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PRISM Europe Consultancy Ltd

Our Software Arm: WinChart® Professional Edition Version 4.0 – based upon Dr Walter Shewhart's original principles

Buy WinChart® Professional

External Data Links with Drill-downs and ‘Dicing & Slicing’

You have SPC software? You have six sigma software? You have fantastic statistical packages?

… but do you have your data?

WinChart Professional

Once the ‘top level’ chart has been created from your source data then, as illustrated in the diagram above, there are various features:

  • WinChart can automatically scan your source columns and make a suitable chart for your selection.
  • The charts can be viewed monthly, weekly, or daily – all with a few simple clicks.
  • Percentage calculations can be performed without cumbersome SQL queries or data manipulation.
  • Regularly-used charts can be made from a dataset in one go, thus leaving the drill-down feature to be used only when required and making such charts quickly and easily accessible.
  • Sometimes it takes time for a data set to be up-to-date. WinChart can easily handle this by allowing points within a specified number of days to be marked as incomplete or to be omitted.
  • All without needing to contact the ICT department each time!

Additionally, when 'slicing and dicing' data, abbreviations in the source field names or in their entries can be replaced by more meaningful descriptions. Charts will be updated automatically from the source data on opening, however an ‘update delay’ can be used, allowing charts to be accessed many times within a short time period without needing lengthy re-reading times. (Access, Excel, MS SQL, etc. supported.)

Cyclic/Seasonal Control Limits

Cyclic control limits can also be applied to the control chart where appropriate:

cyclic/seasonal control limits

(see the Add-On menu, Cyclic Control Limits; note that this is installed with the Add-Ons.)

 

Significant Points are Highlighted Automatically

As can be seen in the cyclic control chart, significant points and runs of points are highlighted to bring them to your attention.

significant points

 
  • The orientation
         up = ‘good’ = green,
         down = ‘bad’ = red,
         both up/down = ‘bad’
    can be changed per chart
  • The colours used can be changed
  • Can be turned off if required

 

Process changes (‘splits’) can be included

splits

    • Limits can also be fixed/unfixed
    • User text can be added on the chart as desired
    • Longer comments can be stored per point
    • Rogue points excluded from calculations if desired

Long charts can be partitioned

long charts

Partitions ‘cut’ the chart, each part ‘stretched’ for greater readability. The most recent partitions can be set to have a fixed number of points in each.

MicroCharts

Sometimes a summary instead of a full chart would be more practicable:

building to a summary building to a summary building to a summary

(based on the chart below)

  • Important recent changes can be seen at a glance
  • The title can be set separately for readability
  • Significant points colour-highlighted
  • The background changes to alert to a current ‘good’ or ‘bad’ result:

ddd      ddd

  • Due to their reduced size many MicroCharts can be placed together

With The Performance Dashboard, MicroCharts can be viewed in place of dials, and also exported to a Word document.

 

Web Viewing

Web page images of the charts can be made en masse, allowing easy uploading to an intranet/internet. This way the charts can be quickly viewed by anyone required without needing the software installing.

web viewing

Viewing Charts Together or Superimposed

It is possible to show multiple charts together on the screen, or to superimpose charts on top of each other. A 'Toolbox' window also allows various formatting options.

view charts together

 

 

Overview of a Chart and Other Features

overview of a chart

 

  • The Median can be used instead of the Mean (for Single Measurements and Sub-groups)
  • The Moving Range (mR) chart available for Single Measurements (XmR)
  • Other control charts are available (Subgroups X-bar R, p & np charts,c & u charts, Cusum)
  • An Additional textual diagnosis report can be created based on the “Western Electric Rules”. Apart from a point outside of control and a consecutive run of points either side of the mean/median, these are not illustrated on the charts: the risk of a false signal would become too high for practical purposes. They are useful, however, for interpreting historical data.
  • Previous version of WinChart had a Standard edition available. This has now been upgraded to the new Professional edition, but there is a switch to turn off features that were not in the previous Standard edition. This can be useful to avoid being overwhelmed by features, and may also be more appropriate for service industry users.
  • (More than 500 points can now be used: on previous versions of WinChart this was a limitation)
  • The software automatically checks for updates on the web (this can be turned off)
  • Software documentation and 'how to' presentations are quickly accessible via Help menus.

 

 

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