AddChartSheet method

Programmatically appends a BIFF8 chart sheet to the workbook, returning the new IXLSWorksheet tab. Previously, chart sheets could only be preserved opaquely on a load-save round-trip via TXLSCustomChart; this method writes a complete chart substream directly into SaveAs(xlExcel97). Excel opens the result as a chart tab of the requested kind. Available since v2.41.0 (Roadmap #10 Phase 1); the array-of-series overload follows in v2.42.0.

TXLSChartType enumeration

Selects the chart kind. Re-exported from lxHandle so user code does not need to import the chart-builder unit directly.

type
  TXLSChartType = (
    xlsChartTypeColumn,
    xlsChartTypeBar,
    xlsChartTypeLine,
    xlsChartTypePie);

TXLSChartSeriesInfo record

Carries a single series declaration for the 6-parameter overload. Categories and Values are A1-range strings (e.g. 'Sheet1!$B$2:$B$5').

type
  TXLSChartSeriesInfo = record
    Name        : WideString;
    Categories  : WideString;
    Values      : WideString;
  end;

Syntax

Five overloads cover progressively richer chart-sheet definitions:

// 1) v2.41.0 — name only; default column chart, no titles, no series.
function AddChartSheet(const Name: WideString): IXLSWorksheet;

// 2) v2.41.0 — name + chart type.
function AddChartSheet(
  const Name : WideString;
  ChartType   : TXLSChartType): IXLSWorksheet;

// 3) v2.41.0 — + chart title.
function AddChartSheet(
  const Name : WideString;
  ChartType   : TXLSChartType;
  const Title: WideString): IXLSWorksheet;

// 4) v2.41.0 — + category-axis title + value-axis title.
function AddChartSheet(
  const Name       : WideString;
  ChartType         : TXLSChartType;
  const Title      : WideString;
  const CatAxisTitle: WideString;
  const ValAxisTitle: WideString): IXLSWorksheet;

// 5) v2.42.0 — + array of series (Name + Categories range + Values range).
function AddChartSheet(
  const Name        : WideString;
  ChartType          : TXLSChartType;
  const Title       : WideString;
  const CatAxisTitle: WideString;
  const ValAxisTitle: WideString;
  const Series      : array of TXLSChartSeriesInfo): IXLSWorksheet;

Remarks

The emitted chart substream covers the BIFF8 framing the spec calls for — BOF (dt=$0020), Chart / PlotGrowth / Frame / Series / SheetProperties / AxesUsed / AxisParent (POS + category axis + value axis + PlotArea + Frame + ChartFormat + chart-kind record + ChartFormatLink + Legend), EOF. Existing chart-sheet round-trip via TXLSCustomChart is unchanged.

Series name binding (v2.42.0): each non-empty Series[i].Name is written into the chart substream as a literal series label via a tStr PTG token on the series-name BRAI (id=2). Excel uses this label in the legend and series selector, so multi-series charts show proper captions instead of the default "Series1 / Series2" placeholders.

Series range binding (v2.47.0): starting in v2.47.0, the Categories and Values A1-range strings are compiled into real tArea3D cell-range references inside the BRAI, going through the formula compiler and the workbook EXTERNSHEET reference table. Before v2.47.0 these two fields were accepted on the API but emitted as cce=0 placeholders, so the rendered chart was empty. Existing v2.42.0 callers that left Categories / Values empty are unaffected.

The returned IXLSWorksheet appears in the Sheets collection and gets a chart-sheet boundsheet entry written on save. Cell-level methods on the result are unsupported — the host worksheet is a chart container, not a data sheet.

Example

This example builds a workbook with a data sheet and a column chart bound to two columns of that data sheet.

var
  Series: array of TXLSChartSeriesInfo;
begin
  // Populate cells on Sheet1.
  Workbook.Sheets[1].Name := 'Data';
  // ... fill A1:B5 with categories + values ...

  SetLength(Series, 1);
  Series[0].Name       := 'Quarterly Revenue';
  Series[0].Categories := 'Data!$A$2:$A$5';
  Series[0].Values     := 'Data!$B$2:$B$5';

  Workbook.Sheets.AddChartSheet(
    'Revenue',
    xlsChartTypeColumn,
    'Quarterly Revenue',
    'Quarter',
    'USD',
    Series);

  Workbook.SaveAs('Revenue.xls', xlExcel97);
end;

Limitations