Increase space for long axis labels in radar chart - r

Question

I want to create a radar chart with ggirahExtra::ggRadar. The problem is that I have long labels and they are clipped. I thought I could create more space between label and plot by adding margin = margin(0,0,2,0, "cm") to element_text in axis.text, but its not working.
Any ideas how to increase the label space are welcome (apart from making the font smaller).
Add: As #tjebo suggests in the comments, it might be easier, or maybe the only way to make it work, to change the underlying functions in ggRadar especially coord_radar. Any suggestions of how to do this are welcome.
library(ggplot2)
library(ggiraphExtra)
dat <- data.frame("Item_A_Long" = 2,
"Item_B_Very_Very_Long"= 0,
"Label_Item_C" = 1,
"Item_D_Label" = 4,
"Another_very_long_label" = 3)
ggRadar(dat,
aes(
x = c(Item_A_Long,
Item_B_Very_Very_Long,
Label_Item_C,
Item_D_Label,
Another_very_long_label)
),
legend.position = "top",
colour = "white",
rescale = FALSE,
use.label = FALSE
) +
scale_y_continuous(expand = c(0,0),
limits = c(0,4)
) +
theme(panel.background = element_rect(fill = "#001957"),
# adding margin = margin(0,0,2,0, "cm") to element_text below does not help
axis.text = element_text(color = "#FFFFFF"),
panel.grid.major.y = element_blank())
Created on 2021-04-30 by the reprex package (v0.3.0)

