diagrams.net (previously draw.io) is a

free and open source Free and open-source software (FOSS) is a term used to refer to groups of software consisting of both free software and open-source software where anyone is freely licensed to use, copy, study, and change the software in any way, and the source ...

cross-platform

graph drawing Graph drawing is an area of mathematics and computer science combining methods from geometric graph theory and information visualization to derive two-dimensional depictions of graphs arising from applications such as social network analysis, car ...

software developed in

HTML5 HTML5 is a markup language used for structuring and presenting content on the World Wide Web. It is the fifth and final major HTML version that is a World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) recommendation. The current specification is known as the HT ...

and

JavaScript JavaScript (), often abbreviated as JS, is a programming language that is one of the core technologies of the World Wide Web, alongside HTML and CSS. As of 2022, 98% of Website, websites use JavaScript on the Client (computing), client side ...

. Its interface can be used to create

diagrams A diagram is a symbolic representation of information using visualization techniques. Diagrams have been used since prehistoric times on walls of caves, but became more prevalent during the Enlightenment. Sometimes, the technique uses a three-d ...

such as

flowcharts A flowchart is a type of diagram that represents a workflow or process. A flowchart can also be defined as a diagrammatic representation of an algorithm, a step-by-step approach to solving a task. The flowchart shows the steps as boxes of va ...

, wireframes,

UML The Unified Modeling Language (UML) is a general-purpose, developmental modeling language in the field of software engineering that is intended to provide a standard way to visualize the design of a system. The creation of UML was originally ...

diagrams, organizational charts, and network diagrams. diagrams.net is available as online as

cross-browser Cross-browser compatibility is the ability of a website or web application to function across different browsers and degrade gracefully when browser features are absent or lacking. History Background The history of cross-browser is involved ...

web app A web application (or web app) is application software that is accessed using a web browser. Web applications are delivered on the World Wide Web to users with an active network connection. History In earlier computing models like client-se ...

, and as offline desktop application for Linux, macOS, and Windows. Its offline application is built using the

Electron The electron (, or in nuclear reactions) is a subatomic particle with a negative one elementary electric charge. Electrons belong to the first generation of the lepton particle family, and are generally thought to be elementary partic ...

framework. The web app does not require online login or registration and can open from and save to the local

hard drive A hard disk drive (HDD), hard disk, hard drive, or fixed disk is an electro-mechanical data storage device that stores and retrieves digital data using magnetic storage with one or more rigid rapidly rotating platters coated with magne ...

. Supported storage and export formats to download include PNG, JPEG, SVG, and PDF. It also integrates with

cloud services Cloud computing is the on-demand availability of computer system resources, especially data storage (cloud storage) and computing power, without direct active management by the user. Large clouds often have functions distributed over mul ...

for storage including

Dropbox Dropbox is a file hosting service operated by the American company Dropbox, Inc., headquartered in San Francisco, California, U.S. that offers cloud storage, file synchronization, personal cloud, and client software. Dropbox was founded in 2 ...

OneDrive Microsoft OneDrive (formerly SkyDrive) is a file hosting service operated by Microsoft. First launched in August 2007, it enables registered users to share and synchronize their files. OneDrive also works as the storage backend of the web ver ...

Google Drive Google Drive is a file storage and synchronization service developed by Google. Launched on April 24, 2012, Google Drive allows users to store files in the cloud (on Google's servers), synchronize files across devices, and share files. In add ...

GitHub GitHub, Inc. () is an Internet hosting service for software development and version control using Git. It provides the distributed version control of Git plus access control, bug tracking, software feature requests, task management, co ...

, and

GitLab.com GitLab Inc. is an Open-core model, open-core company that operates GitLab, a DevOps software package which can develop, secure, and operate software. The Open-source software, open source software project was created by Ukraine, Ukrainian deve ...

. It is also available as plugin to embed the web app in platforms such as

NextCloud Nextcloud is a suite of client-server software for creating and using file hosting services. Nextcloud provides functionally similar to Dropbox, Office 365 or Google Drive when used with integrated office suite solutions Collabora Online or ...

MediaWiki MediaWiki is a Free and open-source software, free and open-source wiki software. It is used on Wikipedia and almost all other Wikimedia movement, Wikimedia Website, websites, including Wiktionary, Wikimedia Commons and Wikidata; these sit ...

Notion Notion or Notions may refer to: Software * Notion (music software), a music composition and performance program * Notion (productivity software), a note-taking and project-management program from Notion Labs Inc. * Notion (window manager), the ...

Atlassian Confluence Confluence is a web-based corporate wiki developed by Australian software company Atlassian. Atlassian wrote Confluence in the Java programming language and first published it in 2004. Confluence Standalone comes with a built-in Tomcat web ser ...

, and Jira. It has been described by tech reviewers such as

TechRadar ''TechRadar'' is an online publication owned by Future and focused on technology. It has editorial teams in the US, UK and Australia and provides news and reviews of tech products and gadgets. It was launched in 2007 and expanded to the US in ...

and

PCMag ''PC Magazine'' (shortened as ''PCMag'') is an American computer magazine published by Ziff Davis. A print edition was published from 1982 to January 2009. Publication of online editions started in late 1994 and have continued to the present d ...

as an alternative to

Lucidchart Lucidchart is a web-based diagramming application that allows users to visually collaborate on drawing, revising and sharing charts and diagrams, and improve processes, systems, and organizational structures. It is produced by Lucid Software ...

