# \[RFC\] Interactive Visualization and Explorer Tool **URL:** \ **Category:** Graphing Capabilities\ **Created:** [May 8, 2020, 7:04am UTC](https://org-roam.discourse.group/t/rfc-interactive-visualization-and-explorer-tool/87 "2020-05-08T07:04:43Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Memex](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5e9695/32.png) [@Memex](https://org-roam.discourse.group/u/Memex)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2020, 7:04am UTC](https://org-roam.discourse.group/t/rfc-interactive-visualization-and-explorer-tool/87/1 "2020-05-08T07:04:43Z")
Few weeks ago I started to build an interactive graph visualizer and integrated note browser (see a demo [here](https://orgroam.slack.com/archives/CV20S23C0/p1588161804087200?thread_ts=1587141004.382000&cid=CV20S23C0)). At first it was just a personal project and curiosity. However, the community showed appreciation and interest in the tool, and graphing capabilities of org-roam became a central discussion topic with many ingenious proposals. Right now I think it is a good idea to consider building it at full scale, and that’s why I need your comments on a few things. ### Architecture There are a few possible ways to organize the codebase. At its core, what I am doing is just taking a JSON file (relationships between nodes and edges) and some HTML files (org-publish of the entire org-roam directory) and displaying them in a webpage using a http-server. Now, I think this much should be a package separated from org-roam (primarily because this is not written in Elisp). However, I am not sure what to do about the conversion of the SQL database to a JSON file part. This can be done in any language (and to do it incrementally, I think we should do it from Emacs, but I am not sure about scalability and performance). If we are doing it in Emacs using Elisp, should this be part of `org-roam` codebase? If not using Elisp, what other option do we have? Also, as I am displaying backlinks below each file in the note browser, `org-publish` needs to be force called on file X each time I reference file X in any other file. I am not sure if this will cause performance issues since AFAIK `org-publish` is synchronous in nature. Would love to know if someone has a better idea. ### Modularity and Other Graphing Features Clustering and centrality measures seem to be the most sought after features. I think it is possible to achieve these using something like igraph where we add extra information in the JSON file. However, I am not sure if this can be done incrementally, as it would most possibly require computation using the entire database (which is compute-expensive). What are our options then? ### Packaging Right now, I am using a shell script that generates the JSON database and starts an http-server. This is complicated to setup cause you have to manually modify some parts of your Emacs dotfile as well. What would be the most user-friendly option for packaging this entire thing? I welcome all of your comments, questions, and suggestions. ---
**Author:** ![jethro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/b5a626/32.png) [@jethro](https://org-roam.discourse.group/u/jethro)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2020, 7:15am UTC](https://org-roam.discourse.group/t/rfc-interactive-visualization-and-explorer-tool/87/2 "2020-05-08T07:15:49Z")
> [@Memex](#): > > Now, I think this much should be a package separated from org-roam (primarily because this is not written in Elisp). This is fine, we’ll be rearchitecting Org-roam in a way that should help with integration with other graphing backends. > [@Memex](#): > > However, I am not sure what to do about the conversion of the SQL database to a JSON file part. This can be done in any language (and to do it incrementally, I think we should do it from Emacs, but I am not sure about scalability and performance). If we are doing it in Emacs using Elisp, should this be part of `org-roam` codebase? If not using Elisp, what other option do we have? We should have JSON output from within Org-roam, it’s not too big an issue, will at least be as performant as the current graphviz output. > [@Memex](#): > > Also, as I am displaying backlinks below each file in the note browser, `org-publish` needs to be force called on file X each time I reference file X in any other file. I am not sure if this will cause performance issues since AFAIK `org-publish` is synchronous in nature. Would love to know if someone has a better idea. This is probably not a good idea. You can use Emacs to run a batch script to run `org-publish` instead, rather than blocking the main Emacs instance. By the way, there’s a graphing server already open-sourced in the wild: [GitHub - org-roam/org-roam-server: A Web Application to Visualize the Org-Roam Database](https://github.com/goktug97/org-roam-server/) I think an exchange of ideas/collaboration on this front could be fruitful. ---
**Author:** ![tecosaur](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/free1/user_avatar/org-roam.discourse.group/tecosaur/32/9_2.png) [@tecosaur](https://org-roam.discourse.group/u/tecosaur)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2020, 7:29am UTC](https://org-roam.discourse.group/t/rfc-interactive-visualization-and-explorer-tool/87/3 "2020-05-08T07:29:00Z")
A quick question from me, @Memex why couldn’t a standalone HTML file work? We can run scripts, fetch local files, etc. ---
**Author:** ![Memex](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5e9695/32.png) [@Memex](https://org-roam.discourse.group/u/Memex)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2020, 8:30am UTC](https://org-roam.discourse.group/t/rfc-interactive-visualization-and-explorer-tool/87/4 "2020-05-08T08:30:00Z")
@tecosaur I am not an expert in web development but seems like loading other HTML files in an iframe is much easier using a server. @jethro Wow. This project makes me question whether I should continue with my efforts or not. While I can think of some reasons why even having two different implementations of graphing would be a good idea, I’m not sure if net productivity would be worth that. ---
**Author:** ![tecosaur](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/free1/user_avatar/org-roam.discourse.group/tecosaur/32/9_2.png) [@tecosaur](https://org-roam.discourse.group/u/tecosaur)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2020, 9:00am UTC](https://org-roam.discourse.group/t/rfc-interactive-visualization-and-explorer-tool/87/5 "2020-05-08T09:00:54Z")
> [@jethro](#): > > By the way, there’s a graphing server already open-sourced in the wild: [GitHub - org-roam/org-roam-server: A Web Application to Visualize the Org-Roam Database](https://github.com/goktug97/org-roam-server/) This looks great! I’m always a fan of extending a good existing solution (when one exists) over doing everything from scratch 😃 ---
**Author:** ![mpick](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@mpick](https://org-roam.discourse.group/u/mpick)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2020, 4:16pm UTC](https://org-roam.discourse.group/t/rfc-interactive-visualization-and-explorer-tool/87/6 "2020-05-10T16:16:58Z")
Maybe this could go into #dev:graph ? Just adding to the conversation : it seems like [Obsidian](https://obsidian.md/) beta uses G6 or similar. It’s beautiful, interactive, useful. They make the node size proportional to the number of links to/from other nodes, and it seems to work well. Clicking a node title simply opens it for now. ![Obsidian_graph](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/free1/uploads/orgroam/original/1X/6c123bb6074aa304ad3a796b9a069c205ad4b8db.png) When the mouse hovers over a node title : ![Obsidian_graph_hover](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/free1/uploads/orgroam/original/1X/f75908ea8390874ee31f4b49094dc6697e553ef0.png) ---
**Author:** ![mpick](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@mpick](https://org-roam.discourse.group/u/mpick)\ **Post date:** [May 14, 2020, 2:13pm UTC](https://org-roam.discourse.group/t/rfc-interactive-visualization-and-explorer-tool/87/7 "2020-05-14T14:13:55Z")
Edit : from a discussion in Obsidian’s Discord, it’s [https://d3js.org/](https://d3js.org/) not G6.