Insert dynamic graphs

Question

Is it possible to insert dynamic graphs into your LaTeX document?

For example, let's say I want to add ABC Enterprise's turnover into my LaTeX document for each month. Could I do something like this @{turnover, Jan=£1000.00, Feb=£1200.00, Mar=£400.00} and then use that data to automatically render/draw a bar chart?

Or is the only way to get a graph into my LaTeX document via inserting images?

Answer 1

If you would like to do it with LaTeX code than it would be probably pgfplots. To me it is often faster to use an external program like gnuplot. The package pgfplots is a tool to implement graphs with the correct typesettings. See Problems in creating graphs using dataplot.

Example

Could you give a minimal example of your database? Your procedure is dependent on the shape of the database. You maybe like to follow How typeset a numeric table from a CSV file.

Compiling

Remember that you mostly do not want to compile the graphs everytime you compile the latex-main file.