Column Chart with Item Renderer – updated

Okay, it didn’t take me long to get back and do some more fiddling with the Column Chart Item Renderer. I went ahead and changed the static ArrayCollection to a dynamic one, because I was trying to figure out something with Themes and needed a button and the button should do something. The ArrayCollection is fairly simple for this chart, so all I did was create a couple of random values from 0 to 100 and made the “date” value the counter time 10. I set it up so that you can press a button and create new data, which is helpful to see the changes to the columns.

// Create some random data for Yesterday and blank data for today
private function dataCreation():void {
	currentArray.removeAll();

	for(var h:int = 0; h < 4; h++) {
		// Generate Random Data
		var randomClose:Number = Math.floor(Math.random() * 100);
		var randomOpen:Number = Math.floor(Math.random() * 100);
		// create a temporary object and add the three values
		var tmpObject:Object = new Object();
		tmpObject.date = (h + 1) * 10;
		tmpObject.close = randomClose;
		tmpObject.open = randomOpen;

		// insert new tmpObject
		currentArray.addItem(tmpObject);
	}

	// Refresh the data
	currentArray.refresh();
}

After that was fixed, I went ahead to modify the ItemRenderer again, but this time to use a GradientFill and a BitMapFill. I had to reduce what was defined for the rectangle, to just a Graphic item as a holder.

s:Graphic id="graphicHolder" />

And then I declared three different rectangles, one for each type of fill. Again, this was to simplify things and also to make sure I was doing the right thing for each fill. As you can see in the Gradient Fill, I had to set the three GradientEntry items to create the look I need. You could do this all dynamically, but I don’t think most people will try different Gradients for each column. Which is why my Gradient fill only changes the Start, Mid and End color of the Gradient.

<fx:Declarations>
	<s:Rect id="imageRect">
		<s:stroke>
			<s:SolidColorStroke id="rectImageStroke" />
		</s:stroke>
		<s:fill>
			<s:BitmapFill id="imageRectFill" fillMode="repeat" scaleX=".70" scaleY=".70" smooth="true" />
		</s:fill>
	</s:Rect>

	<s:Rect id="gradientRect">
		<s:stroke>
			<s:SolidColorStroke id="rectLinGradStroke" />
		</s:stroke>
		<s:fill>
			<s:LinearGradient id="rectLinGrad">
				<s:entries>
					<s:GradientEntry id="linGradColorStart" ratio="0" alpha=".5" />
					<s:GradientEntry id="linGradColorMid" ratio=".25" alpha=".5" />
					<s:GradientEntry id="linGradColorEnd" ratio=".66" alpha=".5" />
				</s:entries>
			</s:LinearGradient>
		</s:fill>
	</s:Rect>

	<s:Rect id="solidRect">
		<s:stroke>
			<s:SolidColorStroke id="rectSolidStroke" />
		</s:stroke>
		<s:fill>
			<s:SolidColor id="rectSolidColor" />
		</s:fill>
	</s:Rect>	
</fx:Declarations>

From here, it was just setting the color for the Gradients and the appropriate image for the BitMap Fills. Except that it took me a while to figure out the correct syntax for the Image. I couldn’t declare it. I couldn’t just Embed it as the source. I had to Embed it as a Bindable Class and then set the BitmapAsset to that Class and finally make it the source for the BitMapFill.

// Embed the Red Apple Image
[Embed(source="../assets/images/red-apple.png")]
[Bindable]
public var imgRedApple:Class;

// Red Image Fill
var imgRedAppleObj:BitmapAsset = new imgRedApple() as BitmapAsset;
imageRectFill.source = imgRedAppleObj;

I simplified the code so that different columns do only two fills. I had columns doing all three fills, but decided that was too much code and could get really confusing. With the example below;

  • If the 1st column has more than 45, then the Red Apple Image Fill is used, else the Red Gradient Fill
  • If the 2nd column has more than 45, then the Blue Gradient Fill is used, else the Blue Solid Fill
  • If the 3rd column has more than 45, then the Green Apple Image Fill is used, else the Green Solid Fill
  • If the 4th column has more than 45, then the Purple Solid Fill is used, else the Purple Gradient Fill

I created a second file for this example, so that the first example and this example could be viewed separately.
View Source

About DeanLogic
Dean has been playing around with programming ever since his family got an IBM PC back in the early 80's. Things have changed since BASICA and Dean has dabbled in HTML, JavaScript, Action Script, Flex, Flash, PHP, C#, C++, J2ME and SQL. On this site Dean likes to share his adventures in coding. And since programming isn't enough of a time killer, Dean has also picked up the hobby of short film creation.

About DeanLogic

Dean has been playing around with programming ever since his family got an IBM PC back in the early 80's. Things have changed since BASICA and Dean has dabbled in HTML, JavaScript, Action Script, Flex, Flash, PHP, C#, C++, J2ME and SQL. On this site Dean likes to share his adventures in coding. And since programming isn't enough of a time killer, Dean has also picked up the hobby of short film creation.

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