What tool to use to draw file tree diagram

Question

Given a file tree - a directory with directories in it etc, what software would you recommend to create a diagram of the file-tree as a graphic file that I can embed in a word processor document I prefer vector (SVG, EPS, EMF...) files. The tool must run on Windows, but preferably cross-platform. The tool may be commercial but preferably free.

Answer 1

Why could you not just make a file structure on the Windows file system and populate it with your desired names, then use a screen grabber like HyperSnap (or the ubiquitous Alt-PrtScr) to capture a section of the Explorer window.

I did this when 'demoing' an internet application which would have collapsible sections, I just had to create files that looked like my desired entries.

HyperSnap gives JPGs at least (probably others but I've never bothered to investigate).

Or you could screen capture the icons +/- from Explorer and use them within MS Word Draw itself to do your picture, but I've never been able to get MS Word Draw to behave itself properly.

Answer 2

Graphviz - from the web page:

The Graphviz layout programs take descriptions of graphs in a simple text language, and make diagrams in several useful formats such as images and SVG for web pages, Postscript for inclusion in PDF or other documents; or display in an interactive graph browser. (Graphviz also supports GXL, an XML dialect.)

It's the simplest and most productive tool I've found to create a variety of boxes-and-lines diagrams. I have and use Visio and OmniGraffle, but there's always the temptation to make "just one more adjustment".

It's also quite easy to write code to produce the "dot file" format that Graphiz consumes, so automated diagram production is also nicely within reach.

Answer 3

Copying and pasting from the tree-command might also work for you, that'd give you the following:

C:\Inetpub>tree
Lista över mappar i miljövariabeln PATH för volymen XXXXX
Volymens serienummer är XXXXXXXX XXXX:XXXX
C:.
├───AdminScripts
├───iissamples
├───mailroot
│   ├───Badmail
│   ├───Drop
│   ├───Mailbox
│   ├───Pickup
│   ├───Queue
│   ├───Route
│   └───SortTemp
├───Scripts
└───wwwroot
    ├───aspnet_client
    │   └───system_web
    │       └───1_1_4322
    │           └───_vti_cnf
    ├───images
    ├───_private
    └───_vti_log

C:\Inetpub>

Answer 4

The advice to use Graphviz is good: you can generate the dot file and it will do the hard work of measuring strings, doing the layout, etc. Plus it can output the graphs in lot of formats, including vector ones.

I found a Perl program doing precisely that, in a mailing list, but I just can't find it back! I copied the sample dot file and studied it, since I don't know much of this declarative syntax and I wanted to learn a bit more.

Problem: with latest Graphviz, I have errors (or rather, warnings, as the final diagram is generated), both in the original graph and the one I wrote (by hand). Some searches shown this error was found in old versions and disappeared in more recent versions. Looks like it is back.

I still give the file, maybe it can be a starting point for somebody, or maybe it is enough for your needs (of course, you still have to generate it).

digraph tree
{
  rankdir=LR;

  DirTree [label="Directory Tree" shape=box]

  a_Foo_txt [shape=point]
  f_Foo_txt [label="Foo.txt", shape=none]
  a_Foo_txt -> f_Foo_txt

  a_Foo_Bar_html [shape=point]
  f_Foo_Bar_html [label="Foo Bar.html", shape=none]
  a_Foo_Bar_html -> f_Foo_Bar_html

  a_Bar_png [shape=point]
  f_Bar_png [label="Bar.png", shape=none]
  a_Bar_png -> f_Bar_png

  a_Some_Dir [shape=point]
  d_Some_Dir [label="Some Dir", shape=ellipse]
  a_Some_Dir -> d_Some_Dir

  a_VBE_C_reg [shape=point]
  f_VBE_C_reg [label="VBE_C.reg", shape=none]
  a_VBE_C_reg -> f_VBE_C_reg

  a_P_Folder [shape=point]
  d_P_Folder [label="P Folder", shape=ellipse]
  a_P_Folder -> d_P_Folder

