Editing Graph drawing (section)

{{Short description|Visualization of node-link graphs}}
{{redirects|Network diagram|network diagrams in specific contexts|#Application-specific graph drawings}}
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[[File:WorldWideWebAroundWikipedia.png|thumb|Graphic representation of a minute fraction of the [[WWW]], demonstrating [[hyperlink]]s.]]

'''Graph drawing''' is an area of [[mathematics]] and [[computer science]] combining methods from [[geometric graph theory]] and [[information visualization]] to derive two-dimensional depictions of [[graph (discrete mathematics)|graph]]s arising from applications such as [[social network analysis]], [[cartography]], [[linguistics]], and [[bioinformatics]].<ref>{{harvtxt|Di Battista|Eades|Tamassia|Tollis|1998}}, pp. vii–viii; {{harvtxt|Herman|Melançon|Marshall|2000}}, Section 1.1, "Typical Application Areas".</ref>

A drawing of a graph or '''network diagram''' is a pictorial representation of the [[vertex (graph theory)|vertices]] and [[edge (graph theory)|edges]] of a graph. This drawing should not be confused with the graph itself: very different layouts can correspond to the same graph.<ref name="dett6">{{harvtxt|Di Battista|Eades|Tamassia|Tollis|1998}}, p. 6.</ref>  In the abstract, all that matters is which pairs of vertices are connected by edges.  In the concrete, however, the arrangement of these vertices and edges within a drawing affects its understandability, usability, fabrication cost, and [[aesthetics]].<ref name="dett-viii"/> The problem gets worse if the graph changes over time by adding and deleting edges (dynamic graph drawing) and the goal is to preserve the user's mental map.{{sfnp|Misue|Eades|Lai|Sugiyama|1995}}