Edit Charts in the XrmToolBox for Dynamics 365

Ulrik (CRM Chart Guy) Chart XML, XrmToolBox, , ,

For the past months I have been collaborating with Mohamed Rasheed on a plugin for the XrmToolBox. We are pleased to announce that it is now available.

The plugin, which can be downloaded from the plugins store is called “Advanced Chart Editor” and it lets you modify the chart XML in Dynamics 365 (and Dynamics CRM) without having to export the charts or know how to write the XML. All the properties can be added or changed in the interface.

The tool focuses on the styling of the chart, so you can edit all the series and axis properties. Here’s a video to introduce the “Advanced Chart Editor” tool for XrmToolBox.

You can find the project on GitHub here
https://github.com/ITLec/ITLec.CRMChartGuy.XRMToolBox.AdvancedChartEditor

And on NuGet
https://www.nuget.org/packages/ITLec.CRMChartGuy.XRMToolBox.AdvancedChartEditor

Hope you enjoy it. And a huge THANKS to Mohamed Rasheed for pulling this off on the development side. He is a great developer and it definitely wouldn’t have happened without his contribution.

As mentioned in the video, this tool is built on top of the Chart Manager that is already in the XrmToolBox. No need to reinvent the wheel. So of course a tremendous amount of thanks to Tanguy Touzard for having made both the XrmToolBox and the Chart Manager available.

As always please sign up for my newsletter and follow me on Twitter.

And be sure to follow Mohamed Rasheed as well 

43 thoughts on “Edit Charts in the XrmToolBox for Dynamics 365”

  2. I keep getting the error ‘input string was not in a correct format’ when I try to click open the series or chartareas. I’m on a Dynamics 365 version 8.2.1.207. Where can I send the error stack?I have this both on my production and dev environment.
    I hope it’s not a big issue, so I can quickly go about changing some charts…
    Nice work!

    Reply

      • Got same error as Bart. Submitted issue with example on GitHub as requested by Ulrik. 🙂
        A great addition to the XrmToolBox!

  4. I workup to this great new from a post from D365+CRMUG.. Just when you thought it could not get any better..Here comes Ulrik to the rescue.

    Cant wait to install this in my Dev environment.

    Reply

  7. Hi,

    This looks great, but like others I can’t go further than opening the visual editor. After that I get a “unhandled exception” error if I click on any of the nodes. I have the latest update (the one in the app store).

    Reply

  9. Hi Ulrik,
    I have tried this example a few times, but can’t get the second series background color to appear.
    This is the xml for the chart:

    Reply

    • I have corrected my statement below. I would like to load a chart from a dashboard can I do this through the tool without going through the Import Charts tool.

      Reply

  12. When I imported a chart from a file in Advanced Chart Editor Import charts utility, I get the following error Missing ‘description’ node.

    Reply

    • Ankit, make sure that you have the latest version of XrmToolBox.
      I got this and other errors until I realised that I didn’t have the latest version.

      Reply

      • I had that same error – with the latest version. It is actually correct, if you haven’t entered a description, which isn’t necessary – its just that in, say, Notepadd++ you can open, edit and re-import without an issue. But the Advanced Chart Editor won’t let you open it. Even the updated version

  17. I had used the Chart Editor when not part of the XRM Toolbox and it worked great. Now, I get different errors trying to load charts to edit – ones I had edited in the original chart editor – such that I can’t open them. Which also means I can’t work out what is the cause. Weird. Shame that such a great tool works less well now part of the toolbox. One is Missing Description Node

    Reply

  18. Is the ‘standalone’ chart editor still available for download? It seems to me to be much easier to use than the version included in the XRM Toolbox.

    Reply

      • Hi Ulrik, I thought there had been a version that allowed you to edit without first connecting to your site. But I think I was mistaken. The error I was getting was something simple in that I had not put a description into the test chart I created to try to the updated editor in the toolbox. It’s funny that I can create a chart without a description, export it, make a minor change, import it. But in the XRM Toolbox chart editor, it errors out before I can start to do anything. I opened in Notepad++ and had no issue.
        The one thing you can do in something like, say, Notepad++, is look at more than one chart at a time. This is a huge advantage when less experienced, to be able to see something I had done before – compare to a chart already edited when doing something similar – that you can’t do in the XRM Toolbox version of the Chart Editor. If making minor changes – as indicated in your video – the XRM Toolbox editor is great. But when trying to make greater changes – for example as shown in your terrific post “Aggregate Total on top of Stacked Column” – not sure how easy to use.
        I guess it is because your amazing posts have raised the bar for everyone who had thought they were never going to be able to make changes to their Dynamics charts and now were able to do it!

        So hopefully anyone reading down this far will realize just how helpful all your posts are – just not sure how I can make them to the same degree inside the new tool.

        Cheers
        Paul

  19. Hi,
    first of all Thanks for all your great posts. It makes it so much easier to handle problems.
    And here we are… I got a problem with the Advanced Chart Editor. If I change the TitleForeColor of the X Axis it doesn’t apply to the chart in the UCI. Without the UCI I don’t have this issue and it changes the color correctly… just when I open the chart in the new Userinterface (UCI).

    Do you have an advice for me?

    Reply

  21. Hello Ulrik,
    I noticed that when I transform a pie chart on doughnut with the “advanced chart editor” (xrm toolbox), I can’t see the records associated to each part of the doghnut (wich is possible in OOB).
    This problem occurs only with doughnuts not with bars or other charts.
    Do you have any idea why this is occuring and how can I fix it ?
    Thank you so much !
    khadija

    Reply

  22. Hello, thank you for the great post one question excuse me, I have a problem with the chart in Unified Interface the values are not equal as in the regular web version, do you know if Advance charts is supported on UCI?

    Thanks!

    Reply

  23. Hi Ulrik (CRM Chart Guy),

    Great Post and I love the Advanced Chart Editor in XRMToolBox! Question. Is it possible to Bold a specific value on the x-axis? I have a bar chart that shows the number of cases each person completed per month; each person should complete 15 cases per month. I want to bold the value 15 (and the grid line) on the x-axis to show the benchmark is 15. I tried adjusting the TickMark & Grid, but it bold multiple values and the outcome is not what i’m looking for. Is it possible to a specific x-axis value?

    Reply

    • Hi Jane. Thanks for reading. You can achieve this by using a creative combination of major and minor tickmarks and grids. But your result will be a stronger line at 15 rather than bolding the font. You can’t selective bold the font.
      You could also start the numbering at 15 and then set interval to a million or something ridiculous that would never be shown on the chart. Then only the 15 value would be shown.

      Reply

  24. how do I add this tool(advanced chart editor) if I already have XrmToolBox (this tool has manage charts instead) please let me know the step by step things I need to do ,I really need it ASAP.
    thanks in advance

    Reply

      • I have the latest xrmToolBox installed(v1.2020.2.37) but i couldn’t see where the plugin store is , i do see tools library and tried to search for Advanced Chart Editor, nothing comes in the result, please let me know what i missed! thanks in advance again!

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