topic Re: LABELING THE X-AXIS FOR A SUBSET OF THE X-VALUES / SGPLOT in Graphics Programming

LABELING THE X-AXIS FOR A SUBSET OF THE X-VALUES / SGPLOT

Arrie — Wed, 03 Dec 2025 16:20:54 GMT

Hi, I am struggling a bit with the axis labels in my SGPLOT...

Program:

proc sgplot data = my_data;
Vbarbasic X / response=VAR1 name='Series1' fillattrs=(color=orange) legendlabel='LABEL1';
Vbarbasic X / response=VAR2 name='Series2' fillattrs=(color=Purple) legendlabel='LABEL2';
Series x=X y=VAR3 / LINEATTRS=(pattern=solid color=Blue) name='Series1' legendlabel='LABEL3' ;
STEP x=X y=VAR4 / LINEATTRS=(pattern=solid color=Red ) name='Series6' legendlabel='LABEL4' ;

YAXIS label="Production";
XAXIS label ="Moment" values=(0 to 96) VALUESROTATE=diagonal2 valuesformat=MY_FMT.;

keylegend "Series1" "Series2" "Series3" "Series4" "Series5" "Series6"/ title="" location=outside position=right across=1;
run;

The format of the labels looks like: 05-31 00:00, 05-31 01:00, etc.

Labeling all the x-values produces one black bar of unreadable text so I want to label just a subset. Changing the values statement eg to values=(0 to 96 by 4) reduces the number of observations plotted and that is not what I want. So I want all observations plotted in the graph and only a specific subset labeled on the axis

I'm sure I have done this before, but can't find the to do it anymore.

Can somebody help me?

Regards, Arie

Re: LABELING THE X-AXIS FOR A SUBSET OF THE X-VALUES / SGPLOT

PaigeMiller — Wed, 03 Dec 2025 16:32:28 GMT

Is variable X numeric or character, according to PROC CONTENTS? The results you are getting make me think it is character. If it is character, then you will need to convert it to an actual numeric date/time value, assuming that you want it to be a date/time value (is that what you want? you tell us what you don't want, but you haven't really been specific about what you do want).

Re: LABELING THE X-AXIS FOR A SUBSET OF THE X-VALUES / SGPLOT

Arrie — Wed, 03 Dec 2025 16:56:54 GMT

At first it were timestamps but I transformed these to numbers, here from 1 to 96
The labels will display 1 as "05-31 00:00", 2 as "05-31 01:00", etc

Re: LABELING THE X-AXIS FOR A SUBSET OF THE X-VALUES / SGPLOT

PaigeMiller — Wed, 03 Dec 2025 18:07:32 GMT

Is this variable that goes from 1 to 96 numeric or character, according to PROC CONTENTS?

If it is numeric, what is the format according to PROC CONTENTS?

Re: LABELING THE X-AXIS FOR A SUBSET OF THE X-VALUES / SGPLOT

Arrie — Wed, 03 Dec 2025 18:39:55 GMT

Variables in Creation Order

# Variable Type Len Format Label

3 X Num 8 ZO_DAN_RIJ.

and that format says:

1="05-31 00:00"

2="05-31 01:0"

etc

Re: LABELING THE X-AXIS FOR A SUBSET OF THE X-VALUES / SGPLOT

Arrie — Wed, 03 Dec 2025 18:58:11 GMT

Re: LABELING THE X-AXIS FOR A SUBSET OF THE X-VALUES / SGPLOT

MarciaS — Wed, 03 Dec 2025 20:48:42 GMT

You can add the FITPOLICY=ROTATETHIN option to the XAXIS statement to have the procedure rotate the values and thin (remove) some of the tick values.

For example:

XAXIS label ="Moment" values=(0 to 96) VALUESROTATE=diagonal2 valuesformat=MY_FMT. fitpolicy=rotatethin;

I hope that helps.

Marcia

Re: LABELING THE X-AXIS FOR A SUBSET OF THE X-VALUES / SGPLOT

Ksharp — Thu, 04 Dec 2025 07:49:42 GMT

Did you try valuesdisplay= option?

https://blogs.sas.com/content/graphicallyspeaking/2019/04/22/mortgage-rates-overlaying-multiple-years-in-the-same-graph/

For example:

xaxis values=('01jan1960'd to '01jan1961'd by month)
valuesdisplay=('Jan'  ' '   'Mar'   ' '   'May'   ' '   'Jul' 'Aug' 'Sep' 'Oct' 'Nov' 'Dec' ' ');

Re: LABELING THE X-AXIS FOR A SUBSET OF THE X-VALUES / SGPLOT

Arrie — Thu, 04 Dec 2025 09:05:58 GMT

yes...

Re: LABELING THE X-AXIS FOR A SUBSET OF THE X-VALUES / SGPLOT

Arrie — Thu, 04 Dec 2025 09:06:30 GMT

Marcia, this works! Thnka