Setting Data Source Using URL

FusionCharts lets you pass the complete JSON/XML chart data as a static string to the dataSource attribute. Alternatively, you can also save the chart data in a .json or .xml file and then pass the relative URL of this file as value to the dataSource attribute.

The only difference between the two methods is the value that is passed to the dataFormat attribute. For the first method, the dataFormat attribute takes json or xml as values, depending on the chart data. For the second method, the values will be jsonurl and xmlurl.

This article explains how you can set the chart data using the URL of the corresponding file uisng jquery-fusioncharts component.

Load data using JSON as URL

Let's build the same revenue chart which we built in the first example using JSON, and use a .json file as the data source.

FusionCharts will load here..

The data for this chart is represented in the table below:

Country	No. of Oil Reserves
Venezuela	290
Saudi	260
Canada	180
Iran	140
Russia	115
UAE	100
US	30
China	30

The JSON representation for the above table looks as shown below:

{
    // Chart Configuration
    "chart": {
        "caption": "Countries With Most Oil Reserves [2017-18]",
        "subCaption": "In MMbbl = One Million barrels",
        "xAxisName": "Country",
        "yAxisName": "Reserves (MMbbl)",
        "numberSuffix": "K",
        "theme": "fusion",
    },
    // Chart Data
    "data": [{
        "label": "Venezuela",
        "value": "290"
    }, {
        "label": "Saudi",
        "value": "260"
    }, {
        "label": "Canada",
        "value": "180"
    }, {
        "label": "Iran",
        "value": "140"
    }, {
        "label": "Russia",
        "value": "115"
    }, {
        "label": "UAE",
        "value": "100"
    }, {
        "label": "US",
        "value": "30"
    }, {
        "label": "China",
        "value": "30"
    }]
}

Copy this into a file, name it oilReserves.json, and store it in the same folder as your HTML page.

If you are using multilingual characters in your JSON, make sure that you save the JSON data with UTF-8 encoding.

In this step, we will create an instance of the chart type as column2d, set the width and height (in pixels or %), and finally specify the JSON data for the chart as a string.

The code to render a chart using require is given below:

//Include fusioncharts
var FusionCharts = require('fusioncharts');

//Include chart modules
var Charts = require('fusioncharts/fusioncharts.charts');

//Include the theme file
var FusionTheme = require('fusioncharts/themes/fusioncharts.theme.fusion');

var $ = require('jquery');
var jQFc = require('jquery-fusioncharts');

//Pass FusionCharts as dependency
Charts(FusionCharts);

//Pass theme as dependency
FusionTheme(FusionCharts);

$('#chart-container').insertFusionCharts({
  type: 'column2d',
  width: 700,
  height: 400,
  dataFormat: 'jsonurl',
  dataSource: 'https://static.fusioncharts.com/sample/oilReserves.json' // url of datasource
}

The HTML template of the above sample is shown below:

<div id="chart-container">
    FusionCharts will render here
</div>

The above chart has been rendered using the following steps:

Included the necessary libraries and components using import. For example, jquery-fusioncharts, fusioncharts, etc.
Stored the chart configuration in a JSON object. In the JSON object:
- The chart type has been set to column2d. Find the complete list of chart types with their respective alias here.
- The width and height of the chart has been set in pixels.
- The dataFormat is set as XML.
To set the datasource using URL:
- The value of the dataFormat has been set to jsonurl.
- A static URL has been set to dataSource to render the above chart.
Create an HTML template to render the chart.

When rendering your charts locally (without a web server, even if on the localhost), you will not be able to load data from XML or JSON files present on your hard-drive. This is due to security restrictions enforced by most modern browsers.

Load data using XML as URL

The XML representation for the above chart looks as shown below:

<chart caption='Countries With Most Oil Reserves [2017-18] ' subcaption='In MMbbl = One Million barrels ' xaxisname='Country ' yaxisname='Reserves (MMbbl) ' numberprefix='K ' theme='fusion '>
    <set label='Venezuela ' value='290 ' />
    <set label='Saudi ' value='260 ' />
    <set label='Canada ' value='180 ' />
    <set label='Iran ' value='140 ' />
    <set label='Russia ' value='115 ' />
    <set label='UAE ' value='100 ' />
    <set label='US ' value='30 ' />
    <set label='China ' value='30 ' />
</chart>

Copy this into a file called oilReserves.xml and store it in the same folder as your HTML page.

If you are using multilingual characters in your XML, make sure you save the XML data with UTF-8 encoding.