  a_Processing_20081117_7z [shape=point]
  f_Processing_20081117_7z [label="Processing-20081117.7z", shape=none]
  a_Processing_20081117_7z -> f_Processing_20081117_7z

  a_UsefulBits_lua [shape=point]
  f_UsefulBits_lua [label="UsefulBits.lua", shape=none]
  a_UsefulBits_lua -> f_UsefulBits_lua

  a_Graphviz [shape=point]
  d_Graphviz [label="Graphviz", shape=ellipse]
  a_Graphviz -> d_Graphviz

  a_Tree_dot [shape=point]
  f_Tree_dot [label="Tree.dot", shape=none]
  a_Tree_dot -> f_Tree_dot

  {
    rank=same;
    DirTree -> a_Foo_txt -> a_Foo_Bar_html -> a_Bar_png -> a_Some_Dir -> a_Graphviz [arrowhead=none]
  }
  {
    rank=same;
    d_Some_Dir -> a_VBE_C_reg -> a_P_Folder -> a_UsefulBits_lua [arrowhead=none]
  }
  {
    rank=same;
    d_P_Folder -> a_Processing_20081117_7z [arrowhead=none]
  }
  {
    rank=same;
    d_Graphviz -> a_Tree_dot [arrowhead=none]
  }
}

> dot -Tpng Tree.dot -o Tree.png
Error: lost DirTree a_Foo_txt edge
Error: lost a_Foo_txt a_Foo_Bar_html edge
Error: lost a_Foo_Bar_html a_Bar_png edge
Error: lost a_Bar_png a_Some_Dir edge
Error: lost a_Some_Dir a_Graphviz edge
Error: lost d_Some_Dir a_VBE_C_reg edge
Error: lost a_VBE_C_reg a_P_Folder edge
Error: lost a_P_Folder a_UsefulBits_lua edge
Error: lost d_P_Folder a_Processing_20081117_7z edge
Error: lost d_Graphviz a_Tree_dot edge

I will try another direction, using Cairo, which is also able to export a number of formats. It is more work (computing positions/offsets) but the structure is simple, shouldn't be too hard.

Answer 5

As promised, here is my Cairo version. I scripted it with Lua, using lfs to walk the directories. I love these little challenges, as they allow me to explore APIs I wanted to dig for quite some time...
lfs and LuaCairo are both cross-platform, so it should work on other systems (tested on French WinXP Pro SP3).

I made a first version drawing file names as I walked the tree. Advantage: no memory overhead. Inconvenience: I have to specify the image size beforehand, so listings are likely to be cut off.

So I made this version, first walking the directory tree, storing it in a Lua table. Then, knowing the number of files, creating the canvas to fit (at least vertically) and drawing the names.
You can easily switch between PNG rendering and SVG one. Problem with the latter: Cairo generates it at low level, drawing the letters instead of using SVG's text capability. Well, at least, it guarantees accurate rending even on systems without the font. But the files are bigger... Not really a problem if you compress it after, to have a .svgz file.
Or it shouldn't be too hard to generate the SVG directly, I used Lua to generate SVG in the past.

-- LuaFileSystem <http://www.keplerproject.org/luafilesystem/&gt;
require"lfs"
-- LuaCairo <http://www.dynaset.org/dogusanh/&gt;
require"lcairo"
local CAIRO = cairo


local PI = math.pi
local TWO_PI = 2 * PI

--~ local dirToList = arg[1] or "C:/PrgCmdLine/Graphviz"
--~ local dirToList = arg[1] or "C:/PrgCmdLine/Tecgraf"
local dirToList = arg[1] or "C:/PrgCmdLine/tcc"
-- Ensure path ends with /
dirToList = string.gsub(dirToList, "([^/])$", "%1/")
print("Listing: " .. dirToList)
local fileNb = 0

--~ outputType = 'svg'
outputType = 'png'

