February 18, 2022 at 4:39 am
Hi everyone
I am looking for a good data visualization tool to see my data. I do not want a pay per month type of product. I am ok with paying for a perpetual license or free. Can someone help me with some product suggestions?
Thank you
February 18, 2022 at 4:19 pm
See what kind of data? From where?
"I want to know what kind of car or truck I should buy, but I can't tell you how I'm going to use it."
Excel (since you likely already own it) and PowerBI are free. Give it a bash.
February 18, 2022 at 7:22 pm
Excel is simple (or Sheets, etc.)
Power BI is free-ish. Are you looking for yourself or others? Often something I use might be simple and easy, but once I start to share things, it costs $$.
Many places are moving to software rental. like it or not, that's a trend.
February 19, 2022 at 12:55 am
See what kind of data? From where?
"I want to know what kind of car or truck I should buy, but I can't tell you how I'm going to use it."
Excel (since you likely already own it) and PowerBI are free. Give it a bash.
fair point. I am using SQL Server 2019. I am looking at creating charts for financial data. They are stock prices and also related calculations. I know Excel can do it but was hoping for something with more graphing features. I find that I have to prep the data a lot for Excel to show how I want to see things. Excel is great for calculations but not too great for charting. I like Tableau but not ok with the software rental approach.
February 19, 2022 at 12:56 am
Excel is simple (or Sheets, etc.)
Power BI is free-ish. Are you looking for yourself or others? Often something I use might be simple and easy, but once I start to share things, it costs $$.
Many places are moving to software rental. like it or not, that's a trend.
its only for me. ill take a look at Power BI
February 19, 2022 at 1:12 am
I would look at PowerBI and Excel. You can use stored procedures and views as data sources if you want. What kinds of graphs etc did you want to create that Excel/PowerBI won't do? Maybe you can use Azure Data Studio and then use add-ins?
February 19, 2022 at 1:54 am
I would look at PowerBI and Excel. You can use stored procedures and views as data sources if you want. What kinds of graphs etc did you want to create that Excel/PowerBI won't do? Maybe you can use Azure Data Studio and then use add-ins?
I have never used Power BI. I am confused by their pricing. They charge per month but then they have free version. Is it free? trial?
The program I use for charting financial stuff is Metastock and it is great. Super easy to drag and drop, zoom in/out etc. Just super easy. Excel I have to spent more time on getting things ready and then I can't really do much with the graphs. If I want to zoom into an area then that is not easy to do in Excel. I am so used to Metastock that I am a bit spoiled by it. I will give Power BI a shot. Maybe it can do similar stuff as Metastock.
February 19, 2022 at 4:18 am
if what you're doing is purely financial stuff, Metastock may be just what you need. I would wager that there's been a ton of thought and expertise built into the software. The problem you may have with Excel and PowerBI is that, while they can get data from anywhere, you have to build the measures and reports yourself. And if you don't understand how DAX works, that could be a huge problem.
February 19, 2022 at 5:01 am
The problem with Metatstock is that it doesn't handle external data very well. If I create a query in SQL Server 2019 then there is no easy way to have Metastock read that data. It needs a symbol to read a data so that means I have to manually update the symbol in the formula for the chart I am viewing. For exmaple, IBM is already taken so I would use it to view IBM's open, high, low, close, volume data (the standard stuff). If I want to use my SQL Server data then I need do something like IBM2, IBM3 etc to differentiate it from IBM. Not a big deal but Metastock doesn't offer a way to concatenate strings in the formula language so I cannot dynamically create the symbol needed to access the SQL Server data. Too painful.
Doesn't SQL Server 2019 have any kind of visualization tool available as an add-on? Like SSIS offers automation. Isn't there any kind of reporting features in SQL Server? I don't need fancy pie charts/maps etc. Just simple line and bar graphs that allows me to scroll data by date, zoom in/out, and apply filters for stock symbols so I can select the stock I want to see data for.
I have been using Access for years and got fed up with its limitations. Once I started using SQL Server..wow. Then I got exposed to SSIS...wow. There "must" be a reporting/analysis feature that offers graphs. Is there any such thing?
February 19, 2022 at 5:14 am
I think I found answer to my question
https://www.mssqltips.com/sql-server-tip-category/175/reporting-services-charts/
Looks like there IS a way to do it. I saw the graphs and they look like the ones I am interested in.
SQL Server never fails!
February 19, 2022 at 3:00 pm
Reporting Services? Depends on what you're trying to do.
if you want fully interactive charts, that's more PowerBI/Excel
February 19, 2022 at 3:42 pm
pietlinden wrote:I would look at PowerBI and Excel. You can use stored procedures and views as data sources if you want. What kinds of graphs etc did you want to create that Excel/PowerBI won't do? Maybe you can use Azure Data Studio and then use add-ins?
I have never used Power BI. I am confused by their pricing. They charge per month but then they have free version. Is it free? trial?
The program I use for charting financial stuff is Metastock and it is great. Super easy to drag and drop, zoom in/out etc. Just super easy. Excel I have to spent more time on getting things ready and then I can't really do much with the graphs. If I want to zoom into an area then that is not easy to do in Excel. I am so used to Metastock that I am a bit spoiled by it. I will give Power BI a shot. Maybe it can do similar stuff as Metastock.
Regarding PowerBI - if it is only for you then you use PowerBI Desktop - that is completely free (and not a trial) - you only require licensing when you use a Server or the powerBI Service.
February 23, 2022 at 8:14 am
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February 25, 2022 at 12:49 pm
You should be using Power BI DESKTOP. It is completely free and a great tool.
Since you stated that you are using it yourself and not sharing the visuals with anyone, this will meet your needs.
February 28, 2022 at 7:31 pm
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