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Like the title says, is it possible to position a node a certain distance away from another node at a certain angle from that node?

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2 Answers 2

up vote 10 down vote accepted

Yes, TikZ can use polar coordinates. Not sure exactly what is the best way of defining the second node, here is one way.

  \node (A) {A};
  \path (A) ++(30:2) node (B) [draw,fill=blue!20] {B};

In (30:2) 30 is the angle, 2 the distance. 0° is to the right, positive direction is counterclockwise, so node B will be above and to the right of A.

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Gnashing teeth - just beat me to it... –  Brent.Longborough Sep 7 '11 at 19:14
Is it possible to use the \node command instead of \path? Or at least include a style in \path? –  gablin Sep 7 '11 at 19:31
@gablin: I'm no expert, but I wasn't able to think of a way to do it with \node. But you can still do stuff like \path (A) ++(30:2) node (B) [draw,fill=blue!20] {B}; to style the node, if that was what you wanted. –  Torbjørn T. Sep 7 '11 at 19:37
@Torbjorn T: Yup, that's what I wanted. Thanks! =) –  gablin Sep 8 '11 at 9:37

TikZ allows you to specify positions and vectors in polar coordinates. Here's an example:

\node at (0,0) (a) {A node};
\node at (120:1cm) (b) {B node};
\path (a) ++(-45:2cm) node (c) {C node}; 
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