Opendistrib/vendor/bower/chartjs/docs/03-Line-Chart.md

---

title: Line Chart

anchor: line-chart

Introduction

A line chart is a way of plotting data points on a line. Often, it is used to show trend data, and the comparison of two data sets.

Example Usage

var myLineChart = new Chart(ctx, {
	type: 'line',
	data: data,
	options: options
});

Alternatively a line chart can be created using syntax similar to the v1.0 syntax

var myLineChart = Chart.Line(ctx, {
	data: data,
	options: options
});

Data Structure

The following options can be included in a line chart dataset to configure options for that specific dataset.

All point* properties can be specified as an array. If these are set to an array value, the first value applies to the first point, the second value to the second point, and so on.

Property	Type	Usage
data	See data point section	The data to plot in a line
label	String	The label for the dataset which appears in the legend and tooltips
xAxisID	String	The ID of the x axis to plot this dataset on
yAxisID	String	The ID of the y axis to plot this dataset on
fill	Boolean	If true, fill the area under the line
lineTension	Number	Bezier curve tension of the line. Set to 0 to draw straightlines. Note This was renamed from ‘tension’ but the old name still works.
backgroundColor	Color	The fill color under the line. See Colors
borderWidth	Number	The width of the line in pixels
borderColor	Color	The color of the line.
borderCapStyle	String	Cap style of the line. See MDN
borderDash	Array<Number>	Length and spacing of dashes. See MDN
borderDashOffset	Number	Offset for line dashes. See MDN
borderJoinStyle	String	Line joint style. See MDN
pointBorderColor	Color or Array<Color>	The border color for points.
pointBackgroundColor	Color or Array<Color>	The fill color for points
pointBorderWidth	Number or Array<Number>	The width of the point border in pixels
pointRadius	Number or Array<Number>	The radius of the point shape. If set to 0, nothing is rendered.
pointHoverRadius	Number or Array<Number>	The radius of the point when hovered
pointHitRadius	Number or Array<Number>	The pixel size of the non-displayed point that reacts to mouse events
pointHoverBackgroundColor	Color or Array<Color>	Point background color when hovered
pointHoverBorderColor	Color or Array<Color>	Point border color when hovered
pointHoverBorderWidth	Number or Array<Number>	Border width of point when hovered
pointStyle	String, Array<String>, Image, Array<Image>	The style of point. Options are ‘circle’, ‘triangle’, ‘rect’, ‘rectRot’, ‘cross’, ‘crossRot’, ‘star’, ‘line’, and ‘dash’. If the option is an image, that image is drawn on the canvas using drawImage.
showLine	Boolean	If false, the line is not drawn for this dataset
spanGaps	Boolean	If true, lines will be drawn between points with no or null data

An example data object using these attributes is shown below.

var data = {
	labels: ["January", "February", "March", "April", "May", "June", "July"],
	datasets: [
		{
			label: "My First dataset",
			fill: false,
			lineTension: 0.1,
			backgroundColor: "rgba(75,192,192,0.4)",
			borderColor: "rgba(75,192,192,1)",
			borderCapStyle: 'butt',
			borderDash: [],
			borderDashOffset: 0.0,
			borderJoinStyle: 'miter',
			pointBorderColor: "rgba(75,192,192,1)",
			pointBackgroundColor: "#fff",
			pointBorderWidth: 1,
			pointHoverRadius: 5,
			pointHoverBackgroundColor: "rgba(75,192,192,1)",
			pointHoverBorderColor: "rgba(220,220,220,1)",
			pointHoverBorderWidth: 2,
			pointRadius: 1,
			pointHitRadius: 10,
			data: [65, 59, 80, 81, 56, 55, 40],
			spanGaps: false,
		}
	]
};

The line chart usually requires an array of labels. This labels are shown on the X axis. There must be one label for each data point. More labels than datapoints are allowed, in which case the line ends at the last data point. The data for line charts is broken up into an array of datasets. Each dataset has a colour for the fill, a colour for the line and colours for the points and strokes of the points. These colours are strings just like CSS. You can use RGBA, RGB, HEX or HSL notation.

The label key on each dataset is optional, and can be used when generating a scale for the chart.

When spanGaps is set to true, the gaps between points in sparse datasets are filled in. By default, it is off.

Data Points

The data passed to the chart can be passed in two formats. The most common method is to pass the data array as an array of numbers. In this case, the data.labels array must be specified and must contain a label for each point or, in the case of labels to be displayed over multiple lines an array of labels (one for each line) i.e [["June","2015"], "July"].

The alternate is used for sparse datasets. Data is specified using an object containing x and y properties. This is used for scatter charts as documented below.

Scatter Line Charts

Scatter line charts can be created by changing the X axis to a linear axis. To use a scatter chart, data must be passed as objects containing X and Y properties. The example below creates a scatter chart with 3 points.

var scatterChart = new Chart(ctx, {
	type: 'line',
	data: {
		datasets: [{
			label: 'Scatter Dataset',
			data: [{
				x: -10,
				y: 0
			}, {
				x: 0,
				y: 10
			}, {
				x: 10,
				y: 5
			}]
		}]
	},
	options: {
		scales: {
			xAxes: [{
				type: 'linear',
				position: 'bottom'
			}]
		}
	}
});

Chart Options

These are the customisation options specific to Line charts. These options are merged with the global chart configuration options, and form the options of the chart.

Name	Type	Default	Description
showLines	Boolean	true	If false, the lines between points are not drawn

You can override these for your Chart instance by passing a member options into the Line method.

For example, we could have a line chart display without an X axis by doing the following. The config merge is smart enough to handle arrays so that you do not need to specify all axis settings to change one thing.

new Chart(ctx, {
	type: 'line',
	data: data,
	options: {
		scales: {
			xAxes: [{
				display: false
			}]
		}
	}
});

We can also change these defaults values for each Line type that is created, this object is available at Chart.defaults.line.

Stacked Charts

Stacked area charts can be created by setting the Y axis to a stacked configuration. The following example would have stacked lines.

var stackedLine = new Chart(ctx, {
	type: 'line',
	data: data,
	options: {
		scales: {
			yAxes: [{
				stacked: true
			}]
		}
	}
});