This document presents key elements and the philosophy of the control chart approach, and identifies a wide variety of control charts (including those related to the Shewhart control chart, those stressing process acceptance or online process adjustment, and specialized control charts).

It presents an overview of the basic principles and concepts of control charts and illustrates the relationship among various control chart approaches to aid in the selection of the most appropriate part of ISO 7870 for given circumstances. It does not specify statistical control methods using control charts. These methods are specified in the relevant parts of ISO 7870.