Laravel Custom Chart

The core idea was simple: a Laravel developer should be able to pass an Eloquent model into one helper and receive the data structure needed for a dashboard chart. Instead of mixing grouping, aggregation, date formatting, and comparison math into controllers, the package keeps that work inside a reusable class.

CustomChart::create(...) accepts the model class, title, aggregate function, aggregate field, interval count, interval type, total toggle, and date format. That gave the package enough control for common dashboard needs while keeping the call small enough to use directly in a controller or service.

Records are sorted by created_at, grouped through Carbon by day, week, month, or year, and then reduced with the selected aggregate. For count charts the package can count rows; for financial or operational charts it can sum or average a chosen numeric field.

A chart should not skip a date just because there were no matching records. The package builds the expected timeline with CarbonPeriod and fills absent intervals with zero. That makes the output easier to feed into chart libraries because the x-axis stays stable.

This was an early package-building project, and it shows the way I was learning to separate reusable Laravel behavior from one-off application code. The code is compact, but the intent is practical: turn a repeated dashboard need into a Composer package with clear inputs, predictable output, and Laravel auto-discovery.