So far in this book, we have studied graphs in a static manner; in other words, we imported graphs from an external data source and the graph content (nodes or relationships) was never changed. Studying the graph structure in this way gives us some information about the data it is representing. However, in a real-life scenario, whether your graph models a road network or an e-commerce website, it will change over time. In a dynamic graph, all parts of the graph can change. Here are some examples of the ways in which a graph can change:
- Node addition: New users subscribing to a service, new products added to the catalog, or new intersections created.
- Node removal: Products no longer manufactured or customers leaving.
- Link addition: An existing customer buys another product, or a road is added between two intersections.
- Link removal: A closed road or a customer unsubscribing from some services, but maintaining a subscription for other products.
Predicting all of these...
