Graph visualization
From YYiki
There are several visualization methods. For example, you can visualize the adjacency matrix or visualize nodes and links directly (node-link diagram). Node-link diagrams are in general more beautiful but they are not necessarily the best method.
Contents |
Tools
Web
- D3 - When you want to draw graphs on the web.
- sigma.js - http://sigmajs.org/
Desktop
- BioFabric
- Cytoscape - Better than Pajek. Probably one of the best solutions to draw a standard 2D graph figure. Still it is painful to use.
- Gephi - has cool demos but hard to use.
- Gource - visualizing revision control system log
- Graphviz - It produces a very nice layout for small graphs (especially directional ones), but cannot draw large graphs effectively.
- NodeBox - Python library
- Pajek - Once standard, now maybe outdated. You can produce nice figures if you spend a lot of time though.
- Processing - If you are familiar with processing/Java, probably one of the best ways to draw a product-quality graph visualization.
- Tulip (software)
- Ubigraph - cool, but no way to export the results.
- Walrus
Dynamic network
File formats
- .dot: developed by Graphviz project. Simple. OmniGraffle can read it.
- .net (pajek)
- edgelist: probably the simplest and the most common format. You list edges (nodefrom and nodeto) with a separator (e.g. a tab)
Links
- geometry in action: Graph Drawing
- A Visual Survey of Tree Visualization
- http://skyeome.net/projects/networkChart/comparison.html - web-based graph visualization tool comparison
Articles
- Graphs Beyond the Hairball
- http://flowingdata.com/2012/08/02/how-to-make-an-interactive-network-visualization/
Examples
- http://somelab.net/2012/11/how-to-create-a-network-animation-with-r-and-the-igraph-package/
- https://www.youtube.com/user/Gource
- http://markov.uc3m.es/2012/11/temporal-networks-with-igraph-and-r-with-20-lines-of-code/
- http://markov.uc3m.es/2012/10/temporal-network-of-information-diffusion-in-twitter/
