Hierarchical Cyclic layout

The Hierarchical Cyclic layout is a flow aimed layout manipulating especially cyclic graphs and targeting graphs embedding a flow logic (like Process models). The aim of this layout is to show a flow chart having some cycles with a relevant level arrangement and a minimum edges crossing.

Nodes are laid by levels internally computed according to the in and out edges. The position of each node in its level is computed using a algorithmic approach minimizing in/out edge crossings.

In this Layout, some features can be used to perform some advanced visualization requests :

• levels distance (verticalSpacing) : controlling levels spacing for advanced compactness control;
• siblings distance (horizontalSpacing) : controlling levels spacing for advanced compactness control;
• nodes overlapping avoidance policies;
• flow direction : controlling flow direction of the Flow Graph (Top to Bottom, Bottom to Top, Right to Left, Left to Right)
• edges drawing (edgeDrawing) : customizing edges rendering and shapes(straight, straight polyline, curved polyline, orthogonal polyline and curved polyline). Edges are arranges in a way that they still be visible when moving to more that 1 level;
• Edges Anchoring (edgesFromCenter): The edges can start from the center of the node, or you can make them start at the side of the node.

The Hierarchical Cyclic Layout is used for some UML representations (Class Diagram, Data Flow, State Machine..), metabolic pathways, model process and many others.

Projects using this layout : Visualizer and Diagrammer