Commons:Chart and graph resources

See also: Category:Statistics. And: Commons:Convert tables and charts to wiki code or image files. And: Commons:Create charts and graphs online. And: Commons:Free media resources/Datagraphics.

Charts and graphs are great for simplifying info, showing trends over time, illustrating patterns, and so on. The Commons encourages people to find and create more of them; they should always follow accessibility criteria. Upload them to the Commons, and then put them in the relevant categories. See Category help, and feel free to use category search to find the best categories. Create more categories.

To find categorized images:

  See also categories: Charts, Graphs, Statistics, Drawings, Diagrams, Maps and Plots.

Chart making tools, help, and info on Wikipedia

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There is a lot of how-to info, tools, and help on Wikipedia:

Free CC-BY charts on the web

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Public domain charts on the web

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For public domain templates see list in description: Template:PD-ineligible.

Many charts and graphs are in the public domain because they do not meet the threshold of originality. Article shortcuts: COM:TO or COM:TOO. That article has sections on charts and maps near the bottom. There are examples there, and many more examples in Category:PD chart and Category:PD map. For more info see also: en:Threshold of originality.

You can change the text and labels on charts. To erase some text first see the info in Help:Removing watermarks. This is sometimes good to do if there is worry about some text being original enough to be copyrighted. There are freeware image editors such as IrfanView that can edit the text and labels.

Editing the text can also make the chart more useful on Wikipedia. It can make the text larger or more legible at smaller chart sizes. For example; in the thumbnail or medium sizes used on Wikipedia. You can crop the white space around a chart, and put the text close to the chart so that the chart better fills out the available space allotted to it in Wikipedia article.

Does a particular chart pass the threshold of originality? Leave your questions on these talk pages:

Convert PDF to image files

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  • Commons:PDF to image files. Many free charts, graphs, and diagrams from the U.S. federal government and elsewhere are in the PDF format.

Convert spreadsheets, database tables to wikitable format

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See also: Commons:Convert tables and charts to wiki code or image files.

See Help:Table and the section on the Visual Editor and spreadsheets. Also from Help:Table:

To convert from spreadsheets (such as those produced by Gnumeric, Microsoft Excel, or LibreOffice/OpenOffice.org/ Calc), you can use the Copy & Paste Excel-to-Wiki converter. Or you can save your spreadsheets as .csv and use the csv2wikitable converter.

The online csv2wp script (documentation) converts comma-separated values (CSV) format to wikitable pipe syntax. You may use this to import tables from both spreadsheets and databases (such as MySQL, PostgreSQL, SQLite, FileMaker, Microsoft SQL Server & Access, Oracle, DB2, etc.).

Spreadsheets that generate SVG code for charts

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Enter data and options into spreadsheet, copy the automatically generated XML code, and paste into .svg file.

Convert PowerPoint chart to SVG chart

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For an example see the instructions in the source section of this chart page:

See more instructions here:

Can use SVGcrop.com to remove blank space from the edges.

Where to ask for help

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Scalable Vector Graphics

Create timelines

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EasyTimeline

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WikiTimeline

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Resource categories

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Diagram categories. Some images to move to chart or statistics categories:

The following diagram categories (and/or their subcategories) may still have statistical charts, graphs, or tables in them. The individual files can be moved and/or added to subcategories of Category:Charts and Category:Statistics. As many files as possible should be categorized in the right subcategories. New subcategories may be created. Files may need to be categorized in multiple categories. Search for more categories here and here.

Software

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Guidelines for creating better charts and graphs

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  • Bar Graphs [1], Statistics: Power from Data!, Statistics Canada.
  • EIA Guidelines for Statistical Graphs [2].
  • How to Construct Bad Charts and Graphs [3].
  • Avoid chartjunk.

Tutorials

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Galleries for various types of charts and graphs

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See also

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