Optimising layout defaults

[BazilSansom]

Could default parameters for layout plugin be set as a function of network dimensions/properties to generate more satisfactory layouts with less manual input from users?

[WouterSpekkink]

I will explore this. We need to take into account that the layout plugin can be used for different purposes, and that the values that are used as input for these different purposes may differ widely. Having default settings that work equally well for all purposes is impossible. However, maybe I can make the plugin choose defaults after the user chooses the variable that is to be used as the order variable.

[WouterSpekkink]

Okay, so I made a first attempt at this, but it will require more tweaking probably. What I did now is to automatically make the ordered layout plugin recognize the Trophic_Levels variable as a candidate for the order variable. Once it finds this variable in the data laboratory, it calculates the range of the values of thiis variable. If this range is less than 10, it will set the order scaling to 1000. If it is less than 100, it will set the order scaling to 100. If it is less than 1000, it will set the order scaling to 10. If it less than 10.000, it wills et the order scaling to 1. I am not sure yet that these orders of magnitude and their corresponding scaling values actually make most sense. That is something we need to try out.

I also set the default force scale to 4. I think we actually might want this to very with network size. This also requiers some testing.

[WouterSpekkink]

Oh, and I should also point out that you can make presets for layouts in the bottom-left panel. I didn't know myself, but I saw that today. This also helps to deal with this issue.