Graphics Reference
In-Depth Information
Graph Data File Formats
Once data has been collected and connected, most graph analysis
applications will need some way to input the graph data. Although
specialized graph databases are available, in many business-analysis and
smaller data-science applications, simple data files can be used to exchange
graph data between graph applications.
As with many things in the fields of computer software and data, more
than one file format is available for graph data. Some of the more common
techniques are discussed in the following sections. A number of the
supplementary examples on this topic's companion website are provided in
multiple formats. A few of the examples (such as
Trade
and
CPI
) include
sample spreadsheets that provide examples of preparing data for different
file formats on successive worksheets.
Warning
Most graph software only supports a few file types, may not support all
fields, and may have other issues, such as requiring specific names for
some columns. Some experimentation with data preparation and data
formats likely will be required.
CSV Files
A simple way to deal with graph file formats is to create two separate
files—one file of nodes and one file of links—both of which are in a
Comma
Separated Value
(
CSV
) format. These files are identified with a
.csv
extension. Following are a couple of examples:
Nodes.csv:
Person, Number_of_Emails, Total_kb, Most_Recent_Date
"Ann", 1, 2048, "10/31/2014"
"Ben", 4, 7687, "12/09/2014"
"Tim", 2, 102, "11/18/2014"
"Zoe", 3, 4292, "12/09/2014"
Links.csv:
NodeA, NodeB, Number_of_Msgs
"Ann", "Ben", 1
"Ben", "Tim", 2
