DOT and DOTTY

Background

DOT and DOTTY are graph layout products from AT&T Bell Labs. I (Jim Hoagland) managed to obtain a binary-only no-cost University (site) license for DOT and DOTTY for UC Davis. However, it is no longer needed. Anyone can just pick it up as part of the Graphviz package, courtesy of AT&T.

DOT

DOT is a Unix filter that takes a DOT language file specifying the objects in a directed graph and output a optimal (in some sense) layout of the objects in one of a number of formats including Postscript and Maker Interchange Format (MIF).

These line in a file:
digraph G { a -> b [label="hello", style=dashed]; a -> c [label="world"]; c -> d; b -> c; d -> a; b [shape=Mdiamond, label="this is b"]; c [shape=polygon, sides=5, peripheries=3]; d [style=bold]; }
produced this:
[Dot example]

See the Graphviz Documentation for more details on DOT.
DOTTY
DOTTY is a customizable directed graph editor. It is a X Windows based GUI that is very easy to use. With just a few clicks of the mouse, you can build a graph.
DOTTY is built upon DOT and LEFTY (a customizable picture editor included in the DOT/DOTTY distribution).
See the DOTTY Documentation for more details.

Programs that use DOT and DOTTY

Several are mentioned in the DOT and DOTTY documentation
Several tools in the UCD Visual Audit Browser Tools use DOT.
Mkfunctmap uses DOT to make a map of function calls in a C program and is available free.

Getting Them

Pick them up at graphviz.org.

2 February 2006