1	Nodes contain the events in each path. The node displays the width of each link that enters and exits the node. The same event can appear at multiple nodes in the diagram.
2	Links between nodes make up the paths in the diagram. The width of each link can represent either the frequency of the path or the value of a weight measure.
3	Drop-off links are links that end at the current node. Drop-off links are displayed only if some links continue onward from the current node.

A Path in a Sankey Diagram

A path in a Sankey diagram represents a distinct sequence of events. Each path in the diagram consists of one or more transactions. A transaction is a sequence of events that are associated with a specific transaction identifier value.

For example, if your data contains the activity of visitors to a website, then your transaction identifier might be the unique session identifier for each visitor. The events in your data might be the individual pages on the website that the visitor accessed. In this example, each transaction is the sequence of pages that were accessed by a specific visitor, and each path is a sequence of pages that contains all of the transactions that follow that sequence.

Data Roles for a Sankey Diagram

Here are the basic data roles for a Sankey diagram:

Event

specifies a category whose values identify the events that are represented as nodes in the diagram.

Sequence Order

specifies a datetime data item or a measure whose values identify the order of the events for each transaction.

Transaction Identifier

specifies a data item whose values identify the transactions in the diagram.

Note: The paths in a Sankey diagram exclude any missing values in the data items that are assigned to the Event, Transaction Identifier, or Sequence Order role.

In addition to the basic data roles, you can specify the following role:

Weight

specifies a measure for the weight of each event in a transaction. The weight values for each transaction, for each event in a path are aggregated to determine the path weight.

Note: If the measure that is assigned to the Weight role has an aggregation other than SUM or COUNT, then the node width labels in the diagram might be misleading. It is recommended that you disable the Show nodes option if your Weight measure has an aggregation other than SUM or COUNT.

Specify Properties for a Sankey Diagram

On the Properties tab, you can specify the following:

Name

specifies the name of the visualization.

Title

specifies the title that appears above the graph.

Note: Title is disabled if you select Generate graph title.

Generate graph title

specifies that the graph title is generated automatically based on the data items in the visualization.

Show labels

displays the event name for each node.

Show nodes

displays link width values at each node.

Show outline

displays a box around each node.

Vertical layout

displays the diagram vertically.

Link color

specifies the method that is used to group and color the paths or links in the diagram.

Select one of the following:

Path

displays each path as a separate group with a distinct color.

Event

groups links together by event. Links that originate from the same event have the same color. For links between the same two events, the links are combined even if their transactions are part of different paths.

Drop off

groups links together based on whether they are drop-off links. A drop-off link represents a link that ends at the current node while other links continue onward from the current node. For links between the same two events, the links are combined even if their transactions are part of different paths.

Link width

specifies whether the width of a link in a path represents the path frequency (Frequency) or the aggregated value of the weight measure (Weight).

Note: If you do not assign the Weight data role, then Frequency is always used for the link width.

Note: If the aggregated value of the weight measure for any path is negative, zero, or missing, then Frequency is used for the link width.

Minimum path length

specifies the minimum length for a path that is displayed. The path length that you specify indicates the number of nodes in the path.

For example, if the Minimum path length is 3 and the Maximum path length is 5, then the diagram displays only paths that have lengths of 3, 4, or 5 nodes.

Maximum path length

specifies the maximum length for a path that is displayed. The path length that you specify indicates the number of nodes in the path.

For example, if the Minimum path length is 3 and the Maximum path length is 5, then the diagram displays only paths that have lengths of 3, 4, or 5 nodes.

Note: A hyphen character ( - ) specifies that there is no maximum path length.

Minimum frequency

specifies the minimum path frequency for a path that is displayed. For example, if you specify a minimum path frequency of 5, then the diagram displays only paths that have a frequency of 5 or greater.

Maximum frequency

specifies the maximum path frequency for a path that is displayed. For example, if you specify a maximum path frequency of 10, then the diagram displays only paths that have a frequency of 10 or fewer.

Note: A hyphen character ( - ) specifies that there is no maximum frequency.

Path ranking

specifies a ranking method for the paths in the diagram. If you specified a measure for the Weight role, then ranking is based on the aggregated value of the weight measure for each path. If there is no measure for the Weight role, then ranking is based on the frequency of each path.

From the drop-down list, select Top to select the paths with the highest values. Select Bottom to select the paths with the lowest values. In the text field, enter the number of paths to select.

By default, path ranking selects the top 200 paths.

Note: If your ranking method reduces the number of paths that are displayed, then a message appears at the bottom of the diagram.

Compress

combines repeated, consecutive events in each path into a single event. If you specified a measure for the Weight role, then the weight value for a compressed event is the average of the weight values for the repeated, consecutive events that were combined.

