Charter reads the workbook by its row labels, draws every figure at the same size and type, and writes live charts back into Excel, wired to the same cells.
Open an .xlsx to write native charts back into it.
Open an .xlsx, or load the demo workbook to see what the output looks like. Nothing is uploaded. The file is read in this browser.
Binding, the source panel and writing charts into Excel are covered under How it works.
Charter reads a sheet by its row labels rather than its cell addresses, and holds every figure it draws to one standard. Each figure shows the cells it came from.
There is no industry standard for figures in a financial document, so Charter defines one and writes it down. The table below is generated from the same values the renderer uses, so it cannot drift from what is drawn. Every figure on screen, every PNG and SVG, and every chart written into Excel is built from it.
Switching between Word and slides does not re-lay anything out. It stretches the millimetre, so type, rules, markers and padding grow together and a figure keeps its proportions at either size. Set the width by hand if the target width is not the default.
Charter opens blank. The demo workbook is the bundled template: load it and all 8 figures draw and the write back works straight away. Open your own .xlsx with the button at the top. Starting from nothing, Download demo .xlsx gives you the demo workbook without charts: the blocks, formulas and labels already in place. Replace the blue cells and load it back in. Nothing is uploaded, the file is read in this browser.
The Bindings list shows which slots matched. An unlit slot means nothing on the sheet matched it, or the block it matched holds too few points to plot. Charter leaves that figure out rather than guessing, and the list says which it was.
Width, typeface, colour or greyscale and the source note apply to every figure at once. One standard for the whole document.
Pick the target in the panel. Hover a figure to export it as a PNG (300 dpi, fixed physical size) or an SVG. Insert at 100% and every figure lands at the same scale.
Write charts into Excel returns a copy of your file with live chart objects in it. More on this below.
Charter looks for a section headed “Revenue” wherever it sits on the sheet, so pasting your data a row lower does not break it. A chart tied to a fixed range would carry on drawing and plot the wrong cells.
Sheets without labels. The Data: marker is a shortcut, not a requirement. Without it Charter takes the first row holding an unbroken run of numbers, then the column to its left that labels the most rows below. A row equal to the sum of the others in every period is treated as the total whatever it is called, so “Consolidated” and “Group” are never stacked on top of the parts they contain.
Every figure carries its audit trail under Source, just below the chart. Closed, it names the block and the cells. Open, it shows the block and group it matched, the range behind each row drawn, any row read but not drawn and why, and where the unit came from. Turn it off under Bindings for a clean view.
You get a copy of your file with real Excel charts in it, not pictures. Every series is a formula pointing at the cells the figure was read from ('Model'!$D$21:$J$21), so editing the sheet redraws the chart in Excel. Each series also carries a snapshot of the values, as Excel's own files do, so previews that never recalculate still show the chart.
The charts are written to the same standard as the figures on screen, with the typeface, text sizes, palette and figure width you set here. Each one keeps its title in Excel, since a sheet has no caption beside it.
The value axes take the same range and gridlines as the figure, so Excel does not pick its own. That range is set when the charts are written. If later edits take a value outside it, set that axis back to Auto in Excel or write the charts again.
They go in to the right of your data, one column clear of it, starting level with the first block they draw from. A banner or title rows at the top of the sheet stay clear.
Eight types are covered. Column, stacked column with the total above each bar, multi series line, a date axis line for price series, a combo chart on a secondary axis, a football field range built from the sheet’s own Delta column, and a waterfall with the total marked as a subtotal. Where a sheet lacks what a figure needs, that figure is skipped.
Chart XML, drawing anchors, relationship parts and the ZIP writer are all written here. Everything already in your workbook is copied through unchanged.