Choose your learning path

The core audience is a nontechnical analyst working with an agent; v0.6.0 initially serves technical analysts and integrators more completely (see Who GraphForge is for). The coordinated launch starts with the public Hub lifecycle, whose production fixture and publish-back qualification are still blocked. For a local lesson available now, both paths offer a small graph and a question. Choose by your current skills, not by how ambitious your research question is. The docs target v0.6.0; Installation states package availability.

Basic

No programming prerequisite. The explanations assume no more technical background than a first-year anthropology student. Learn what the data represents, how records are connected, how to inspect an answer, and what conclusions the evidence supports. Technical execution is guided or assisted by a coding agent or technical helper.

1. Your first graph: understand items, connections, and a question.
2. Work with an agent: ask for a result and check what ran.
3. Your first mixed-methods project: connect survey responses and interview excerpts, challenge an explanation, and revisit a saved finding.

You can complete these tasks without studying research Branches, ontology contracts, command-line flags, or database internals. Basic does not mean a point-and-click application is available: the execution guide states when a helper needs to install or run software.

Advanced

Basic Python, database, and terminal skills. Think of the technical background of a second-year data science student. Write and adapt queries, run analyses, save and move projects, and use research history when needed. GraphForge-specific concepts are introduced at the task that uses them; expert engine knowledge is not assumed.

Start with Advanced: work directly with GraphForge, then choose a notebook or language integration. Continue to save and reopen, query, construct, and analyze. Inquiry records, history, and sharing are optional tasks, not a completion checklist.

Specialist reference and contributor material

The API reference is for looking up a command or method. Architecture, formal contracts, and engineering serve implementers and maintainers. They remain available, but neither learning path requires reading them first.