Highcharts is a JavaScript library for creating beautiful, interactive charts for the Web. It supports more than 20 chart types with various configuration options to help visualize data in a more robust way.
This book aims to be a fast-paced, step-by-step guide for anyone who is starting out with Highcharts. It presents information in a simple manner to help you get started with Highcharts in no time. References to the official documentation have been provided for you whenever a new concept is introduced to encourage you to dig deeper into the details.
You will be first exposed to simple concepts such as initializing different chart types and using their configuration options to modify their appearance and behavior. Once you have a solid foundation, we will move on to relatively advanced concepts, including Highcharts events and APIs. Finally, you will be presented with some additional techniques that involve working with stored and dynamically generated data.
By the end of this book, you will have a solid understanding of Highcharts and will be able to use it in different scenarios.
Chapter 1, Getting Started with Highcharts, describes Highcharts and its features. It covers basic installation of Highcharts with a working chart example.
Chapter 2, Column and Bar Charts, covers column and bar charts. It introduces the basic chart configuration options and shows how to configure a drilldown series.
Chapter 3, Line and Spline Charts, covers line and spline charts. It explains how different chart types can be combined to present data in a more understandable way.
Chapter 4, Area, Scatter, and Bubble Charts, describes the working of area, scatter, and bubble charts. It also introduces a new Highcharts feature: creating 3D charts.
Chapter 5, Pie, Polar, and Spider Web Charts, gives a step-by-step guide on working with basic pie charts and then configuring them to create a drilldown series. After that, polar and spider web charts will be explained.
Chapter 6, Other Chart Types, covers different chart types that are not covered in the previous chapters, including gauges, waterfall chart, pyramid chart, funnel chart, and heat maps.
Chapter 7, Theming with Highcharts, covers different aspects of modifying the appearance of Highcharts. It shows how to create a global chart theme, how to use Google web fonts, and how to use jQuery UI easing for chart loading effects.
Chapter 8, Exploring Highcharts APIs and Events, explains the usage of the robust yet simple APIs that Highcharts provides. At the end of this chapter, you will be provided with a foundation to work with Highcharts events and extend Highcharts.
Chapter 9, Going Further with Highcharts, includes different techniques to work with data from various sources and export Highcharts into various formats.