tikz-network - A tool to visualize complex networks in LaTeX.

Summary

tikz-network is an open source software project for visualizing graphs and networks in LaTeX. It aims to provide a simple and easy tool to create, visualize and modify complex networks. The packaged is based on the PGF/TikZ languages for producing vector graphics from a geometric/algebraic description. Particular focus is made on the software usability and interoperability with other tools. Simple networks can be directly created within LaTeX, while more complex networks can be imported from external sources (e.g. igraph, networkx, QGIS, ...). Additionally, tikz-network supports visualization of multilayer networks in two and three dimensions.

Purpose

In recent years, complex network theory becomes more and more popular within the scientific community. Besides a solid mathematical base on which these theories are built on, a visual representation of the networks allow communicating complex relationships to a broad audience.

Nowadays, a variety of great visualization tools are available, which helps to structure, filter, manipulate and of course to visualize the networks. However, they come with some limitations, including the need for specific software tools, difficulties to embed the outputs properly in a LaTeX file (e.g. font type, font size, additional equations and math symbols needed,...) and challenges in the post-processing of the graphs, without rerunning the software tools again.

In order to overcome this issues, the package tikz-network was created. Since LaTeX is a standard for scientific publications and widely used, there is a high chance that users are already familiar with the syntax and the structure of this language. Beside LaTeX, no other software tool is needed. The commands of tikz-network are kept simple but allow a high control over the produced output. Post-processing of the network (e.g. adding drawings, images, texts, equations,...) can be done easily, due to the compatibility with PGF/TikZ (Tantau 2015). Also, the embedding of the network visualization into the LaTeX-environment enables the use of the fonts, font sizes, mathematical symbols, hyperlinks, references,..., as used in the document. Additional features are the three-dimensional visualization of (multilayer) networks, and the compatible with other layout and visualization tools (e.g. igraph, netwrokx, QGIS, ...).

Additional information and examples

• The usage of the package is documented in the manual (arXiv).
• The current developer version of the package is available on GitHub.
• There, also additional (more complex) examples can be found.
• To convert networks from Python into TikZ an API for the package is available under https://pypi.org/project/network2tikz/ or https://github.com/hackl/network2tikz

License

Copyright (c) 2019 Juergen Hackl

This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.

This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details.

You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with this program. If not, see http://www.gnu.org/licenses/.