About yFiles for HTML

The most common tasks to be performed with graphs boil down to a handful of things:

• visualization
• (interactive) creation and editing
• automatic element arrangement, i.e., automatic graph layout
• structural analysis
• persistence and image export

Visualization is the task of actually generating a visual representation of an existing graph. Note that this does not necessarily mean the creation of a static picture, but more generally describes forms of representation that could also allow interaction.

The item (interactive) creation and editing means interacting with a graph like creating nodes and connecting them with edges, adding further elements to an existing graph, or removing elements from an existing graph.

Automatic element arrangement or automatic graph layout, as we call it, is the creation of high-quality, easy-to-understand drawings of a graph to help in communicating information more quickly.

Structural analysis means solving advanced questions that relate to a graph structure, for instance, determining the shortest path between two nodes.

Persistence as well as image export and printing support are often summarized under the term input and output, I/O for short. Persistence means serializing the diagram (preferably together with all related data) and storage to a permanent medium. Image export and printing are also common tasks for storing and presenting the visual information of a diagram.

The yFiles for HTML diagramming library supports your application with state-of-the-art automatic graph layout, highly efficient implementations of advanced graph analysis algorithms, and excellent graph visualization and interaction capabilities. yFiles for HTML is something like a Swiss Army knife that:

• Helps the professional JavaScript programmer building high-quality, graph structure related applications.
• Helps the serious graph worker realizing demanding projects in the JavaScript programming language.