Who Benefits from Graph Platform?

Tom Sawyer's Graph Platform, is designed to benefit enterprises that are grappling with complex data and seeking to uncover key trends and relationships.

Graph Platform | Tom Sawyer Software

What is a graph platform?

A graph platform is an integrated set of tools for modeling, integrating, visualizing, analyzing, and building applications with connected data.

Graph technology, and specifically graph visualization and analysis techniques employed by graph platforms, can be applied across many industries to address complex questions such as:

How can I deliver key insights to decision makers at the right time?
How can I optimize my schedules or processes?
Are there hidden relationships in the data that can provide clues to understanding?
Do trends exist in the data that can help with decision making?

A graph platform enables business insights through powerful graph visualization and analysis.

A graph platform gives organizations a way to work with connected data as more than isolated records. It helps teams understand how information relates across people, systems, processes, assets, and events, providing a foundation for graph-based applications that support visualization, analysis, knowledge graph development, and deployment.

Why choose a graph platform?

A graph platform may be right for you if any of these issues sound familiar:

How often has your business been limited by a legacy database that is set in stone?
Where are the gaps that leave valuable institutional knowledge locked in the heads of critical staff members?
Is your data spread across multiple systems and data silos?
Is your IT department strapped with building and maintaining integrations between systems?
Is your decision-making ability restricted by legacy databases that reflect how the software was designed, rather than how your business is structured?
Is data presented to users in a way they can understand and utilize to make critical business decisions?

The alternative to using a graph platform is to assemble a set of independent tools to address these concerns. And each tool can bring significant integration challenges that may require custom code to bridge the gaps between those tools.

Tom Sawyer Perspectives, the industry-vetted graph platform

Tom Sawyer Perspectives graph platform enables enterprises to produce interactive graph visualization and analysis applications from federated data.

The Tom Sawyer Perspectives graph platform enables enterprises to produce interactive graph visualization and analysis applications from federated data.

For more than 30 years, Tom Sawyer Software has developed graph-based applications and engineered a cohesive set of tools for working with connected data. These tools are agnostic to how data is stored and can integrate with other software.

The Tom Sawyer Perspectives platform is an SDK and low-code development platform that provides enterprises with the tools they need to build and deploy innovative graph applications.

Graph power is at the core of Tom Sawyer Perspectives

Tom Sawyer Perspectives and the Tom Sawyer Software team help organizations build a solid foundation for long-term success with graph technology.

The platform supports every stage of graph application development, including:

developing your information schema,
accessing and analyzing your data with its run-time graph model,
designing best-in-class visualizations, and
deploying your application.

Knowledge graphs

Tom Sawyer Perspectives supports organizations at different stages of knowledge graph development, from building a new knowledge graph to working with an established one.

The schema editor lets teams create a graph-based schema on top of legacy relational data or work directly with an existing graph store, linking data from one or multiple sources.

Graph model

Graph applications depend on a graph model that describes how information is connected. The model captures relationships between data elements, allowing applications to analyze and present connected data as a whole.

Tom Sawyer Perspectives uses an in-memory graph model that brings together data from relational databases, graph databases, files, APIs, and other enterprise systems. Design-time tools support model creation, while APIs give developers programmatic access when needed.

Graph application framework

Graphs organize information in a way that reflects how people understand relationships and context. Users also need intuitive ways to explore, search, and interact with graphs to find the answers they need.

Tom Sawyer Perspectives development tools work directly with the graph model to support interaction and authoring within graph-based applications.

Data-driven development

A picture can be worth a thousand words, or even a thousand hours. The right visualization helps users interpret information and understand what matters most.

Every data element in the schema can convey meaning through the nodes and edges shown on screen. Tom Sawyer Perspectives helps teams quickly experiment with how data is organized, analyzed, visualized, and explored to create more useful applications for end users.

Graph databases

A graph database stores and queries connected data, while a graph platform provides broader capabilities for building applications with that data.

Tom Sawyer Perspectives works with graph databases and other enterprise data sources, while Tom Sawyer Software helps teams evaluate data store options through requirements analysis and rapid prototyping.

Deployment

Design and package your Tom Sawyer Perspectives web application for deployment in your preferred environment. Applications can use your existing authentication mechanisms to secure access to data. You can deploy your application behind a load balancer and configure automatic scaling to meet demand.

