Layout metrics for Euler diagrams

We present an aesthetics based method for drawing Euler diagrams. Aesthetic layout metrics have been found to be useful in graph drawing algorithms, which use metrics motivated by aesthetic principles that aid user understanding of diagrams. We have taken a similar approach to Euler diagram drawing,...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Flower, J., Rodgers, P., Mutton, P.
Format: Conference Proceeding
Language:English
Subjects:
Concrete
Councils
Data visualization
Engineering drawings
Java
Set theory
Smoothing methods
Software engineering
Software tools
Unified modeling language
Online Access:Request full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:We present an aesthetics based method for drawing Euler diagrams. Aesthetic layout metrics have been found to be useful in graph drawing algorithms, which use metrics motivated by aesthetic principles that aid user understanding of diagrams. We have taken a similar approach to Euler diagram drawing, and have defined a set of suitable metrics to be used within a hill climbing multicriteria optimiser to produce "good" drawings. There are added difficulties when drawing Euler diagrams as they are made up of contours whose structural properties of intersection and containment must be preserved under any layout improvements. We describe our Java implementation of a pair of hill climbing variants to find good drawings, a set of metrics that measure aesthetics for good diagram layout, and issues concerning the choice of weightings for a useful combination of the metrics.
DOI:10.1109/IV.2003.1217990