-- dirToList must have a trailing slash
function ListDirectory(dirToList)
  local dirListing = {}
  for file in lfs.dir(dirToList) do
    if file ~= ".." and file ~= "." then
      local fileAttr = lfs.attributes(dirToList .. file)
      if fileAttr.mode == "directory" then
        dirListing[file] = ListDirectory(dirToList .. file .. '/')
      else
        dirListing[file] = ""
      end
      fileNb = fileNb + 1
    end
  end
  return dirListing
end

--dofile[[../Lua/DumpObject.lua]] -- My own dump routine
local dirListing = ListDirectory(dirToList)
--~ print("\n" .. DumpObject(dirListing))
print("Found " .. fileNb .. " files")

--~ os.exit()

-- Constants to change to adjust aspect
local initialOffsetX = 20
local offsetY = 50
local offsetIncrementX = 20
local offsetIncrementY = 12
local iconOffset = 10

local width = 800 -- Still arbitrary
local titleHeight = width/50
local height = offsetIncrementY * (fileNb + 1) + titleHeight
local outfile = "CairoDirTree." .. outputType

local ctxSurface
if outputType == 'svg' then
  ctxSurface = cairo.SvgSurface(outfile, width, height)
else
  ctxSurface = cairo.ImageSurface(CAIRO.FORMAT_RGB24, width, height)
end
local ctx = cairo.Context(ctxSurface)

-- Display a file name
-- file is the file name to display
-- offsetX is the indentation
function DisplayFile(file, bIsDir, offsetX)
  if bIsDir then
    ctx:save()
    ctx:select_font_face("Sans", CAIRO.FONT_SLANT_NORMAL, CAIRO.FONT_WEIGHT_BOLD)
    ctx:set_source_rgb(0.5, 0.0, 0.7)
  end

  -- Display file name
  ctx:move_to(offsetX, offsetY)
  ctx:show_text(file)

  if bIsDir then
    ctx:new_sub_path() -- Position independent of latest move_to
    -- Draw arc with absolute coordinates
    ctx:arc(offsetX - iconOffset, offsetY - offsetIncrementY/3, offsetIncrementY/3, 0, TWO_PI)
    -- Violet disk
    ctx:set_source_rgb(0.7, 0.0, 0.7)
    ctx:fill()
    ctx:restore() -- Restore original settings
  end

  -- Increment line offset
  offsetY = offsetY + offsetIncrementY
end

-- Erase background (white)
ctx:set_source_rgb(1.0, 1.0, 1.0)
ctx:paint()

--~ ctx:set_line_width(0.01)

-- Draw in dark blue
ctx:set_source_rgb(0.0, 0.0, 0.3)
ctx:select_font_face("Sans", CAIRO.FONT_SLANT_NORMAL, CAIRO.FONT_WEIGHT_BOLD)
ctx:set_font_size(titleHeight)
ctx:move_to(5, titleHeight)
-- Display title
ctx:show_text("Directory tree of " .. dirToList)

-- Select font for file names
ctx:select_font_face("Sans", CAIRO.FONT_SLANT_NORMAL, CAIRO.FONT_WEIGHT_NORMAL)
ctx:set_font_size(10)
offsetY = titleHeight * 2

-- Do the job
function DisplayDirectory(dirToList, offsetX)
  for k, v in pairs(dirToList) do
--~ print(k, v)
    if type(v) == "table" then
      -- Sub-directory
      DisplayFile(k, true, offsetX)
      DisplayDirectory(v, offsetX + offsetIncrementX)
    else
      DisplayFile(k, false, offsetX)
    end
  end
end

DisplayDirectory(dirListing, initialOffsetX)

if outputType == 'svg' then
    cairo.show_page(ctx)
else
  --cairo.surface_write_to_png(ctxSurface, outfile)
  ctxSurface:write_to_png(outfile)
end

ctx:destroy()
ctxSurface:destroy()

print("Found " .. fileNb .. " files")

Of course, you can change the styles. I didn't draw the connection lines, I didn't saw it as necessary. I might add them optionally later.

Answer 6

For large graphs, GraphViz is a poor choice. You might wish to try aiSee instead. Cross-platform, free for non-commercial usage, supports export to SVG and EPS.