# How to Share a Graphviz Diagram — Dependency Graphs That Open Canonical: https://commareports.com/share-graphviz-diagram Published: 2026-09-14 > dot -Tsvg gives you a file, not a link. Publish the SVG as a page so a dependency or call graph opens in a browser with text selectable and searchable. # Share a Graphviz diagram `dot -Tsvg deps.dot -o deps.svg` finishes in a second and produces exactly what you wanted: the dependency graph, laid out properly, every edge accounted for. Now send it to the person who asked why the build takes eleven minutes. You have an SVG file, and a file is not a link. ## Use SVG, and mean it The format choice is not cosmetic here. Graphviz graphs are usually large and text-dense — package names, function symbols, module paths — and the reader's first action is almost always to look for one specific node. - **`-Tsvg`** keeps labels as text. Ctrl-F finds `libcrypto`. Zoom stays sharp. - **`-Tpng`** makes all of that unsearchable, and at the width of a real dependency graph the labels are unreadable at fit-to-screen. ```bash dot -Tsvg deps.dot -o deps.svg ``` ## Publish it inside a page Inline the SVG into a small document and publish that: ```html Build dependency graph — main

Build dependency graph

Generated from main. Red edges are cycles.

``` The scroll container is the detail people forget. A dependency graph is often six thousand pixels wide, and without `overflow: auto` it either overflows the page or gets squashed into illegibility. Inlining rather than linking keeps it one self-contained file — a separate `deps.svg` alongside is the missing-sibling problem behind [HTML reports that lose their CSS](/html-report-broken-css). ## Regenerate it in CI A dependency graph is only interesting when it is current, and the honest lifespan of a hand-generated one is about a week. Render it in the pipeline and update the same report on every merge: ```yaml - run: dot -Tsvg build/deps.dot -o build/deps.svg - run: ./scripts/publish.sh build/deps.svg ``` One permanent URL that always shows `main`, instead of an artifact that [expires](/fix/ci-artifact-expired) and a Slack thread full of dead links. See [publishing from CI](/ci). ## Anything that emits DOT The same path works for the tools that use Graphviz as a backend rather than as a diagramming language: - `go tool pprof -dot` — call graphs from a profile - `madge`, `dependency-cruiser` — JavaScript module graphs (see [sharing a dependency-cruiser report](/share-dependency-cruiser-report)) - `pydeps`, `jdeps` — Python and JVM dependencies - `terraform graph` — resource dependency graphs Render to SVG, publish, share the URL. ## Worth knowing - **`rankdir=LR` for deep graphs.** Vertical layouts get impossibly tall; browsers scroll horizontally better than they scroll a 20,000px page. - **Comments anchor to the graph**, so "this edge shouldn't exist" lands on the diagram — see [commenting on HTML](/comment-on-html). - **5 MB per report body.** Even large SVG graphs fit comfortably. ## Try it Free — unlimited reports, commenters and revisions. **[Publish a diagram →](/docs/quickstart)** ### Related - [Share a PlantUML diagram](/share-plantuml-diagram) · [Share a Mermaid diagram](/share-mermaid-diagram) - [Share a dependency-cruiser report](/share-dependency-cruiser-report) · [Share a flamegraph](/share-flamegraph) - [Publish from CI](/ci) · [Commenting on HTML](/comment-on-html)