Your first chart and report in 5 minutes

RavingDesk runs in your browser. Next to the paper-trading desks it has a Data & charts section for your own tables. Your desk is saved automatically on this device (IndexedDB); data only leaves the browser when you run a tool step, and then only for that one calculation.

1. Open the workspace

Click Launch RavingDesk and choose Data start under Data & charts in the desk list. It shows four ways in: Paste or import data, Fetch public data, Use your desk data and Open a project file, followed by the Data & chart examples. Desks you worked on earlier are under File → Recent desks…. A small tip box explains the idea; close it with the × when you no longer need it.

2. Bring in a table

Choose Paste or import data. Paste a table with a header row — straight from Excel, Google Sheets or a CSV file:

Month,Region,Revenue,Orders
2026-01,North,12400,310
2026-01,South,9800,250
2026-02,North,13900,342
2026-02,South,10150,262

The preview below the text box shows how RavingDesk read it: 4 rows, 4 columns detected, and a chip per column — Month: date, Region: text, Revenue: number, Orders: number. Give the dataset a name and press Import.

The dataset opens with a card per column (filled cells, distinct values, range, mean and a small sparkline) and the rows below. Use Filter and Sort by to look around; Save as new dataset keeps exactly the rows you see.

3. Draw a chart

Press Add a step… and choose Local chart under Charts and diagrams. The chart appears immediately. In Settings:

• Chart type: Stacked bar
• X axis: Month
• Values (Y): tick Revenue
• Split into series by: Region

Every change redraws the preview. Below it, Findings say in plain words what the chart shows (highest and lowest value, change from first to last). SVG, PNG and CSV download the chart and the data behind it.

4. Add an analysis

Add a second step: A/B test. Set Value column to Revenue, Group column to Region, Group A to North and Group B to South, then press Run. RavingDesk sends the two groups to the Probability & Statistics Studio and shows the p-value, the estimated difference with its confidence interval and the effect size — plus a sentence such as “The difference between A and B is statistically significant” or “No statistically significant difference”.

With only a handful of rows a test rarely becomes significant; that is the honest answer, not a bug.

5. Open the report

Open the Data report desk (or press R). Write a short Introduction and Conclusion. The report collects the Key findings of all steps, every chart and every result. Print / save as PDF prints only the report; Download HTML saves a single self-contained file you can e-mail or put on an intranet.

What next?

• File → Save workspace file writes a .ravingdesk.json file with the whole desk, data included; File → Share link… creates a link with your data and steps (step results are not included — the recipient presses Run all).
• Open the example Regional sales dashboard to see a finished version of this tutorial.