//Using amCharts and Timetric to Graph Security Data

When looking for web graphing apps which could take multiple series of data and plot them on a graph suitable for embedding on a web page I came across a simple, and free, Flash graphing application worth mentioning. Although my journey started with AJAX, I soon found the Flash-based graphs amCharts provides were more than sufficient. You can embed these into a website, or a security metrics site, while retaining control of the data. Data is formatted in xml (giving more control over the graph) or in a csv format. The simple to use settings files are also in xml, giving you a lot of control around the graph fonts, colors, and forms.

In fact, the most difficult part of using amChart graphs is going to be pulling data in from the various data sources and updating the xml data files. While this is a work in progress, I thought it would be worth sharing this and some quick examples below. I should also mention that PHP scripts exist to pull data from a database and into the correct format. For more information see the amcharts site.

The first chart below is from the amCharts site. Click and drag on a portion of the graph you would like to highlight and try out the scroll bar at the top of the graph. This is helpful for graphs that show trends, yet have granular underlying data that may be hidden. The second pie graph is my gift to Art…and fairly accurate I might add.

Another mention should go out to a fairly new site called Timetric. Timetric allows you to graph data by entering fields manually, uploading a csv or xls file, or pulling data through an api. I did try this out and had some issues in formatting and uploading the data to produce graphs. It would also be obvious that these graphs are stored on a third-party server…something to keep in mind should you plan on using this for any data deemed sensitive. Here is a quick example from the site.