Microsoft Automatic Graph Layout (MSAGL) is a .NET library for automatic graph layout. It was created by Lev Nachmanson at Microsoft Research.^[1]

Earlier versions carried the name GLEE (Graph Layout Execution Engine).^[2]

Contents

The MSAGL software supplies three programming libraries:

• Microsoft.MSAGL.dll, a device-independent graph layout engine;
• Microsoft.MSAGL.Drawing.dll, a device-independent implementation of graphs as graphical user interface objects, with all kinds of graphical attributes, and support for interface events such as mouse actions;
• Microsoft.MSAGL.GraphViewerGDI.dll, a Windows.Forms-based graph viewer control.
• Microsoft.MSAGL.WpfGraphControl.dll, a WPF (Windows Presentation Foundation) based graph viewer control.

A trivial application is supplied to demonstrate the viewer.

Features

MSAGL performs layout based on principles of the Sugiyama scheme;^[3] it produces so called layered, or hierarchical, layouts (according to the MSAGL home page). Modified Coffman–Graham scheduling algorithm is then used to find a layout that would fit in a given space. More detailed description of the algorithm can be found in U.S. Patent 7,932,907.

At some time, it did not support a wide range of different layout algorithms, unlike, for instance, GraphViz or GUESS.

It does not appear to support incremental layout.^[4]

Availability and licensing

MSAGL is distributed under MIT License as open source at GitHub.^[5]