The graph platform supports flexible deployment across enterprise environments, making it easier to deliver graph applications where users need them.

Leveraging institutional knowledge

Whether you have already started on your institution's knowledge map or are just getting started, you'll find the tools you need to leverage your business knowledge with Tom Sawyer Perspectives.

You can start by extracting the schema from your data source to get a head start on your knowledge graph, or use the schema designer to map and visualize a knowledge graph from scratch.

Tom Sawyer Perspectives can help engage end users in improving the integrity of your collective business intelligence.

Knowledge graph as schema

Is your data ready to deliver the answers and insights your end users need?

Most databases are designed to address their initial use cases but may present significant limitations when a new question arises, a different analysis is needed, or a new business workflow is required. Legacy databases often reflect the limitations of their original software design, even as business structures and workflows evolve.

The in-memory graph in Tom Sawyer Perspectives addresses this challenge by helping you design the data schema you wish you had. Your data may be distributed and disconnected, but the in-memory graph lets you work with data integrated in real time to address your users’ needs.

The Tom Sawyer Perspectives schema editor.

Tom Sawyer Perspectives allows you to link to data from multiple data sources and connect it in a unified schema that delivers the power you expect from graphs, and the seamless knowledge graph experience your users need.

The schema provides a solid foundation to build your application quickly.

Learn how to integrate with a Neo4j database

This short video illustrates how easy it is to start with an empty project, connect to a graph database, extract the schema, and see first visualization results within minutes.

Learn more about how to connect to a variety of data sources:

In-memory graph model

The Tom Sawyer Perspectives model is an in-memory representation of your data that can be constructed from multiple data sources of different types. This means you can leverage the existing knowledge in your business, even if you have not yet invested in a data lake, graph database, or another data consolidation approach.

With the schema editor, you can design a graph that is suited to the specific problem you are solving, organized for the work you want it to do, and isolated from other concerns. The model represents your schema in memory as a collection of nodes, edges, and related attributes.

The schema and graph model underpin the graphical design environment and enable advanced interactions for integrators:

Built-in model functions make it easy for less technical users to build data-driven applications without coding.
Run-time interfaces give experienced developers the power to interact with the model directly as needed, making it easier to integrate Tom Sawyer Perspectives into other applications or extend the platform with other tools.

Graph model benefits

The Tom Sawyer Perspectives model provides the backbone for your application.

Tom Sawyer Perspectives leverages the underlying model and APIs to give non-programmers a low-code experience to design their application, including graph editing, graph analytics, and an unsurpassed set of tools for presenting data.

Tom Sawyer Perspectives also supports an API for access to model elements for experienced programmers with more advanced requirements for integration with other tools.

The Tom Sawyer Perspectives graph platform provides these key graph features.

Database agnostic

Scalable to millions of elements

Open API

Automatic binding to source data

Automated commit to graph databases

Graph-native application framework

Knowledge graphs are popular because they align closely with how people understand relationships in the world.

The Tom Sawyer Perspectives model supports intuitive data navigation and natural interaction with knowledge graphs at the application layer.

Tom Sawyer Perspectives provides the tools to create applications that put the value of graphs into users' hands.

A graph application platform should give users more than a static view of connected data. It should support interactive exploration, multiple coordinated views, filtering, layout, and analysis so users can move from complex data to practical insight.

Key features for graph-based application development include:

Flexible dashboard layout design
Synchronization across multiple views
Five fully automated graph layouts
Grouping, nesting, and navigation
Powerful filtering and search
Timeline analysis
Rich node and edge annotations
Graph analytics
Internationalization support

Example graph application built with Tom Sawyer Perspectives.

To get started with Tom Sawyer Perspectives:

Design your schema with the Tom Sawyer Perspectives schema editor.
Define how schema elements and data should be displayed, in one or several different views.
Arrange your views to meet the needs of your users.

We take care of synchronization across your views.

Watch this informative YouTube video for a tour of Tom Sawyer Perspectives Designer:

Data-driven application development

Move beyond a one-size-fits-all approach to graph interaction. Control each and every aspect of your visualization and behavior. Link to other tools as needed, or craft a visualization that looks right at home in the application you already support.

