EventAPI

Interface EventAPI

The EventAPI provides the functions registerListener and unregisterListener for managing event listeners. Examples of event triggers are the addition and removal of nodes, changes to node properties, and user interactions with the visualization.

  • The EventType enum lists all available event types.
  • An event listener is registered for a set of event types and must implement the IEventListener interface.
  • An event's type property specifies its EventType and determines its structure.

The example below demonstrates how to register a listener for NODE_ADDED events. Registering an event listener returns a listener ID, which can be used to unregister the listener later.

// Get the webvis context
const context = webvis.getContext();

// Register a listener for NODE_ADDED events
const listenerId = context.registerListener([webvis.EventType.NODE_ADDED], (event) => {
   // Print the ID of the added node.
   console.log(event.targetNodeID);
});

// ...

// Later: unregister the listener
context.unregisterListener(listenerId);

Several events are linked to a specific node in the hierarchy, e.g. NodeClickedEvents. When registering a listener for the corresponding event types, a listening scope must be specified in the node hierarchy. For more information, see the registerListener function.

interface EventAPI {
    registerListener<T extends WebVisEvent = WebVisEvent>(
        eventTypes: EventType[],
        listener: IEventListener<T>,
        nodeID?: number,
        observeSubTree?: boolean,
    ): number;
    unregisterListener(listenerID: number): void;
}

Hierarchy (View Summary)

Index

Methods

registerListener unregisterListener

Methods

  • Registers a listener for a set of EventTypes. If the given event types array is empty, the listener will react to all event types. The listener must implement the IEventListener interface. It will be called with events that extend the WebVisEvent base class. An event's type property specifies its EventType and determines its structure.

    Several EventTypes are linked to a specific node in the hierarchy. These include all that have a NODE_ or TOPOLOGY_ prefix, as well as several animation-related event types.

    When registering a listener for these event types, a listening scope must be specified in the node hierarchy. This is done by setting the optional parameters nodeID and observeSubTree. The observeSubTree flag determines whether the listener is scoped to only the specified node or the entire subtree under the node.

    By default, listeners are scoped to the global root node and observeSubTree is false, such that listeners do not receive any events linked to added nodes. To listen to events from all nodes, set nodeID to 0 and observeSubTree to true.

    There are a few things to note when scoping listeners:

    • NODE_ADDED events are linked to the parent node of the added node.
    • NODE_CHANGED events behave differently depending on the node property that has changed. When the node property is recursive, the event is passed to all listeners in the subtree. When the change to the node property affects the node's ancestors, events will also be triggered for the ancestors.

    Type Parameters

    • T extends WebVisEvent = WebVisEvent

      The type of event that the listener listens to. This can also be a union of multiple event types.

    Parameters

    • eventTypes: EventType[]

      The types of events that the listener listens to. If an empty array is passed, the listener will listen to all event types.

    • listener: IEventListener<T>

      The event listener.

    • OptionalnodeID: number

      The ID of the node to which the listener should be scoped. Default: 0

    • OptionalobserveSubTree: boolean

      If set to true, the listener will be scoped to the whole subtree under the specified node. Default: false

    Returns number

    • The ID of the event listener.

  • Unregisters the event listener with the given ID.

    Parameters

    • listenerID: number

      The ID of the event listener that should be unregistered.

    Returns void

    EventAPI