User:Canifis/sandbox

Introduction
To their readers' chagrin, few internet comics (known as "webcomics") update at the same time, every day. Most update once per week at an (apparently) random time of day or night. Even worse, some just add new pages as those pages are finished, meaning some days see multiple pages per update, or even multiple updates per day!

Naturally, a few readers of these webcomics have asked, "What does the distribution of update times look like?" The purpose of these instructions is to answer that question: I will demonstrate how to use several commonplace programs to collect and display update data in both a scatter plot and a bubble chart.

Materials
==> /e.g./ Internet Explorer or Mozilla Firefox ==> /e.g./ Microsoft Office Excel or LibreOffice Calc ==> /e.g./ Notepad, Notepad++
 * A computer with internet access
 * An internet browser
 * A spreadsheet program
 * (Optional) A .txt file program

= To create a scatter plot =

Steps
==> If you are using a text file, record in a format like "MM/DD/YY;HH:MM:SS _M." For example: 10/25/14;07:12:00 PM. ==> If you are recording directly into a spreadsheet, make one column in MM/DD/YY format and one column in HH:MM:SS format (note AM or PM).
 * 1) Collect the data.
 * 2) Open your web browser and navigate to the webcomic site you want to analyze. On each page, open the "Tools" menu and access the "Page Info" window.
 * 3) Look for a section labelled "Modified." In a text file or directly into your spreadsheet, record the time and date given there.
 * 1) For each additional page whose data you want to collect, repeat steps a and b. It may be convenient to choose your pages in chronological order.
 * 2) (Optional) If using a text file, now copy your data. Open a spreadsheet and click Edit > Paste Special > Unformatted Text. Uncheck the Tab and Space boxes, then check the Semicolon box. Press "OK."


 * 1) Create the chart.
 * 2) Select both columns of data, using either your mouse or shift and the arrow keys.
 * 3) Navigate to Insert > Object > Chart to open the Chart Wizard. In the first step, select "XY - Scatter."
 * 4) Click on the second step. Make sure that "Data series in columns" is selected, and that "Data range" encompasses only the cells you want to include. If "First row as label" or "First column as label" are selected, de-select them.
 * 5) Skip the third step and click on the fourth step. Here, enter
 * the chart title, such as, "[Name of webcomic] Time of Update"
 * the X axis label, such as, "Date of update"
 * the Y axis label, such as, "Time of update"
 * 1) Click "Finish."

==> You may need to right-click the chart and select edit to complete these tasks.
 * 1) Edit the chart.
 * 1) Change the Y axis range.
 * 2) Right-click the vertical axis and select "Format Axis."
 * 3) Navigate to "Scale."
 * 4) Enter "00:00:00" for the minimum time and "24:00:00" for the maximum time.
 * 5) Press OK.
 * 6) (Optional) Change the X axis range.
 * 7) Right-click the horizontal axis and select "Format Axis."
 * 8) Navigate to "Scale."
 * 9) Set Minimum to a few days before the earliest data point.
 * 10) Set Maximum to a few days after your latest data point.
 * 11) Press OK.
 * 12) (Optional) Right-click one of your data points and select Format Data Series. You can use this to change the color or shape of the data points.
 * 13) (Optional) Right-click on the chart area and select "Format Wall." Navigate to "Area" and select "Color" from the "Fill" drop-down menu. You can use this to change the background color of your chart.
 * 14) (Optional) Delete the legend on the right-hand side.
 * 15) Check that the chart is formatted as you like, then click a cell away from the chart to get out of editing mode. Right-click the chart and select "Export," then save the chart as an image file. Good image formats are .png and .gif.