Tidier Drawings of Trees

Abstract

Various algorithms have been proposed for producing tidy drawings of trees–drawings that are aesthetically pleasing and use minimum drawing space. We show that these algorithms contain some difficulties that lead to aesthetically unpleasing, wider than necessary drawings. We then present a new algorithm with comparable time and storage requirements that produces tidier drawings. Generalizations to forests and m-ary trees are discussed, as are some problems in discretization when alphanumeric output devices are used.