Microsoft Visio Microsoft Visio ( ) (formerly Microsoft Office Visio) is a diagramming and vector graphics application and is part of the Microsoft Office family. The product was first introduced in 1992, made by the Shapeware Corporation, later renamed Visio ...

, and

SmartDraw SmartDraw is a web-based diagramming tool used by teams to collaborate on and make flowcharts, organization charts, mind maps, project charts, and other business visuals. Integration and Add-Ons SmartDraw lets you add diagrams to Microsoft Off ...

History

JGraph Ltd

JGraph Ltd is a

private limited company A private limited company is any type of business entity in Privately held company, "private" ownership used in many jurisdictions, in contrast to a Public company, publicly listed company, with some differences from country to country. Examples ...

founded by Gaudenz Alder and David Benson in

2000 File:2000 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: Protests against Bush v. Gore after the 2000 United States presidential election; Heads of state meet for the Millennium Summit; The International Space Station in its infant form as seen from ...

in the United Kingdom.

JGraph

JGraph started as a pure

Java Java (; id, Jawa, ; jv, ꦗꦮ; su, ) is one of the Greater Sunda Islands in Indonesia. It is bordered by the Indian Ocean to the south and the Java Sea to the north. With a population of 151.6 million people, Java is the world's mo ...

language software project by Gaudenz Alder and as a University project in 2000 at

ETH Zurich (colloquially) , former_name = eidgenössische polytechnische Schule , image = ETHZ.JPG , image_size = , established = , type = Public , budget = CHF 1.896 billion (2021) , rector = Günther Dissertori , president = Joël Mesot , a ...

, Switzerland. The initial public release of JGraph 1.0 was in May 2002. The original design for JGraph was to make it an architectural extension of the

Swing Swing or swinging may refer to: Apparatus * Swing (seat), a hanging seat that swings back and forth * Pendulum, an object that swings * Russian swing, a swing-like circus apparatus * Sex swing, a type of harness for sexual intercourse * Swing rid ...

Java-toolkit and its JTree class.

mxGraph

In 2005, development began on mxGraph, which is a

software library In computer science, a library is a collection of non-volatile resources used by computer programs, often for software development. These may include configuration data, documentation, help data, message templates, pre-written code and sub ...

written in

using HTML5 and

SVG Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) is an XML-based vector image format for defining two-dimensional graphics, having support for interactivity and animation. The SVG specification is an open standard developed by the World Wide Web Consortium sinc ...

technologies. The project was publicly released in 2006, and supported

Firefox 1.5 The project that became Firefox today began as an experimental branch of the Mozilla Suite called ''m/b'' (or ''mozilla/browser''). Firefox retains the cross-platform nature of the original Mozilla browser, using the XUL user interface markup lan ...

and

Internet Explorer 5.5 Microsoft Internet Explorer 5 (IE5) is a graphical web browser, the fifth version of Internet Explorer, the successor to Internet Explorer 4 and one of the main participants of the first Browser wars, browser war. Its distribution methods and Wi ...

. mxGraph was originally made available as

freeware Freeware is software, most often proprietary, that is distributed at no monetary cost to the end user. There is no agreed-upon set of rights, license, or EULA that defines ''freeware'' unambiguously; every publisher defines its own rules for t ...

through a hosted demo of the software for online use, with publicly available source under a

end-user license agreement An end-user license agreement or EULA () is a legal contract between a software Software is a set of computer programs and associated software documentation, documentation and data (computing), data. This is in contrast to Computer hardware ...

for non-commercial use with the option to purchse a commercial license. In 2009, mxGraph was open sourced under the Apache license. JGraph also bundled official

ports A port is a maritime facility comprising one or more wharves or loading areas, where ships load and discharge cargo and passengers. Although usually situated on a sea coast or estuary, ports can also be found far inland, such as Ha ...

of mxGraph in other languages including Java, C#, and

PHP PHP is a General-purpose programming language, general-purpose scripting language geared toward web development. It was originally created by Danish-Canadian programmer Rasmus Lerdorf in 1993 and released in 1995. The PHP reference implementati ...

JGraphX

After the final JGraph 5.x release in February 2010, the project renamed its Java-language application to JGraphX, integrated the mxGraph library, and took on mxGraph's version numbering, starting with JGraphX 1.10.0.5 released in 2012.

Diagramly

In 2011, the company started publishing its

hosted service A hosted service provider (xSP) is a business that delivers a combination of traditional IT functions such as infrastructure, applications ( software as a service), security, monitoring, storage, web development, website hosting and email, over the ...

for the mxGraph web application under a separate brand, Diagramly with the domain "diagram.ly". After removing the remaining use of

Java applets Java applets were small applications written in the Java programming language, or another programming language that compiles to Java bytecode, and delivered to users in the form of Java bytecode. The user launched the Java applet from ...

from its web app, the service rebranded as draw.io in 2012 because the " .io suffix is a lot cooler than

.ly .ly is the Internet country code top-level domain (ccTLD) for Libya. Registration A .ly registration is the process of registering a user domain name within the ccTLD for Libya. The .ly domain, introduced in 1997,

", said co-founder David Benson in a 2012 interview. In February 2020, the company announced on its blog that the hosted version of the web application would move from "draw.io" to the "diagrams.net" domain, citing security reasons. The move was completed a month later. The software library, file format, and integrated services remain branded as "drawio".

References

External links

* *
Java API for working with Drawio diagrams
Java (programming language) libraries Free data visualization software Data visualization software Diagramming software Windows software {{Mindmaps