I’m often asked what tools I use for network analysis. Over the years I’ve tried most of them with the exception of Valdis Kreb’s Inflow . I’ve pretty much settled on UCINET/NetDraw because of its wide acceptance in academic circles; NodeXL because of its flexibility and ease of use for quick and dirty tasks; Sentinel Visualizer because of its link analysis, geospatial views, and timelines capabilities; and Cyram NetMiner because it is an all in one package with great visualisation capabilities. Of these Cyram NetMiner is my tool of choice, although unfortunately new licencing arrangements may change that (see below ). I’ve been using NetMiner since its version 2 release in 2005. In May 2011 Cyram released version 4 of NetMiner and I’m very impressed, although it’s not for the faint-hearted or novice! Here’s the first of a multi-part review.

There are eight packages and five licence types to choose from, which personally I found a bit confusing, particularly as some packages are standard to a licence. The packages are:

• Basic – the essential package on which everything else is built. It includes 26 data transformation tools like symmetrize, and convert to one-mode network; 28 analysis options, such as centrality, block-modelling and brokerage; an 23 visualisation options, ranging from spring diagrams to concentric circles or targets (which I think are the hallmark diagrams of NetMiner, and which I use extensively).

• Advanced Analysis – extends the 28 analysis options to 36 by including measures like homophily and page rank, as well as a number of measures for two-mode networks.

• Explore – simply provides a way to explore and reanalyse the results of previous analysis. To my way of thinking this package should be part of the basic package, and therefore is essential.

• Advanced Visualisation – provides the capability to draw three dimensional maps as well as contour and surface plots, and heat diagrams.

• Statistics –provides 28 statistical measures, such as ANOVA, regression, and correlation.

• Tools – provides a query composer, graph editor, and matrix calculator. Again I think the query composer and graph editor should be part of the basic package.

• Database – provides the ability to retrieve data from SQL Server and Oracle databases

• Script – is an exciting new package that allows Python scripts to be used, the creation of new algorithms, and the automation of repetitive or conditional tasks.

For most users they will be happy with the Basic package plus Explore and Tools. As a power user I decided I wanted the lot!

The five licence types are also confusing, and restrictive. They are:

• Student Coursework – a three month standalone licence that includes everything, but is limited by the analysis of 1,000 nodes.

• Student Research – an annual licence built on the basic package plus the addition of packages. It varies in cost depending on whether the analysis is for a small network (1,000 nodes), medium network (10,000) nodes, or a large network (100,000 nodes).

• Academic – an annual or perpetual standalone licence built on the basic package plus the addition of packages. Again it varies in cost depending on whether the analysis is for a small network (1,000 nodes), medium network (10,000) nodes, or a large network (100,000 nodes). The licence is for non-commercial use.

• Institution – a perpetual network licence that includes all packages and is capable of handling 100,000 nodes. The licence is for an institution which performs research and development activities, or a not-for-profit organisation, and which is not affiliated with any commercial operation.

• Enterprise - a perpetual network licence that includes all packages and is capable of handling 1,000,000 nodes. There are no restrictions on use.

I settled on a perpetual academic licence with all the packages, capable of running 10,000 nodes. This cost $2,100, so it’s not a trivial investment. I really wanted a commercial licence but given I don’t run a network or use a server this is at the moment problematic. I also understand that Cyram wants to operate on a Royalty basis, which doesn’t work for most small businesses! I’m still in discussion with Cyram about this one. Fortunately I have a commercial perpetual licence for NetMiner 3 to cover my commercial activities

In the coming days I’ll provide a review covering the tools output and scripting capabilities. In short they are awesome!

Regards Graham