Generate Network Graphs for Joomla Sites with NodeXL

If you are interested in visualizing networks on your Joomla website (such as social networks, computers, biological systems, clusters in business groups or industries, etc.), you should look into NodeXL, an impressive open source and free program.

NodeXL is used to visualize and analyze networks and is being developed for a larger audience than those of the more complicated and sometimes obscure scientific social network packages. It has been developed by Microsoft Research and a group of universities. While many other social network programs are difficult to learn and provide poor visualization, NodeXL generates amazing graphs and works directly out of the box if you have Excel 2007 installed on your computer.

NodeXL is basically a template for Excel 2007 (it does not work in openoffice) that adds extra functionality to Excel. The developers deliberately used Excel as a platform because many people are familiar with Excel which lowers the learning curve substantially.

You can easily customize the graph’s appearance; zoom, scale and pan the graph; dynamically filter vertices and edges; alter the graph’s layout; find clusters of related vertices; and calculate a set of graph metrics.

Below are examples of NodeXL graphs with different settings and filters applied. Click on the image to enlarge. You can download the program here.

Example 1:A basic NodeXL graph showing vertex size based on the number of connections with others in the network. The more connections, the larger the vertex. In this example, we use spheres for all actors in the network. The graph is shown in Harel-Koren lay-out.

Example 2:A basic NodeXL graph - the same as above - but with a sub section of the graph selected in red. You can set the color for the selection. The graph is shown in Harel-Koren lay-out.

Example 3:A basic NodeXL graph showing vertex size based on the number of connections with others in the network with the color and the size of the vertex linked to the number of connections. The more connections, the larger the vertex and the more blue a vertex is. In this example, we use spheres for all actors in the network. The graph is shown in Harel-Koren lay-out.

Example 4:A basic NodeXL graph showing vertex size based on the number of connections with others in the network with the color and the size of the vertex linked to the number of connections. The more connections, the larger the vertex and the more blue a vertex is. In addition, we do show labels in the graph and use spheres for all actors in the network.The graph is shown in Harel-Koren lay-out.

Example 5:A basic NodeXL graph showing vertex size based on the number of connections with others in the network with the color and the size of the vertex linked to the number of connections. The more connections, the larger the vertex and the more blue vertex is. In addition, we do show labels in the graph and use spheres for all actors in the network.The graph is shown in Fruchterman-Reingold lay-out.

Example 6:A basic NodeXL graph - the same as above - showing vertex size based on the number of connections with others in the network with the color and the size of the vertex linked to the number of connections. The more connections, the larger the vertex and the more blue a vertex is. In addition, we do show labels in the graph and use spheres for all actors in the network.The graph is shown in Fruchterman-Reingold lay-out and labels are shown.

Example 7:A basic NodeXL graph showing vertex size based on the number of connections with others in the network with the color and the size of the vertex linked to the number of connections. The more connections, the larger the vertex and the more blue a vertex is. Vertexes with 2 links are shown in full color - the others are show in the background. The graph is shown in Harel-Koren lay-out. No labels are shown.

Example 8:A basic NodeXL graph showing vertex size based on the number of connections with others in the network with the color, shape and the size of the vertex linked to the number of connections. The more connections, the larger the vertex and the more blue a vertex is. Vertexes with 2 links are shown in full color - the others are show in the background. The graph is shown in Fruchterman-Reingold lay-out and no labels are shown.

Example 9:A basic NodeXL graph showing vertex size based on the number of connections with others in the network with the color, shape and the size of the vertex linked to the number of connections. The more connections, the larger the vertex and the more blue a vertex is. Vertexes with 2 links are shown in full color - the others are show in the background. The graph is shown in Fruchterman-Reingold lay-out and labels are shown.