Basic Terminology

What is Chart?

• A chart is a pictorial representation of information. It shows information in a simple way, often using lines and curves to show values.
• Representation of information's through charts, figures, and graphs enable large sets of data to be more quickly understood and analyzed.
• It is often said that "a picture is worth a thousand words" because a picture can convey significant overview and comparative information about data that is much more difficult to gather from the textual data itself.
• Charts help decision makers to make quick and timely decisions.

History of Jfreechart

• The JFreeChart project was founded by David Gilbert, in February 2000.
• The most recent release of this library, version 1.0.6, was released in June 2007. Subsequently, version "JFreeChart version 1.5.0" was released in November 2017. This release includes a streamlined build structure with JavaFX support being moved into a separate project (JfreeChart-FX).
• JFreeChart is one of the most popular open source Java charting libraries that supports a wide variety of chart types which includes pie charts, bar charts, area charts, line charts, histograms, and Gantt charts and less frequently used types such as Candlestick, Wind, and Wafer Map charts.
• A Dataset must be created before creating a chart using JFreeChart. A Dataset contains the data that displays in the chart. JFreeChart features many different Dataset objects which you can use to create assorted types of charts.
• JFreeChart is particularly effective when a user needs to regenerate graphs that changes on a frequent basis.