Note: For all of the options under Path Analytics, click the Apply changes button

to apply your changes.

Managing the Path Selection for a Sankey Diagram

About Path Selections

You can subset the paths in a Sankey diagram by creating a path selection. A path selection uses a set of conditions to select or exclude paths based on the nodes or events in each path.

Create a New Condition By Using the Add New Condition Window

To create a new condition by using the Add New Condition window, follow these steps:

In the visualization toolbar, click the drop-down list, and then select Add New Condition. The Add New Condition window appears.
From the Condition drop-down list, select the condition type.
From the Events drop-down list, select the events for the condition.
From the Type drop-down list, select one of the following:

Include Only

specifies that the path selection includes only paths that contain one or more of the selected events.

Exclude

specifies that the path selection excludes all paths that contain one or more of the selected events.
Click OK to apply the new condition to your path selection.

Tip

You can create a condition for the path selection when only the Event role is assigned to the visualization. For large data sources, you might want to create your path selection before assigning all of the data roles to avoid long loading times.

Create a New Condition from Selected Nodes

To add a new condition from selected nodes in the diagram, follow these steps:

Select one or more nodes in the diagram.

Note: To select multiple nodes, press the Ctrl key.
Click the drop-down list, and then select either Include Only or Exclude, and then select the condition type. The condition type can be any of the following:

Paths Containing All the Selected Nodes

includes or excludes paths that contain all of the selected nodes. This condition type is based on specific nodes in the diagram, rather than the event values.

Paths Containing Any of the Selected Nodes

includes or excludes paths that contain any of the selected nodes. This condition type is based on specific nodes in the diagram, rather than the event values.

Paths Containing the Selected Events on Any Node

includes or excludes paths that contain any of the selected events, on any node. This condition type is based on the event values of the selected nodes.

Paths Starting With the Selected Events

includes or excludes paths that start with any of the selected events.

Paths Ending With the Selected Events

includes or excludes paths that end with any of the selected events.

The new condition appears on the Path Selection tab of the details table.

Edit a Condition for a Path Selection

To edit a condition for a path selection, follow these steps:

Open the details table for your visualization by clicking the drop-down list from the visualization toolbar, and then selecting Show Details.
In the details table, select the Path Selection tab.
In the Type column, select the condition type:

Include Only

includes only the paths that satisfy the condition.

Exclude

excludes the paths that satisfy the condition.

Remove Conditions from a Path Selection

To remove a condition from a path selection, perform the following steps:

Open the details table for your visualization by clicking the drop-down list from the visualization toolbar, and then selecting Show Details.
In the details table, select the Path Selection tab.
To remove specific conditions, select the conditions that you want to remove, right-click one selected condition, and select Remove Selected Conditions.

To remove all of the conditions, right-click any condition, and select Remove All Conditions.

Explore the Transaction Identifier Values for a Path Selection

You can explore the transaction identifier values for your path selection by creating a new visualization. To create a new visualization from your path selection, perform either of the following steps:

On the Path Selection tab of the details table, right-click a condition, and then select Create Visualization from All Conditions. All of the conditions in your path selection are used to filter the data in your new visualization.
In the Sankey diagram, select one or more nodes, click the drop-down list, select Create New Visualization, and select a condition for your path selection. For more information, see Create a New Condition from Selected Nodes.

The new condition and any existing conditions are all used to filter the data in your new visualization.

The new visualization appears as a bar chart of the data item assigned to the Transaction Identifier role. A visualization filter selects all of the transaction identifier values that correspond to your path selection. If your Sankey diagram includes a weight measure, then the weight measure also appears in the bar chart.

Note: You can perform any standard visualization tasks with the new visualization. For example, you can add data items and change the visualization type.

Use the Spotlight Tool to View Multiple Data Tips

The spotlight tool enables you to view data tips for all of the nodes that are within a circular area around the cursor.

Click

to enable or disable the spotlight tool.

Display the Overview

For large diagrams, the overview enables you to select the portions of the diagram that are visible.

To display the overview, click the Options

drop-down list from the visualization toolbar, and then select Show Overview.

Zoom a Sankey Diagram

You can zoom a Sankey diagram by using either of the following controls:

in the overview, select the part of the diagram that you want to zoom
scroll the mouse wheel over the visualization to zoom in or zoom out at the location of the cursor

Pan (Scroll) a Sankey Diagram

You can pan (scroll) the diagram by using any of the following controls:

In the overview, drag the selection box.
Hold down the Shift key and drag the diagram.
When you have zoomed in on a diagram and scroll bars are displayed, reposition your zoomed view by holding down the Shift and Alt keys and dragging the diagram.

Last updated: January 8, 2019