Chart Choice Skill

Chart choice is a sentence-completion exercise: the chart exists to make one stated point legible in three seconds, and the point's grammar picks the form — comparing things (bars), change over time (lines), parts of a whole (stacked/100% bars — pie only under five slices), distribution (histogram), relationship (scatter). Most bad charts are either the wrong form for the point, or the right form dressed dishonestly: truncated bar axes, dual axes engineered for drama, 3D anything. The skill picks the form, then runs the honesty pass.

What This Skill Produces

• The chart verdict — the form, chosen from the point's grammar, with the reasoning stated
• The honesty pass — axes, baselines, sorting, and the dual-axis/3D vetoes applied
• The labeling spec — title-as-the-point, direct series labels, the source line — so the chart survives being screenshot out of context
• The alternative — when the honest answer is "this wants a table, not a chart"

Required Inputs

Ask for these if not provided:

• The point, as a sentence: "show the data" isn't chartable; "East region drove the Q2 recovery" is — the sentence picks the chart, and extracting it is half the skill
• The data's shape — categories × measures × time; how many series (five lines are a chart; twelve are spaghetti — the shape forces choices)
• The venue — a live deck (bolder, fewer labels), a doc (denser is fine), a dashboard (self-serve labeling); and whether it will be screenshot-forwarded (assume yes)

Framework: The Choice and Honesty Rules