Reveal

The Reveal tool is a way to step through a Cypher statement step-by-step to understand how it executes. Reveal focuses on stepping through the Cypher syntax itself, primarily by re-writing the Cypher statement progressively to include more and more of the syntax. As each additional piece of Cypher is executed, nodes and relationships are added to a graph visualization to show how the additional piece of Cypher affects the results.

Reveal does not currently map Cypher syntax to the actual query plan, where Cypher syntax gets transformed into Operators (https://neo4j.com/docs/cypher-manual/current/planning-and-tuning/operators/). You will still need to use the PROFILE and EXPLAIN keywords in Neo4j Browser, Workspace, or UPX if you want to analyze Cypher execution in this way (https://neo4j.com/docs/cypher-manual/current/planning-and-tuning/).

How to use Reveal

The image below shows the different areas of the Reveal tool.

cypher workbench reveal overview

To use Reveal follow these steps:

  1. Connect to a Neo4j database

  2. Enter Cypher

  3. Use the Run / Debug buttons

  4. See Results

    1. Graph Visualization

    2. Results Table

  5. Configure colors and labels

Click on an item above to get more information.