General question about graphs : How can I truncate the graph to better see the variations on a histogram?

[Michael Duarte Goncalves]

Hi everyone,

I've come to ask a rather general question, following the excellent suggestion provided by Maarten Buis in a post to which he replied and advice me to use the -twoway spike- command for these type of data.

How can I "zoom in", if I can call it that, on the period I'm interested in (i.e. more or less from 0 to 25,000) and not take the whole scale on the x-axis please?

Here's the code I've written (I'm obviously open to any suggestions for improving my code, thank you).

forvalues j = 1/2 {
bys power_p`j' : egen count_p`j' = count(power_p`j') if tariff_2
replace count_p`j' = . if count_p`j' == 0
}

    preserve


    bys power_p1 power_p2: keep if (_n==1)

        // First Period
           # delimit;
           twoway spike count_p1 power_p1, lwidth(thick) lcolor(green%25)
           ytitle("No. of Households", orient(horizontal))
           ylabel(, nogrid format(%9.0fc))
           xtitle("Contracted Power (in Watts)")
           subtitle("{bf}1{sup:st} Period", pos(11) size(2))
           scheme(white_w3d)
           legend(off)
           name(distribution_period_p1, replace)
           ;
           # delimit cr
          
          
        // Second Period  
           # delimit;
           twoway spike count_p2 power_p2, lwidth(thick) lcolor(blue%10)
           ytitle("No. of Households", orient(horizontal))
           ylabel(, nogrid format(%9.0fc))
           xtitle("Contracted Power (in Watts)")
           //xlabel(0(5000)25000, labsize(tiny) alternate nogrid format(%9.0fc))
           subtitle("{bf}2{sup:nd} Period", pos(11) size(2))
           scheme(white_w3d)
           legend(off)
           name(distribution_period_p2, replace)
           ;
           # delimit cr
          
          
           graph combine distribution_period_p1 distribution_period_p2,                ///
           cols(1) ycommon title("{bf}Households - Distribution of Contracted Powers on:", pos(11) size(2.75))    ///
           scheme(white_w3d) name(distribution_power_p1_p2, replace)
          
           graph export "../figures/hist_cont_powers_1st_2nd_Period.png", replace
           graph export "../figures/hist_cont_powers_1st_2nd_Period.pdf", replace
          
          
    restore

Sorry Nick Cox, I have still to change my x-axis label to "Contracted Powers (in kW)"...

Nice continuation,

Michael

[George Ford]

check to see if you have very large values for the variables, which usually is the reason you get that look.

can use xlabel to restrict the range -

, xlabel(0(10000)30000)

[Nick Cox]

Restricting the axis labels won't restrict the range of the data shown. An if condition is needed.

[Michael Duarte Goncalves]

Hi George Ford, Hi Nick Cox,

Thank you both for you suggestions.
I will have a look on the data, and try the if condition.

Best,

Michael