make a node contain several other nodes?

Question

Say I have three nodes, A, B and C. I want to draw an oval around those three nodes, and have that oval count as a new node D. So I want to be able to draw an edge from D to some other node F (and also be able to draw a node from B to F, which would of course intersect the bounding oval that defines the node D). How can I do that?

Answer 1

1. Choose one of the first three group style templates from the "Group Nodes" palette section as the default group style template. (The default template is the one with the blue background.)
2. Select nodes A, B, and C.
3. Group the selected nodes using "Grouping" -> "Group" or CTRL+ALT+G.
4. Change the group node's Shape property to "Ellipse".
5. Increase the group node's Top Group Inset, Left Group Inset, Bottom Group Inset, and Right Group Inset properties to restrict placement of A, B, and C inside the visual oval group bounds.

Comments

(1) How do I remove all the text at the top of the group (the "-" sign, and "Group 1"?

(2) Can I make a node part of two groups? I want to make venn diagrams. When I tried, one group occluded the other

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The "-" sign is not text, but a control for closing the group node. If you do not want that control to be displayed, change "File" -> "Preferences", tab "Display", option "Group State Icon" to "Never Show Group State". Changing this option will however affect all group nodes.

To remove the "Group 1" text, select the group node and clear the its "Text" property. Additionally, you might want to change label properties "Background" to "No Color" and "Size" to "Fit Content".

A node may only belong to at most one group node. Thus yEd is not well-suited to creating venn diagrams. Nevertheless, it is possible to do so by creating the visual impression of one node belonging to multiple groups by using semi-transparent background colors. yEd even comes with a venn diagram sample, see "Help" -> "Example Graphs" -> "Visual Features" -> "venn_diagram_ps3.graphmlz".