Plotting method for 'netify' objects

This function provides a comprehensive tool to visualize 'netify' objects through various graphical representations including points, edges, texts, and labels. It leverages the capabilities of the 'igraph' and 'ggplot' packages to create customizable network visualizations.

Usage

# S3 method for class 'netify'
plot(x, ...)

Arguments

x

A 'netify' object, which contains the network data structured for analysis and visualization.

...

Additional arguments, which can include but are not limited to: - point_layout: Optional, user-provided node layout; if not provided, layout will be generated based on layout parameter. - layout: Specifies the layout algorithm from 'igraph' to position the nodes if point_layout is not provided. Available options include "nicely", "fruchterman.reingold", "kamada.kawai", "random", "circle", "star", "grid", "graphopt", "sugiyama", "drl", "lgl", "bipartite", "tree", "randomly", "dh", "fr", "kk", "gem", and "mds". - remove_isolates: Logical; if TRUE, isolates will be removed from the plot. Default is TRUE. - static_actor_positions Logical indicating whether to use static positions for actors. Useful in longitudinal studies where node positions should remain consistent over time. If TRUE, the layout by default is calculated based on a collapsed adjacency matrix across all time points. Users can also specify a specific time point to use as the static layout by setting which_static to the desired time point. - add_edges: Logical; if TRUE, edges will be added to the plot. Default is TRUE. - curve_edges: Logical; if TRUE, edges will be curved. Default is FALSE. - add_points: Logical; if TRUE, points (nodes) will be plotted. Default is TRUE. - add_text: Logical; if TRUE, text annotations will be added. Default is FALSE. - add_label: Logical; if TRUE, labels will be added. Default is FALSE. - select_text: A vector of node names to specifically add text to; others will not have text. - select_label: A vector of node names to specifically add labels to; others will not have labels. - point_size: A fixed size for all points, equivalent to geom_point(size = point_size) in ggplot2. - point_size_var: A variable from the node data to dynamically size points, equivalent to geom_point(aes(size = point_size_var)) in ggplot2. These arguments control various aspects of the plot's appearance and functionality.

Value

A 'ggplot' plot object that can be further modified or printed.

Details

plot.netify creates a network plot with flexible options for customization. It allows the user to specify:

• Whether or not to include edges and how they are rendered (straight or curved).

• Whether nodes are displayed as points.

• Whether to annotate nodes with text or labels.

• Specific nodes to annotate, allowing selective emphasis within the network.

• Custom layouts if the automatic placement does not suffice. Additional customization options like point_size and point_size_var allow users to apply typical ggplot2 methods directly to network visualizations, facilitating easy integration of familiar graphical adjustments.

Author

Cassy Dorff, Shahryar Minhas

Examples

# load icews data
data(icews)

# choose attributes
nvars = c( 'i_polity2', 'i_log_gdp', 'i_log_pop' )
dvars = c( 'matlCoop', 'verbConf', 'matlConf' )

# create a netify object
netlet = netify(
    dyad_data=icews, actor1='i', actor2='j',
    time = 'year',
    symmetric=FALSE, weight='verbCoop',
    mode='unipartite', sum_dyads=FALSE,
    actor_time_uniform=TRUE, actor_pds=NULL,
    diag_to_NA=TRUE, missing_to_zero=TRUE,
    nodal_vars = nvars, 
    dyad_vars = dvars
)

# add basic summary network stats
netlet = add_nodal(
    netlet, 
    summary_actor(netlet),
    actor='actor', time='time')

# plot the network
plot(netlet, 
     edge_color='lightgrey', 
     point_size_var = 'degree_total',
     point_color_var = 'i_polity2'
     )