Like many other features of PowerPoint, there are several AutoLayouts designed for
creating charts. You can also create a chart on any slide by clicking the Insert Chart
button on the Standard toolbar.
When you double-click on a chart placeholder or click the Insert Chart button, the computer immediately creates a column chart with sample data inside of it. To alter the data to fit your needs, type in your data in the Datasheet, a spreadsheet-like table that organizes information into axes and series of data.
As you type data into the datasheet, the chart changes to meet the new data. For this example, we'll change the numbers and the legend headings in the first column. (East, West, & North) The axis titles, 1st Qtr through 4th qtr, will remain.
To edit a chart, you can double-click on it. While editing the chart, you are actually in a Microsoft program called Microsoft Graph. (other programs in the Office suite use it as well) To exit out and get back, simply click outside of the chart.
There is a general rule of thumb to editing. Once you are in edit mode, right-click the item you wish to alter and choose to format it from the shortcut menu. In the slide below, we right-click on the chart and choose Chart Type from the shortcut menu to change this column chart to a line chart.
Since it is hard to see the Miami line on the line chart, we can right-click it and choose Format Data Series from the shortcut menu. Also, we'll format the vertical axis to show the numbers in dollar amounts.
Charting in PowerPoint also allows a rather unusual feature, the ability to hide
columns or rows of information. To do this, we need to bring back the datasheet. This is
accomplished by clicking on the View Datasheet button on the toolbar WHILE EDITING THE
CHART. 
Once the datasheet
is up, click on the gray column heading at the top (or row heading at the left) and choose
Exclude Row/Col from the Data menu. Here is the result when we hide the 4th Quarter
information and the San Diego information.
You will notice that the information for the 4th Quarter and for San Diego are grayed out. The chart now shows only information for Chicago and Miami for the first three quarters.
If the data for your chart is contained in a spreadsheet program, such as Excel or
Lotus 1-2-3, you can import it into PowerPoint with the Import File button. 
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