First, you should load recharts:

library(recharts)

1 Introduction

Force plot includes 2 basic types:

Force chart with curve
Force chart with line

The keys are:

data structure:
matrix mode: A data.frame comprising of a column of name, and a numeric matrix. Assign the name column to x, the matrix to y.
node/link mode: node data.frame [x, NA, series, weight]; link data.frame [x, x1, relation, value]. Combine them using rbind. If you don’t provide node data.frame, recharts will build it automatically. Assign the param list [x, x1, series/relation, weight/value] accordingly.
force chart and chord chart are exchangeble by the toolbox buttons.

2 Function Call

echartr(data, x, <y>, <series>, <t>, <type>, <subtype>)

Arg	Requirement
data	source data in the form of data.frame
x	character independent variable. Other type will be coerced to factors. For node/link mode, you must provide two columns of `x`. For matrix mode, only the first column of `x` is accepted.
y	numeric dependent variable. For node/link mode, only the first column of `y` is accepted. For matrix mode, all the columns of `y` are accepted.
series	series variable which will be coerced to factors. Only the first one is accepted if multiple variables are provided.
t	timeline variable which will be coerced to factors. Only the first one is accepted if multiple variables are provided.
type	‘force’/‘force_curve’, ‘force_line’.
subtype	force: c(“arrow”, “triangle”) arrow: The end symbol of the connection lines is arrow. triangle: The end symbol of the connection lines is triangle force_line: c(“arrow”, “triangle”)

3 Showcase

3.1 Data Preparation

3.1.1 Matrix Mode

grpmtx <- matrix(c(11975, 5871, 8916, 2868, 1951, 10048, 2060, 6171, 8010, 16145,
                   8090, 8045, 1013, 990, 940, 6907), byrow=TRUE, nrow=4)
grpmtx <- as.data.frame(grpmtx)
names(grpmtx) <- paste0('Group', 1:4)
grpmtx$Name <- paste0('Group', 1:4)
knitr::kable(grpmtx, align=c('lllll'))

Group1	Group2	Group3	Group4	Name
11975	5871	8916	2868	Group1
1951	10048	2060	6171	Group2
8010	16145	8090	8045	Group3
1013	990	940	6907	Group4

The first 4 columns are exactly a matrix structure and the last column is a name vector. So this meets data structure requirements for matrix mode.

Matrix mode can be transformed to node/link mode as well. Matrix[i, j] represents 2 nodes (i & j) and 1 link (i -> j).

3.1.2 Node/link Mode

str(yuNetwork)

## List of 2
##  $ nodes:'data.frame':   49 obs. of  3 variables:
##   ..$ name  : chr [1:49] "曾麟书" "曾国藩" "曾纪泽" "曾纪鸿" ...
##   ..$ series: chr [1:49] "Root" "Node 1" "Node 2" "Node 2" ...
##   ..$ value : num [1:49] 3 9 3 3 3 3 6 3 3 6 ...
##  $ links:'data.frame':   49 obs. of  4 variables:
##   ..$ source  : chr [1:49] "曾麟书" "曾麟书" "曾麟书" "曾国藩" ...
##   ..$ target  : chr [1:49] "曾国藩" "曾国荃" "曾国潢" "曾纪泽" ...
##   ..$ relation: chr [1:49] "父子" "父子" "父子" "父子" ...
##   ..$ weight  : num [1:49] 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 ...

The yuNetwork dataset contains a nodes data.frame and a links data.frame. You can then combine them into one.

nodes:
- name: the nodes name,
- series: the series that the nodes belongs to,
- value: the importance score of the nodes.
links:
- source and target: defines the connections,
- relation: the name of the connections,
- weight: the importance sorce of the connections.

nodes <- cbind(yuNetwork$nodes[,1], NA, yuNetwork$nodes[,2:3],
               stringsAsFactors=FALSE)
names(nodes) <- names(yuNetwork$links)
yu <- rbind(yuNetwork$links, nodes, stringsAsFactors=FALSE)

3.2 Force Chart

3.2.1 Force with Curve

Set type ‘force’.

echartr(yu, c(source, target), weight, relation, type='force') %>% 
    setTitle("Yu Family of Shaoxing") %>% setTheme(palette=c(
        'tan3','green3','green2','lawngreen','olivedrab1'))

3.2.2 Force with Line

3.2.2.1 Matrix Mode

echartr(grpmtx, Name, c(Group1, Group2, Group3, Group4), type='force_line') %>% 
  setTitle('Test Data', 'Force with ribbon')

3.2.2.2 Node/link Mode

Set type ‘force_line’.

echartr(yu, c(source, target), weight, relation, type='force_line') %>% 
    setTitle("Yu Family of Shaoxing") %>% setTheme(palette=c(
        'tan3','green3','green2','lawngreen','olivedrab1'))

3.2.3 Force with Timeline

Let’s use year columns as timeline.

echartr(deutsch, c(club, player), weight, role, t=year,
        type='force', sub='arrow') %>% 
  setTitle('Club Orientation of Deutsch Soccer Team')

4 Futher Setup

Then you can configure the widgets, add markLines and/or markPoints, fortify the chart.

You can refer to related functions to play around on your own.

Basic Plots 14 - Force Chart