How do I make a random coordinate number?

Question

I'm trying to implement this graph which looks like:

My graph has only those yellow nodes. Apparently yellow nodes have a random position. How can I make such position?

Here is my current code:

foreach ($subjects as $key => $subject){

    $nodes[] = [   "data" => [ "id" => "$subject->id",
        "Strength" => 5,
        "selected" => false,
        "cytoscape_alias_list" => ["Aarauer Bierdeckel"],
        "canonicalName" => "Aarauer Bierdeckel",
        "Milk" => "$subject->body",
        "Synonym" => "Kuentener",
        "Quality" => 290,
        "Type" => "Semi-soft",
        "SUID" => $subject->id,
        "NodeType" => "Cheese",
        "name" => "$subject->title",
        "Country" => "Switzerland",
        "shared_name" => "$subject->title"
    ],
        "position" => ["x"=>$key*2,"y"=>$key*2],    // please focus on this line
        "selected" => false,
    ];
}

As you see I've set $key*2 for nodes. This is the output:

All nodes are upon each other which doesn't seem good. Anyway, is there any idea how can I make a cheesy coordinate number for nodes?

Noted that it would be great if you have any suggestion about nodes-relations and their coordinate spot. I mean I can change the query and get any needed number related to nodes' relations.

Answer 1

You can use some energy based methods, like Force-Directed Graph Drawing . There are different implementations of this renown method in PHP such as this .