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World Entity Graph

A complete guide to understanding and rearranging entity graphs in study room Worlds.

What is the Entity Graph?

The Entity Graph is a visual map of all the people, places, events, objects, and concepts in your study room's World. Every node (circle/box) represents an entity — a character, a location, a timeline event, an object, or a piece of context. Every edge (line/arrow) represents a relationship between two entities.

Think of it as a detective's corkboard — you pin up everyone and everything involved in your investigation, then draw strings between them to show how they connect. The graph makes those connections visible at a glance.

Key concepts

Entity (Node)
A person, place, event, object, or concept in your World. Each entity has a type — Character, Place, Timeline, Object, or Context.
Relation (Edge)
A connection between two entities — e.g., “works at”, “lives in”, “married to”, “owns”. Relations can be directional (arrow) or mutual (line).
Confidence
How sure you are about an entity or relation (1–5). Thicker borders = higher confidence. Useful for investigations where some facts are certain and others are speculation.
World vs. Room
A Worldis a standalone knowledge base (e.g., “Biography of Albert Einstein”). A Study Roomcan link to a World to bring its entities into the room's graph. Linked entities appear with a dashed border and open in the Notaepedia when clicked.

Reading the Graph

Node colors

  • 🔵 Characters — people in your World
  • 🟢 Places — locations, buildings, regions
  • 🟣 Timeline — events, dates, milestones
  • 🟠 Objects — evidence, items, artifacts
  • ⚪ Context — background info, sources

Edge styles

  • — Solid line — a confirmed relation
  • - - Dashed line — a theory edge (speculative)
  • → Arrow — a directional relation (A → B)
  • Thickness — reflects confidence level
💡 Tip: Click any node to open its detail page. Hold Shift and click multiple nodes to select them. Right-click any node for a context menu with quick actions.

Layout Presets — Rearranging Your Graph

Below the graph, you'll find a layout toolbar with preset buttons. Each preset arranges nodes differently — click any button to instantly reorganise your graph. Positions are automatically saved.

◉

Circle

Types arranged around a ring. Within each type, nodes form a mini-circle. Best for balanced overviews.

≡

Row

Each type gets its own horizontal band — CHARACTER row at the top, PLACE below, etc. Best for left-to-right reading.

‖

Column

Each type gets its own vertical column. Best for tall viewports and timeline-heavy Worlds.

⟐

Force

A physics simulation — connected nodes attract, all nodes repel. Best for seeing clusters and isolated nodes.

⊙

Radial

All nodes radiate outward from the most-connected entity. Best for understanding centrality.

↧

Tree

Hierarchical layout using dagre — nodes are layered by connection direction. Best for directed graphs and chains of relations.

💡 Tip: Click Reset to return to the default Circle layout at any time. Your manual drag positions are always saved — the presets are non-destructive.

Collapse & Select-All

The legend below the graph has two powerful tools for managing large Worlds with many entities.

Collapse (⊟)

Click the ⊟ button next to any type label (e.g., Character ⊟) to collapse all nodes of that type into a single group node. The group node shows the count — e.g., “Character (47 nodes collapsed).” Click the group node (or ⊞ in the legend) to expand them back.

Useful when you want to focus on one category at a time — collapse Places to inspect only Characters and their relations.

Select-All

Click the colored swatch next to any type label to select all nodes of that type at once. This is the foundation for alignment tools — select all Characters, then use the context menu to align them in a row.

Right-Click Context Menu

Right-click any node to open a context menu with quick actions. The menu adapts based on what you clicked and what's selected.

Open entityNavigates to the entity's detail page. For linked World entities, opens in Notaepedia.
Open in NotaepediaFor linked World entities — opens the Notaepedia article for that entity.
Open task / Open in bookshelfFor task nodes and bookshelf items — navigates to the appropriate page.
Select all of this typeSelects every node of the same type (e.g., all Characters).
Collapse / expand this typeToggles the collapse state for the entity's type.
Align / Distribute / ArrangeWhen 2+ nodes are selected, shows alignment tools — align left/center/right, distribute, arrange in row/column/grid.
Deselect allClears the current selection.

Selection Alignment Tools

When you select 2 or more nodes (hold Shift and click), the context menu gains alignment tools. These let you precisely organize selected nodes.

Align:┤◄├Left┤├Center┤►├Right
┴Top─Middle┬Bottom
Distribute:↔ DistEven horizontal spacing
↕ DistEven vertical spacing
Arrange:─ Row│ Col▦ Grid

Practical Workflow

Here's a typical workflow for cleaning up a messy graph in a large investigation room:

  1. Collapse everything. Use ⊟ on each type to collapse Characters, Places, Timeline, Objects, and Context into group nodes. Now you see a clean 5-node overview.
  2. Expand one type at a time. Click the Character group node to expand it. Now you see all Characters on the graph. Rearrange them with the Row or Force layout if needed.
  3. Select and align.Shift+click to select multiple Characters, right-click → Arrange in Row. Now they're neatly lined up.
  4. Move to another type. Collapse Characters (⊟), expand Places. Repeat the alignment process. Work through each type methodically.
  5. Final layout. When all types are organised, collapse everything, then expand all. Choose a layout preset — Force for seeing clusters, Tree for hierarchy, Row for clean category lanes.
💡 Tip: For very large Worlds (100+ entities), the Force layout can take 1–3 seconds to compute. Be patient — the result is worth it.

Still have questions?

💬 Ask in the Community Support Room