Quality Progress - American Society for Quality

Not to put words in my friend's (Mr. Prevette) mouth, but I bet he would agree that bar
charts are often subjected to all the magic effects that Microsoft can offer. Edward Tufte
calls these effects, collectively, chart junk, and tells us to avoid it. Three dimensional bar
charts with Moire effects are particularly annoying. Tufte also advises us not to
underestimate the intelligence of our audience. Quantitative information should be
presented in a "data rich" environment or format. And, just for the record, I support the
copyright restrictions. Pass the magazine around instead of copying, so people can
appreciate the whole context.
Steven Byers
Olympia, WA
17364 Re: Re: Publishing Bar Charts
William Pflanz
Dec-09-03
Steve,
I just wanted to note for Bridget's benefit that copying articles is copyright protected. I
will concede that since ASQ allows copies for a fee than they should make the charts
readable on a black and white copier. A control chart cannot be used to communicate all
information. Histograms and Pareto charts are bar charts and it is not unusual to use bar
charts to communicate information to non-technical people and management since it is
easier to understand.
Bill Pflanz
Section 801
17363 Re: Letter: Clear Explanation of Split-Plot Designs
Rob Kinnear
Dec-09-03
Thanks Peter. I agree with you. I tried analyzing the data myself to see if I could
reproduce the Variability numbers in Table 2. I could not reproduce them. Do you know
how the numbers were obtained?
R. Kinnear
rkinnear@borgwarner.com
17362 Experimental Design-Split Plot
Rob Kinnear
Dec-09-03
In the Nov 2003 magazine, how was the Variability calculated in Table 2 on p. 66? I tried
it using ANOVA and my numbers don't match.