Forcing charts with common columns to display colors consistantly
 

Novice poster using Excel 2k on Win2k:

I wish to force Excel to use the same color for the same
data-item (column) across multiple charts - even multiple
workbooks consistantly.

Some of the charts diplay top n or bottom n, therefore it
is impossible know which colors should be used.

My spreadsheet makes serial stored procedure calls to a
SQL Server and then stores the returned data on a hidden
sheet until the process is re-run for a different
parameter set.

My thought was to loop through the ChartObjects/the
SeriesCollection/PointsCollection and then pass the
Point "Name/Caption" to a function and return the correct
(user defined color) for that data item.

Whilst my code may not be perfect it is performing the
nested loops as described - Why can I not access the
Point 'Name' i.e. the column name on a column type chart?

This is irritating as the information is presented to me
when ever I hover the cursor over the chart column.

I am currently achieving the same effect by using the
value of a hidden data-label but its not neat!

Is my approch misguided or am I missing something?

Regards

Kieran Hayes