Ardoq's visualization environment brings together data exploration, analysis, and editing into a single, unified experience. Instead of switching between workspaces, builders, and editors, you can explore, analyze, and update your architecture data directly in the view.
Key benefits:
Explore data visually without technical expertise. Navigate your architecture by clicking through components and their relationships — no need to understand the metamodel or build traversals from scratch.
Stay in context while making updates. Edit component fields, create references, and switch analytical perspectives without leaving the visualization.
Find what you need faster. A context selector in the toolbar makes it easy to switch or add components to your view, and viewpoint switching lets you change analytical perspective in one click.
Built for the most common use cases. The interface keeps complex tools out of the way until you need them, so everyday tasks like exploring data and updating fields are straightforward.
What you can do in views
Ardoq's visualization environment lets you interact with your architecture data through three core capabilities:
Exploring data — Navigate through components and their relationships using viewpoints, with the ability to explore the graph further by expanding connections from individual components.
Switching perspectives — Apply different viewpoints to the same data to change what data is shown, how it's structured, and how it's visualized. A viewpoint defines the traversal (which components and relationships to include), the view style (block diagram, dependency map, etc.), and any formatting, grouping, or filtering.
Updating data — Edit component fields, create new components and references, and manage your architecture model directly from the Component Overview Page.
The experience is designed around a simple workflow: find a component, explore its context, apply the right viewpoint, and make updates — all without leaving the view.
Creating and managing viewpoints
Viewpoints are reusable templates that define what data to show and how to show it. They determine which components and relationships appear in a visualization and which view style (block diagram, dependency map, etc.) to use.
Using existing viewpoints
Most of the time, you'll work with viewpoints that have already been created by your organization's architects or admins. You can find and apply these from:
The Viewpoints panel in the sidebar — click the Viewpoints icon in the toolbar to browse available viewpoints for your current component type.
The Component Overview Page — the Viewpoints tab shows all viewpoints that apply to the selected component.
Creating new viewpoints
You can create viewpoints in several ways.
From the Viewpoints page:
Go to the Viewpoints page and click Create new in the top right.
Define your starting component type and select context components.
Build a traversal by adding paths to related component types.
Configure filters, grouping, labels, and conditional formatting.
Save as a viewpoint.
From a view:
Load a component and build a traversal around it.
Configure the view style, formatting, grouping, and filters as needed.
Save the resulting configuration as a reusable viewpoint.
Tip: Most users don't need to create viewpoints themselves. If you find yourself building the same traversal repeatedly, ask your Ardoq admin whether a shared viewpoint already exists, or request one be created.
Default viewpoints
When you double-click a component or navigate to it without a specific viewpoint selected, Ardoq shows the component's immediate neighbour — all incoming and outgoing references to any connected component. This gives you an instant overview of a component's context without needing to configure anything.
Exploring data in views
The view
The main area of the screen is dedicated to your visualized data. The visualization style depends on the active viewpoint — available styles include:
Block diagram — hierarchical layout showing parent-child and grouping relationships.
Dependency map — shows directed references between components.
Relationship map — network-style view of all connections.
Bubble chart — size-based visualization for comparing component attributes.
Timeline — chronological view of components along a time axis.
Interactive blocks — interactive, editable block-based layout.
Interacting with the view
Click a component to select it.
Double-click a component to explore it — this replaces the current view with an overview of all directly connected components (both incoming and outgoing references) for that specific component.
Right-click a component to access the context menu, where you can see component details, create references, add child components, apply saved viewpoints, build a custom graph extension for that component, and more.
Tools available in the view
The toolbar at the top of the screen gives you access to several panels:
Details — View key fields and information about the selected component. Quickly review or update data without opening the full Component Overview Page.
Viewpoints — Browse, search, and switch between saved viewpoints. See Switching viewpoints below.
View styles, formatting, and grouping — Change how your data is visualized. Switch between view styles (block diagram, dependency map, etc.), apply conditional formatting, and configure grouping rules.
Datasets and components — Manage the datasets loaded in your view, and browse the components available within them.
Exploring from a specific component
There are two ways to explore the connections of a specific component:
Double-click to quickly see everything connected to it. This replaces the current view, removing all other data and loading all connections one degree out from that component. It's the fastest way to answer "what does this thing connect to?"
Right-click → Add dataset to view for more control. This gives you two options:
Apply a saved viewpoint — load a saved viewpoint with this component as context, added alongside your existing data.