Tom Sawyer Perspectives makes it easy to choose and customize a set of tools that work together to create the best possible experience for your end users.

The platform provides the flexibility to create beautifully functional designs with no coding required. Should you need even greater degrees of freedom, you can readily extend those experiences with our API and your custom code.

Case Study: Use-case-driven design

This example application was developed in cooperation with Sanofi and highlights how every element of the drawing may be used to communicate details essential to the user.

Every node and edge, and how they are arranged in the drawing can be used to communicate multiple variables that are meaningful for instant orientation even in the most complex of domains. Embed images, highlight paths, apply color, style, shape and size to draw the user's attention to what matters.

Build the graph that tells your data story clearly and concisely.

Sanofi custom application built with Perspectives

Sanofi custom application built with Tom Sawyer Perspectives

Choosing the right data store

Choosing a graph-based persistence layer can be a daunting decision. Utility, scalability, reliability, long-term support, and cost all play into your decision.

Do you know what you want from your graph store so that you can better evaluate the trade offs?

Don't make assumptions about what your requirements are, or where the bottlenecks might be. Prototype your graph aspirations with Tom Sawyer Software to bring clarity to the decision process, before you make long-term commitments to a specific data storage solution.

We can help quantify your expectations and chart a path to the architecture that will best meet your long-term needs. We have experience with a wide variety of data sources and have worked with all of the leading graph databases including open-source options and a wide variety of legacy data stores.

Considerations when choosing a data store

The questions to ask about graph data stores are the same ones that have always been important to safeguard business data.

Let us help you understand your requirements, analyze your metrics, and evaluate your options.

ACID support
Performance on sparse versus dense graphs
Supported query languages
Schema support and indexing
Security
Multi-tenancy
Horizontal scaling
Long-term support

Application Deployment

Tom Sawyer Software's graph-based application platform is at home in any environment. We give you the tools to get started with your first application from day one. Whether you need to quickly deploy your application on your favorite cloud hosting platform, such as AWS or Azure, or you want to deploy your application to Docker, Kubernetes, or Terraform, we have you covered.

Local Deployment

On the desktop, or in a simple web app, if your objective is to serve small groups of people in your organization, Tom Sawyer Perspectives can help you build and deploy quickly.

Private Cloud

Do you need an enterprise tool that fits into your secure private cloud architecture? Tom Sawyer Perspectives supports your authentication solution and can scale up to meet the needs of your growing internal user base.

Public Cloud Applications

Getting ready to make your application available to the world? Tom Sawyer Perspectives applications can be containerized, or can be part of a multi-tenant SaaS offering, based on your go-to-market plans.

See for yourself how easy it is to package and deploy your application with these how-to videos.

FAQs about graph platforms

What is the difference between a graph platform and a graph database?

A graph database is primarily designed to store and query connected data. A graph platform provides a broader environment for turning that data into applications, adding graph modeling, visualization, analysis, and deployment on top of the stored data. A graph platform also draws from many sources at once, integrating relational databases, APIs, files, and other enterprise systems alongside graph databases into a single connected view.

What is the difference between a graph platform and a knowledge graph?

A knowledge graph represents information as connected entities, relationships, and properties. A graph platform provides the tools that put that knowledge graph to work, letting teams explore, visualize, and interact with it through practical applications. In short, a knowledge graph organizes and represents connected information, while a graph platform delivers that information to end users in a form they can act on.

What are the main components of a graph platform?

A graph platform typically includes a graph model for organizing connected data, data integration capabilities, graph visualization tools, graph analysis capabilities, application development tools, and deployment support. Together, these components allow organizations to connect information from multiple sources, understand relationships and patterns, and build applications that make connected data easier to explore and use.

How much coding does building a graph application require?

The amount of coding depends on the platform and the complexity of the application. Tom Sawyer Perspectives provides a low-code development environment with visual design tools and built-in model functions for creating data-driven graph applications. Developers can also use APIs and custom code when more advanced integration, customization, or application behavior is required.

When should an organization use a graph platform?

An organization should consider a graph platform when important questions depend on relationships across people, systems, assets, processes, or data sources. Graph platforms are especially useful when data is distributed across multiple systems, dependencies are difficult to understand, or users need interactive visualization and analysis to turn connected data into practical insight.

Graph Platform