Answer 1

It's a matter of clipping. The problem is also the white standard background of your drawing device. Below a hacky workaround.
turn off clipping with a modified version of ggiraphExtra::coord_radar as well as ggiraphExtra::ggRadar. Note I have removed a (very) few bits from the original ggRadar function, so if you need all arguments, you'd need to modify the function yourself.
Turn all background elements blue
Superimpose all onto a pure blue background, I am using cowplot.
library(cowplot)
library(ggplot2)
p1 <- ggRadar2(dat,
aes(
x = c(
Item_A_Long,
Item_B_Very_Very_Long,
Label_Item_C,
Item_D_Label,
Another_very_long_label
)
),
colour = "white",
rescale = FALSE,
clip = "off"
) +
theme(
plot.background = element_rect(fill = "#001957", color = "#001957"),
panel.background = element_rect(fill = "#001957"),
# adding margin = margin(0,0,2,0, "cm") to element_text below does not help
axis.text = element_text(color = "#FFFFFF"),
panel.grid.major.y = element_blank()
)
p2 <-
ggplot() +
theme_void()+
theme(panel.background = element_rect(fill = "#001957"))
ggdraw(p2) + draw_plot(p1)
the modified functions
coord_radar2 <- function(theta = "x", start = 0, direction = 1, clip = "off") {
theta <- match.arg(theta, c("x", "y"))
r <- if (theta == "x") {
"y"
} else {
"x"
}
ggproto("CoordRadar", ggplot2::CoordPolar,
theta = theta,
r = r, start = start, clip = clip,
direction = sign(direction), is_linear = function(coord) TRUE
)
}
ggRadar2 <- function(data, mapping = NULL, rescale = TRUE, legend.position = "top",
colour = "red", alpha = 0.3, size = 3, ylim = NULL, scales = "fixed",
use.label = FALSE, interactive = FALSE, clip = "off", ...) {
data <- as.data.frame(data)
(groupname <- setdiff(names(mapping), c("x", "y")))
groupname
mapping
length(groupname)
if (length(groupname) == 0) {
groupvar <- NULL
}
else {
groupvar <- ggiraphExtra:::getMapping(mapping, groupname)
}
groupvar
facetname <- colorname <- NULL
if ("facet" %in% names(mapping)) {
facetname <- ggiraphExtra:::getMapping(mapping, "facet")
}
(colorname <- setdiff(groupvar, facetname))
if ((length(colorname) == 0) & !is.null(facetname)) {
colorname <- facetname
}
data <- ggiraphExtra:::num2factorDf(data, groupvar)
(select <- sapply(data, is.numeric))
if ("x" %in% names(mapping)) {
xvars <- ggiraphExtra:::getMapping(mapping, "x")
xvars
if (length(xvars) < 3) {
warning("At least three variables are required")
}
}
else {
xvars <- colnames(data)[select]
}
(xvars <- setdiff(xvars, groupvar))
if (rescale) {
data <- ggiraphExtra:::rescale_df(data, groupvar)
}
temp <- sjlabelled::get_label(data)
cols <- ifelse(temp == "", colnames(data), temp)
if (is.null(groupvar)) {
id <- ggiraphExtra:::newColName(data)
data[[id]] <- 1
longdf <- reshape2::melt(data, id.vars = id, measure.vars = xvars)
}
else {
cols <- setdiff(cols, groupvar)
longdf <- reshape2::melt(data, id.vars = groupvar, measure.vars = xvars)
}
temp <- paste0("plyr::ddply(longdf,c(groupvar,'variable'), dplyr::summarize,mean=mean(value,na.rm=TRUE))")
df <- eval(parse(text = temp))
colnames(df)[length(df)] <- "value"
df
groupvar
if (is.null(groupvar)) {
id2 <- ggiraphExtra:::newColName(df)
df[[id2]] <- "all"
id3 <- ggiraphExtra:::newColName(df)
df[[id3]] <- 1:nrow(df)
df$tooltip <- paste0(df$variable, "=", round(
df$value,
1
))
df$tooltip2 <- paste0("all")
p <- ggplot(data = df, aes_string(
x = "variable", y = "value",
group = 1
)) +
ggiraph::geom_polygon_interactive(aes_string(tooltip = "tooltip2"),
colour = colour, fill = colour, alpha = alpha
) +
ggiraph::geom_point_interactive(aes_string(
data_id = id3,
tooltip = "tooltip"
), colour = colour, size = size)
}
else {
if (!is.null(colorname)) {
id2 <- ggiraphExtra:::newColName(df)
df[[id2]] <- df[[colorname]]
}
id3 <- ggiraphExtra:::newColName(df)
df[[id3]] <- 1:nrow(df)
df$tooltip <- paste0(
groupvar, "=", df[[colorname]], "<br>",
df$variable, "=", round(df$value, 1)
)
df$tooltip2 <- paste0(groupvar, "=", df[[colorname]])
p <- ggplot(data = df, aes_string(
x = "variable", y = "value",
colour = colorname, fill = colorname, group = colorname
)) +
ggiraph::geom_polygon_interactive(aes_string(tooltip = "tooltip2"),
alpha = alpha
) +
ggiraph::geom_point_interactive(aes_string(
data_id = id3,
tooltip = "tooltip"
), size = size)
}
p
if (!is.null(facetname)) {
formula1 <- as.formula(paste0("~", facetname))
p <- p + facet_wrap(formula1, scales = scales)
}
p <- p + xlab("") + ylab("") + theme(legend.position = legend.position)
p <- p + coord_radar2(clip = clip)
if (!is.null(ylim)) {
p <- p + expand_limits(y = ylim)
}
p
p
}

Answer 2

You can use the labelled package to create labels with line breaks and then set label = TRUE in ggRadar(). You can add more than one break for super long labels.
library(ggplot2)
library(ggiraphExtra)
library(labelled)
dat <- data.frame("Item_A_Long" = 2,
"Item_B_Very_Very_Long"= 0,
"Label_Item_C" = 1,
"Item_D_Label" = 4,
"Another_very_long_label" = 3)
var_label(dat$Item_A_Long ) <- "Item \nA long"
var_label(dat$Item_B_Very_Very_Long ) <- "Item_B_\nVery_\nVery_Long"
var_label(dat$Label_Item_C ) <- "Label_\nItem_C "
var_label(dat$Item_D_Label ) <- "Item_\nD_Label"
var_label(dat$Another_very_long_label ) <- "Another_very_\nlong_label"
ggRadar(dat,
aes(
x = c(Item_A_Long,
Item_B_Very_Very_Long,
Label_Item_C,
Item_D_Label,
Another_very_long_label)
),
legend.position = "top",
colour = "white",
rescale = FALSE,
use.label = TRUE
) +
scale_y_continuous(expand = c(0,0),
limits = c(0,4)
) +
theme(panel.background = element_rect(fill = "#001957"),
# adding margin = margin(0,0,2,0, "cm") to element_text below does not help
axis.text = element_text(color = "#FFFFFF"),
panel.grid.major.y = element_blank())