Open new dataset from selection — opens the Viewpoint Builder, letting you select exactly which triples (relationship paths) to load for that specific component only.
Navigating Components and Viewpoints
Switching context components
The context component is the focal point of your current viewpoint. To change it:
Use the context selector in the toolbar to search for and select a different component to load into your viewpoint. The selector shows components of the applicable type in your current viewpoint from any workspace containing that component type.
Switching viewpoints
To see the same data through a different analytical lens:
Click the Viewpoints button (the visibility icon) in the toolbar at the top of the screen to open the Viewpoints panel.
Browse or search available viewpoints. If you have a component selected in the view, viewpoints applicable to that component's type are shown. Otherwise, viewpoints applicable to your current context component type are shown.
Click a viewpoint to apply it. If you have a component selected, that component becomes the new context and the viewpoint is applied to it. If no component is selected, the viewpoint replaces the current one while keeping your context component the same.
You can also switch viewpoints from the Component Overview Page — the Viewpoints tab lists all applicable viewpoints with previews.
Browser history
Ardoq supports browser back/forward navigation. As you navigate between components and viewpoints, your journey is tracked in the browser history. Use your browser's back and forward buttons to retrace your steps.
Updating data directly from the view
You can update architecture data directly while working in a view through the Component Overview Page. Right-click a component and select the edit option, or click through from the details panel, to open the Component Overview Page as a drawer. From there you can edit fields, create and manage references, access viewpoints, and customize component styling — all without losing your place in the view.
For full details, see the Component Overview Page article.
Best Practices
For admins and architects
Create and share viewpoints for common analytical questions so users don't need to build their own.
Use meaningful viewpoint names and descriptions — these appear in the viewpoint panel and help users choose the right one.
Define metamodel constraints to control which reference types are available for each component type. This simplifies the reference creation experience on the Component Overview Page.
For data quality
Update data where you find it — the Component Overview Page makes it easy to fix outdated fields as you encounter them during exploration.
Use reference creation in the Component Overview Page rather than external spreadsheets or bulk imports when adding individual relationships. It validates against your metamodel, preventing invalid connections.
Known Limitations
No in-view quick filtering yet. You cannot hide or show component types, reference types, or adjust degrees of separation directly in the view. Changes to what's visible currently require opening the Viewpoint Builder.
Saving custom explorations as viewpoints is not yet supported. If you build up an ad-hoc graph expansion from specific components resulting in multiple datasets, you cannot save this as a reusable viewpoint.
No advanced search for context components. The context selector currently only shows components from the workspaces of the context component type. If you need to search with more advanced criteria, you have to use the Viewpoint Builder (Datasets in the top bar → Edit dataset on the dataset block in the left-hand panel).
Multiple datasets (data blocks) prohibit saving as a viewpoint. If you load more than one dataset in a single view, you cannot save the combined view as a viewpoint.
Browser history works but is invisible. While back/forward navigation works, there is no visual history panel showing where you've been — you can only retrace steps, not see your journey.
The Grid Editor is not yet replaced. Bulk editing and creation of components still uses the legacy Grid Editor, which doesn't fully integrate with the viewpoint experience.
Deep hierarchies require manual traversal setup. Recursive structures (e.g., capability hierarchies 5+ levels deep) must be manually configured at each level in the Viewpoint Builder. Repetition support is not yet available.
Not available in legacy Discover or workspace-based workflows.
What's Next
We're actively working to improve the working-in-the-view experience. Here's what's planned:
We consider adding
Simplified traversal exploration — a more visual, interactive way to define what data you see, without needing to master the full Viewpoint Builder.
Instance-level graph expansion — an improved interface for extending the graph from a single component, following specific relationship paths, again not needing the Viewpoint Builder.
Repetitions in the graph — define a recursive pattern once (e.g., "capability → sub-capability") and have it apply to all levels automatically.
History panel — a visible navigation trail showing where you've been, making exploration feel safe and retraceable.
Save the start query — filter the list of context components when opening a viewpoint, so you only see relevant components.
Later
In-view quick filtering — hide/show component types and reference types directly in the view without opening the builder. Apply filters in-view to curate what you see.
Save a viewpoint from what you see — save any explored view as a reusable viewpoint, regardless of how it was built.
Guided reference creation — create references directly in the view with drag-and-drop, with duplicate prevention and metamodel compliance.
Explore further
Product tour: Explore how to work in the view with this quick interactive tour.
Have feedback? Share it with us via your Customer Success Manager or directly on the Ardoq Product Portal.