You can also display labels, borders, and markers, or define actions for each series in data bars. These properties are listed under Basic Settings category in the Properties panel.

For example, you can display labels in data bars by doing the following:

1. Select the series name in the Choose Series drop-down.

   

2. Enable the Show Data Label property check box.

   

3. To customize the label style and more, open the Advanced

   

4. Here, you can modify the label’s style, format, angle, position, and more to enhance the data presentation in the data bar.

   

Now, the report design will look like the following image.

Preview report

You can preview the report at design time using the built-in Report Viewer to ensure the report is designed as needed.

Conclusion

I hope this blog provided a clear overview on how to configure and customize the appearance of the data bar report item in the Bold Reports designer. For additional information on the data bar feature, you can browse the documentation.

If you have any questions, please post them in the comments section below. You can also contact us by submitting your queries through our contact page, or if you already have an account, you can log in to submit your support query. Feel free to check out the Bold Reports Embedded Edition demos and documentation to explore the available tools and their various customization features.

Bold Reports now comes with a 15-day free trial with no credit card information required. We welcome you to start a free trial and experience Bold Reports for yourself. Give it a try and let us know what you think!