Snapshot Filtering (Temporal Views)

The snapshot filter is the diagram's time control. It decides which entities, relationships, and distributions belong to the slice of time you want to see. This page is the full reference — if you just want to drive it, start at How to Use Snapshots instead.

1. Why this exists

Ownership structures move. Directors come and go. Trustees change. Shares are issued and transferred. Group members join and leave. A diagram that ignored dates would always show the union of every past, present, and future arrangement piled on top of itself.

The snapshot filter lets you ask the diagram a specific question:

• "What did this structure look like as at today?"
• "What did it look like on 30 June last year?"
• "What does it look like through the FY2025 income period?"
• "What entities exist anywhere in the timeline, with no date filter at all?"

2. The mental model: a window over a timeline

Every snapshot is a window — an interval on the timeline — with each bound optional. There are five possible shapes:

An entity or relationship is included when its own lifetime (also possibly open-ended) overlaps the window. That single rule is the whole filter.

3. The overlap rule

Each item has a lifetime defined by two optional bounds:

• Relationships: start date and end date.
• Entities (standalone): group join date and group exit date.
• Distributions: a single distribution date (treated as [date, date]).

An item is in the snapshot when:

itemStart ≤ windowEnd  AND  itemEnd ≥ windowStart

A missing bound on either side is treated as ±∞ — i.e., open-ended.

Worked examples (window = 1 Jan 2024 → 30 Jun 2024)

Worked examples (window = From 1 Jan 2024 only)

Worked examples (window = Up to 1 Jan 2024 only)

4. The two toggles

These checkboxes sit at the bottom of the popover and apply immediately on change. They are disabled in All dates mode (where the filter is inert).

Include undated

What it controls: items that have no dates at all on either end of their lifetime.

Default: on. Practical effect: with this off, your diagram only shows relationships that have been given proper appointment / cessation dates.

Hide disconnected entities

What it controls: entities that survive their own date check but have no visible relationships within the snapshot window.

Tip: leave this on for clean structure views; turn it off when you want to confirm an entity is in scope even though no in-period relationships connect it.

5. Where snapshot interacts with other diagram filters

A diagram has three independent ideas of "scope":

These compose, in order. The snapshot does not override the entity filter — if an entity is not in scope, the snapshot can never bring it back. The locked product rules are:

1. All content is filtered by the snapshot. Canvas, edges, in-node detail rows, and synthetic role nodes are all filtered through the same overlap rule.
2. Out-of-scope entities are completely excluded. They do not appear in the canvas, the stencil, or any node's content.
3. In-scope but stencil-hidden entities still appear inside other nodes' content (e.g., a hidden director still appears in the parent company's node-content director list), provided the snapshot includes them.

Interaction matrix

6. How relationships, distributions, and node content are filtered

Canvas relationships

• A relationship is shown if its lifetime overlaps the window (see Section 3).
• Relationships with no dates follow the Include undated toggle.

In-node detail rows (officeholders, beneficiaries, named shareholders, etc.)

The same rule applies to every detail row inside a node:

• A row is shown if its relationship's lifetime overlaps the window.
• The target person/entity must also be in the entity filter scope (rule 2 above).
• Undated rows follow the Include undated toggle.

A former director with a cessation date earlier than the window will not appear in the company's directors list. A current director who hasn't been given an appointment date will appear if Include undated is on, and disappear if it's off.

Distributions

• A distribution is a point-in-time event. It appears if its distribution date falls inside the window.
• Distributions are unaffected by Include undated (they always have a date) and by Hide disconnected (they sit on relationships, not entities).
• Distribution rendering still requires the Distributions link toggle under Diagram Settings.

Synthetic role nodes (e.g., grouped beneficiaries)

Treated the same as in-node content: filtered by snapshot and by entity-filter scope.

7. Stencil visual cues

8. Defaults and persistence

The mode 'live' is intentional: it lets the diagram re-resolve to "today" every time it loads, rather than locking onto the day you first opened it.

Selecting All dates is also persisted (as mode: 'all') so the diagram remembers your preference across reloads.

9. Performance and limits

• Snapshot filtering runs entirely client-side over the relationships and entities already loaded for the diagram. There is no extra network round-trip per snapshot change.
• Switching between Today (live) and All dates is effectively free; pinning a date triggers a graph re-sync to update stencil placement.
• Diagrams in scenario mode use the scenario's own snapshot setting, which can be inherited from the base diagram (see Scenario Settings).

10. Edge cases

11. Related topics

• How to Use Snapshots — task-oriented walkthrough
• Snapshot Filtering FAQ — troubleshooting
• Diagram Scopes — controlling which entities are eligible to draw
• Focus Entity — how the focal entity affects scope
• Distributions — how distribution dates interact with snapshots
• How to Create Relationships — putting dates on relationships so snapshots can use them