9 ms·

Mermaidjs: create diagrams and flowcharts from text

43 points by gnur 8y ago

davidjgraph 8y ago
We did this 3 months ago, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16889181 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16889181
bmurray7jhu 8y ago
Why not just use tikz / LaTeX?
- ozim 8y ago
  I am not going to draw hyperbola, math equations or whatever that is. I don't want to spend next week configuring LaTeX. I just want to plug in some js library and have Gantt/Flow/Sequence diagram, which I don't want to draw by hand or save in some binary format but want to put it in GIT repo. I tried LaTeX twice it just does not work on Windows, and I don't really need it that much. I have no time to find out why it does not work out of the box for me. Just like dropbox, I install app and it syncs my files, setting VPS with Rsync could work but I do not have time to troubleshoot it in case something is not working.
- asutekku 8y ago
  Because latex might be a tad too heavy (and complex). Also, having a choice is good.
- AndrewOMartin 8y ago
  One does not simply use tikz / LaTeX.
_salmon 8y ago
Just tried using this for a project last week. Whatever algorithm it uses for positioning nodes is terrible. You end up with a huge confusing spaghetti mess of a diagram.
- pc86 8y ago
  The good thing about open source is that you can improve on it for the good of all :)
- BrandoElFollito 8y ago
  I had the same problem until I realized that the order matters very much. You may want to try to move the code around a bit and see if the result is improved.
corpMaverick 8y ago
I was just doing some diagrams last night. And my wife told me:"Why don't you make a program that makes them?" and I just thought: "She has no idea how hard that would be". Awesome work!
sgt101 8y ago
DiagrammeR uses Mermaid to do flowcharts in R. I used it to do the gantts for a project I'm running last week!
- wodenokoto 8y ago
  Thanks for the recommendation. Link for the lazy: http://rich-iannone.github.io/DiagrammeR/ http://rich-iannone.github.io/DiagrammeR/ It would be really cool if you could have mermaid/graphviz blocks in your R-notebook.
yoz-y 8y ago
Looks nice and I am just looking for a replacement for plantUML. The syntax looks very similar and I wonder whether it is a superset of plantUML format. That would actually be great.
nerdponx 8y ago
I still don't understand why you would write this instead of a Graphviz renderer.
- brudgers 8y ago
  The future is already here — it's just not very evenly distributed. -- William Gibson Everyone doesn't know about Graphviz. It's older than some HN'ers. So old that it comes from the glory days of Bell Labs. Graphviz. http://viz-js.com/ http://viz-js.com/ Viz.js is a port of Graphviz for browsers, http://viz-js.com/ http://viz-js.com/
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
sandGorgon 8y ago
can i use this using a cli ? I'm not able to find the documentation for this for using it through the nodejs cli. Edit. - found this https://github.com/mermaidjs/mermaid.cli https://github.com/mermaidjs/mermaid.cli
speedkills 8y ago
Is there any way to make diagrams render in a github readme?

43 points by gnur 8y ago

davidjgraph 8y ago

We did this 3 months ago, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16889181 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16889181

bmurray7jhu 8y ago

Why not just use tikz / LaTeX?

ozim 8y ago
I am not going to draw hyperbola, math equations or whatever that is. I don't want to spend next week configuring LaTeX. I just want to plug in some js library and have Gantt/Flow/Sequence diagram, which I don't want to draw by hand or save in some binary format but want to put it in GIT repo. I tried LaTeX twice it just does not work on Windows, and I don't really need it that much. I have no time to find out why it does not work out of the box for me. Just like dropbox, I install app and it syncs my files, setting VPS with Rsync could work but I do not have time to troubleshoot it in case something is not working.
asutekku 8y ago
Because latex might be a tad too heavy (and complex). Also, having a choice is good.
AndrewOMartin 8y ago
One does not simply use tikz / LaTeX.

_salmon 8y ago

Just tried using this for a project last week. Whatever algorithm it uses for positioning nodes is terrible. You end up with a huge confusing spaghetti mess of a diagram.

pc86 8y ago
The good thing about open source is that you can improve on it for the good of all :)
BrandoElFollito 8y ago
I had the same problem until I realized that the order matters very much. You may want to try to move the code around a bit and see if the result is improved.

corpMaverick 8y ago

I was just doing some diagrams last night. And my wife told me:"Why don't you make a program that makes them?" and I just thought: "She has no idea how hard that would be". Awesome work!

sgt101 8y ago

DiagrammeR uses Mermaid to do flowcharts in R. I used it to do the gantts for a project I'm running last week!

wodenokoto 8y ago
Thanks for the recommendation. Link for the lazy: http://rich-iannone.github.io/DiagrammeR/ http://rich-iannone.github.io/DiagrammeR/ It would be really cool if you could have mermaid/graphviz blocks in your R-notebook.

yoz-y 8y ago

Looks nice and I am just looking for a replacement for plantUML. The syntax looks very similar and I wonder whether it is a superset of plantUML format. That would actually be great.

nerdponx 8y ago

I still don't understand why you would write this instead of a Graphviz renderer.

brudgers 8y ago
The future is already here — it's just not very evenly distributed. -- William Gibson Everyone doesn't know about Graphviz. It's older than some HN'ers. So old that it comes from the glory days of Bell Labs. Graphviz. http://viz-js.com/ http://viz-js.com/ Viz.js is a port of Graphviz for browsers, http://viz-js.com/ http://viz-js.com/

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

sandGorgon 8y ago

can i use this using a cli ? I'm not able to find the documentation for this for using it through the nodejs cli. Edit. - found this https://github.com/mermaidjs/mermaid.cli https://github.com/mermaidjs/mermaid.cli

speedkills 8y ago

Is there any way to make diagrams render in a github readme?