Designing complex network visualisations using the wayfinding map metaphor

Despite their widespread use, network visualisations can be rather challenging to design and use. This is due to the fact that such visualisations are generally used to represent highly complex underlying data sets. As such, the resulting charts often include a very large number of visual elements and many non-linear relations between them that must be displayed. More effective design-oriented approaches are therefore needed to better support designers in creating network visualisations for complex data sets that are more understandable and usable for their users. The use of visual metaphors seems to offer such an approach to designing visualisations of complex data. In this article, we propose the use of wayfinding map metaphor in network diagrams to support both the designers and users of this type of data visualisation. We also provide a mapping of the three common map wayfinding tasks – orientation, exploration, and navigation – to three categories of network diagram user interactions. To demonstrate the potential of our proposed approach, we provide an example case study using a prototype network diagram visualisation tool – Colocalisation Network Explorer – which we have developed to support the exploration of relationships between various diseases and the portion of the human genome involved in their onset.