# How the Map works

> What the map's colours, views and box show, and what it is not.

Page: https://docs.memex.tools/how-the-map-works

**Map**, beside **List** at the top of **Notes**, draws the same notes as a picture: every note is a dot, every wiki-link a line drawn the way it was written. The search box, **All tags** and **Status** stay where they are and work as they do on the list, except that what they leave out is dimmed rather than removed, so you still see where the matches sit.

Red marks notes that need work (no tags, no description, no links either way, links that lead nowhere), yellow marks notes you flagged, and notes waiting for review are faded. Position means nothing; only colour and size do.

## Views

**Everything**, **Orphans**, **Hubs**, **Neighbourhood**, **Possibly stale**, **Islands**, each with a sentence saying why you would look. **Suggested links** adds dashed lines between notes that are close in meaning but not linked; a dashed line is a suggestion, not a fact.

**2D** and **3D** switch between the flat map and a flyable view that separates clusters a flat map has to overlap; 3D needs a mouse or trackpad. On either, drag a note to move it. Very large collections are capped at six hundred notes on the map, flagged and defective ones first.

## The box

Clicking a note opens a box over the map with its description, tags, what it needs, its links either way and **Open note**; clicking one of its tags shows that tag's notes. With no note picked, **Orphans**, **Hubs**, **Possibly stale** and **Islands** list their notes in the same box. It opens in the top right corner; drag its bar to move it, and it stays there until you close it. Closing puts it back in the corner, and the next note or view you click opens it again.

## What the map is not

The map is a way to navigate and to spot what needs attention. It is not a knowledge graph: memex extracts no entities and no facts.

**Settings › Preferences** › **Map** chooses flat or 3D, dots or squares, curved, straight or arrowed links, and whether labels show titles, numbers or nothing.

## Related

- [Map](https://docs.memex.tools/map): Your notes as dots and their links as lines, with views for orphans, hubs and stale notes.
- [How search and the Notes list work](https://docs.memex.tools/how-search-works): How a search chooses between exact words and meaning, the search operators, filters, workspaces and the list itself.