Exploring relationships and graphs

Reader outcome

Follow two recorded relationships from a familiar subject, interpret their direction and origin, and leave with an identifiable research trail—not an unsupported conclusion.

Before you begin

Choose a subject you can already open from Search or Browse, and a question about something connected to it. For example: Which people, places, works, or documents are connected to this subject, and why?

You do not need to know a graph ID. Public relationships may be explored within their collection’s displayed scope; following a link to restricted material does not grant access. This tutorial uses your chosen subject, rather than presuming that the same sample object or specific relationship exists in every collection.

1. Open the subject’s connected view

Start on your subject’s page. Find the available related subjects, relationships, or graph view and open it. Read the title and the type or description of the object you are starting from.

Look at what the view says it contains. It may show a selected collection, a local neighborhood of related objects, or the first page of a longer list. Before selecting a link, recognize that this is a view over recorded data, not an inventory of every relationship in the world.

If the page shows several groups or kinds of connections, choose the one most relevant to your question rather than simply taking the first visible result.

2. Read the first edge as a statement

Pick a connection from your subject to another person, place, concept, work, or source. Read the representation from end to end:

Direction matters. For illustration, A is located in B describes a different relationship from B is located in A. A graph may draw both objects next to each other, but their proximity does not establish either assertion. If the view shows an incoming link, do not silently rewrite it as an outgoing one or invent its inverse predicate.

Expected result: you can explain one recorded relationship in ordinary language while retaining its direction and origin. This is a description of what the source records, not yet a ruling that the assertion is true.

3. Open the related object and take a second step

Follow the selected link to its destination. Confirm the destination’s title, type, and identity. Return if it is a similarly named but different object.

From the destination, select a second relationship that advances your question. Read its direction and origin separately from the first one. The two edges may come from different providers, different editions, or different observations.

Record the path in this form:

Expected result: you can retrace both steps and explain what each asserts. The existence of a path between the first and third objects does not establish a direct relationship, causation, agreement, ownership, or evidentiary support between them.

4. Inspect provenance and a documentary reference

Return to one edge in the path and inspect the source or provenance information associated with it. Keep four things separate:

1. The producer or collection that reported or imported the relationship.
2. The underlying assertion: the particular subject, predicate, target, and any qualifiers.
3. A cited document or original publisher, if a reference was provided.
4. A retained copy or separate assessment, only if the view identifies one.

A Wikidata relationship, for example, may cite a work published by someone other than Wikidata. The imported statement and the publisher’s document are different objects. Following that citation helps you inspect a source; it does not mean the cited bytes were retained or that Counterpedia independently verified the statement.

Open a documentary reference where one is actually available, and identify its publisher, title, version or date when shown, and the relevant passage. If this relationship has no attached reference, preserve that absence rather than manufacturing a citation. Continue toward a source-backed relationship or end the trail with an explicit note that documentary support was not provided in the view.

5. Understand bounded neighborhoods and pagination

Return to the graph or related-material list. Check whether the visible neighborhood has a continuation, page boundary, or selected depth. If additional relationships are available, open the next group while retaining your place in the current trail.

If the view ends or reports a limit, interpret it carefully: you have reached the boundary of this requested view, not demonstrated that the subject has no other connections. A missing relationship can reflect selection, coverage, indexing, access, or the original provider’s data.

When inspecting another provider’s neighborhood, do not assume identical identifiers refer to the same object unless the product records an identity relation. Similar names and URLs are not enough to construct a cross-source identity.

6. Recover from ambiguous, missing or restricted paths

A relationship appears backwards. Reread its subject, predicate, target, and any incoming/outgoing label. Preserve the recorded direction. Follow a supported reverse relation only when it is actually present.

Two objects have the same name. Open each object’s context and identifier before choosing; avoid joining them based on labels alone.

The related item or source cannot be opened. Keep the relationship and reference you actually saw, note the missing destination or access restriction, and try a different authorized source. A visible link does not grant permission to read or redistribute the target.

There is no visible relationship or reference. Change the collection or search scope, or select another connection relevant to your question. Do not infer that the relationship does not exist anywhere.

You cannot continue through a larger neighborhood. Note the page, depth or view boundary that stopped you. An incomplete traversal is still an accurately described result when its limit is explicit.

7. Return to your subject with an inspectable trail

Go back to the starting subject. You should now be able to answer:

• What were the two objects connected by the first relationship, and what did its label and direction mean?
• Which second relationship did you follow, and did its provider or origin differ?
• Which document did you actually inspect, if one was available? Who published it, and which edition or passage mattered?
• What is the boundary of your conclusion? Did you observe only a graph association, or did you also examine documentary evidence relevant to the assertion?
• Which identities or links let you return to this specific path?

A useful graph session ends with a better research question and a traceable path. You do not need to run Check to complete it. If you want a focused assessment of a particular statement, Using Counterpedia Check is a separate, optional task; graph reachability does not produce a Check result.

Optional tutorials

The main procedure does not require these exercises. Choose a tutorial for a field-level comparison, or skip to the closing explanation below.

Skip the optional exercise and read the closing explanation.

Tutorial: Read a qualified statement

Compare a compact fact with its full statement, preserve the qualifiers that affect its meaning, and follow the references attached to that statement.

Starting material

Open Douglas Adams from Search or Browse and select a statement with at least one recorded qualifier. Keep the subject identifier and release or version visible in your notes. Use a statement with a reference for the documentary part of the exercise. A statement without qualifiers is not an example of a qualified statement.

1. Record the complete statement

Expand the statement and copy the supplied fields into the worksheet below. Use readable labels in your explanation and retain exact identifiers in the reference column.

Record an explicitly unknown or no-value state as displayed. Do not replace it with an empty string, zero, or a value from a different statement.

2. Compare the compact and expanded views

Compare the at-a-glance display with the expanded statement. Identify which fields the compact display includes and which require expansion. Determine whether a qualifier limits the time, place, method, or other scope of the value. Use the qualifier present; do not add a time limit just because the worksheet lists time as an example.

Write a one-sentence paraphrase that includes every qualification needed to preserve the meaning. Then write a separate exercise paraphrase with one qualifier omitted. Explain what the shorter sentence would incorrectly allow a reader to infer. Neither paraphrase edits the source record.

Expected result: you can point to the exact field responsible for the difference in meaning.

3. Inspect the attached reference

Open a reference from the selected statement, not a bibliography elsewhere on the page. Record its locator and publisher. Locate the relevant passage or metadata, and distinguish what you read in the document from what the dataset reports. A reference that cannot be opened remains an uninspected reference.

A reference group is associated with the selected statement. It is not automatically evidence for every other statement on the subject page.

4. Inspect the surrounding view

Read any pagination or truncation indication. An at-a-glance selection is a display subset. Follow the full-statement or next-page control when additional records are offered; keep the release or version consistent while comparing them.

Output and completion check

Keep the worksheet, the two labelled paraphrases, and the reference you inspected. Check that the value, its qualifiers, and its reference group still belong to the same statement. Describe the view’s limits separately from the statement’s meaning.

Apply the procedure elsewhere

Repeat the inspection on Eotyrannus. A different property or a statement with no qualifiers is a useful comparison, but label that difference. Explain which fields remain common and which are absent; do not create a qualifier to make the examples symmetrical.

Return to Exploring relationships and graphs, or continue with source identity and retained copies.

Corresponding overview

Follow connections

Continue

• Exploring sources and references — inspect the document reached through a reference.
• Tracing information back to its source — investigate one assertion and the passage attached to it.
• Reading an entry — return from the graph to the subject’s readable account.