Excel Add-In for

Manipulating Points
on Charts (MPOC)
by Diego Oppenheimer, on November 2, 2009 | 0 Comments | 4

Overview
In Excel 2007, the ability to directly resize or reposition points
on the chart was deprecated. This feature was sometimes
referred to as Graphical Goal Seek. For example, in Excel
2003 a user could click on a data point in a column chart
twice which would surface handles that could be used to
resize the columns. Over the last couple of years we have
received a lot of feedback from customers indicating that this
was a valuable feature for some scenarios. However, we were
not able to react in time to roll this feature back into Excel
2010 but we are evaluating how to bring this back as a native
feature in a future release. In an effort to restore this lost
functionality, we have developed a sample Add-In that can be
used in both Excel 2007 and Excel 2010.
In this blog post, I will provide the Sample Add-In for download
and illustrate how to use this Add-In for manipulating points
on your chart.
The sample add-in with RibbonX and VBA code is here.
Using the MPOC Add-In
Before trying out the following scenario, please install
the Add-In as described in the provided documentation
(attached at the bottom of this post).
In this section we will run through a fictional scenario about
how you can use the Add-In to manipulate points on your
chart. Tailspin Toys is in the process of developing a new toy
airplane and are conducting various experiments before they
settle on the final design. We will be looking at one such
experiment where the company is studying the impact of

different materials and wingspans on the maximum altitude

that can be attained by this toy air plane.
The experiment has been largely successful and it has been
observed that for all materials there is a general trend:
Initially as the wingspan increases, the altitude begins to
increase.
However, larger wingspan results in a heavier plane.
Hence, as we keep increasing the wingspan the heavier
plane fails to reach the previous attained heights
resulting in the benefits tapering off.
The scientists are elated at their find but these are some
erroneous values in the data (show with red circles on the
chart). The field scientist tells us that the erroneous readings
were caused by some loose wiring to the altimeter used in the
experiment. Since the trends are pretty obvious, the research
department wants to clean up the charts before presenting
their findings to the management.

In the next steps, we will see how MPOC Add-In can be used
for this purpose:
IMPORTANT: Please back-up your file before using the
MPOC Add-In. The undo functionality in Excel will NOT work
since this Add-In is written entirely using VBA. Also, this is a
sample Add-In, so please exercise caution before using it on
important data.
1. We will start by selecting the point on the chart that we
want to manipulate

2. A Manipulate Points button will now appear

whenever a chart object is selected under the Chart
Tools -> Layout Tab of the Ribbon.

3. Click this Button to Launch the MPOC Dialog. The dialog

will be automatically populated with information about
the selected point.
In this case, we have selected the 8th point in the
Aluminum series. Since this is an X-Y scatter
chart, we can change both the X and Y value associated
with this point. Next, we will see how we can change the

Y- value associated with this point to smoothen our

curve.

NOTE: Value controls are used to directly manipulate the

value of the cell corresponding to the selected point on
the chart. We dynamically add additional value controls
depending on the type of the chart. For example: column
or bar charts have one value controls, x-y scatter charts
have two value controls and bubble charts have three
value controls.
4. In this step, we will decrease the Y-Value associated with
the point to smoothen the curve (as we have determined
that the altitude is too high due to an error).
NOTE: The MPOC Add-In provides 3 different ways to
change the value of the point with varying level of
precision:
Scroll Bar When you are far away from the value you
want, use scroll bars quickly change values.
Spin Button When you are close to the value you
want, use spin button for greater precision to zone in on
the value you want.
Text Box if you know the value you want, why waste
time zoning in on the value. Use the textbox to directly
input it in the text box
1.
Drag the scroll bar associated with the Value Y to
the left to quickly preview where we want the point on
the chart. We let go when we are in the vicinity of
where we want to be.

2.

Next, we will use the spin button to refine the

position of the point (or else if we know the precise
value, simply type it in the text box).

5. Next, we will change the next erroneous value. Since we

have a modeless dialog, all we have to do is simply click
to select the point on the chart (NO need to close the
dialog). The dialog will automatically update with
information about the selected point.
MPOC provides a truly modeless experience you can
even click on a different chart or a different worksheet
and the dialog will automatically update itself.

Repeat step 4 to change the value associated with this

point.

6. Next, let us explore alternate ways of selecting a

different point on the chart by using theSeries
dropdown and Point dropdown on the dialog (or you may
choose to select your point directly on the chart by using
a mouse pointer as described in step 5). This method is
quite useful when there are many points or series on the
chart and selecting points can be difficult. Also, this
opens up the possibility of manipulating points of charts
where point selection is not supported such as area
charts.
1.
With just the chart selected (no points or series
selected), launch the MPOC dialog as described in
step 2 (if it is not up already).
2.
The MPOC dialog is automatically populated with
the series information for the selected chart.

3.

Choose the series in the Series dropdown whose

point you want to manipulate. Let us choose
Aluminum. The entire series will be
automatically selected on the chart and the point
information will be populated in the Points dropdown.

4.

Next, let us choose the point that we want

manipulate using the Points dropdown. We happen to
know that we want to select the 28th point in the
series. The point is automatically selected on the
chart and the information about value is populated in
the dialog.

5.

The next step is to change the value to smoothen

the curve. We do this the same way as shown in step
4.

Thus using the MPOC Add-In, we can easily manipulate points

of the chart to smoothen out the erroneous values.

MPOC Add-In Documentation

The section above covers the basics of using the Add-In. There
are many more features that are beyond the scope of this
blog article but these are covered in great detail in the
provided documentation (attached at the bottom of this post).
Please read the documentation before using this Add-In. Some
of the topics covered in the documentation are:
1. Installation Instructions
2. Formula Support The MPOC Add-In will not
overwrite formulae in cells. We will instead use the Goal
Seek feature in Excel to manipulate points that are
based on formulas.
3. Dialog Forms The MPOC Add-In supports two forms
of dialogs controlled by registry keys
1.
Compact Form

2.

Expanded Form

4. Known Limitations Unsupported scenarios include

Cross Workbook charts and Pivot Charts.
Conclusion
The Manipulate Points on Charts (MPOC) Add-In is a sample
solution that will help you manipulate points on charts. This
Add-In can be used to visually smooth curves in Excel. If this
Add-In is useful to you or if there are any chart interactivity
features you would like to see, we would like to hear from you.