This may be helpful:
http://69.24.73.172/scirra/wiki/index.php?title=Events
If you insert any object, it won't do much if you don't set up some events to modify it (or python scripting).
In this case, Bar Chart displays an empty chart when inserted. To make it load data.txt, I created a Start of Layout condition, so when you open this layout data.txt is loaded. You could simply insert the bars using the Insert Bar action with preset data, or data from another source.
Text Manipulator is another plugin which performs handy operations on strings. In the sub event for Start of Layout I use a loop to add as many bars as there are items in data.txt; the code is admittedly nontrivial especially if you haven't done much string parsing.
TextManipulator2.GetSubstring(";", 0)[/code:1mg7qowh]
This expression extracts the text before the first instance of a ';' in a string.
If we take:
[code:1mg7qowh]10;Item 1;233;11;11[/code:1mg7qowh]
This will be 10.
[code:1mg7qowh]TextManipulator2.GetSubstring(";", 1)[/code:1mg7qowh]
Will return 'Item 1', the name of the bar.
If you have further questions, feel free to ask.