One-line diagrams, clearances and switching

One circuit. One picture. Everyone on it.

NodeFabric gives engineers, operators, and field crews a live, shared one-line of the circuit — and a safer, auditable way to plan and execute switching. Operate devices on the model, watch energization update, hold-tag what must not be touched, and run every switching order against the diagram instead of a piece of paper.

Web based · nothing to install Works off-signal in the field

Start a trial Request a demo

Illustrative feeder. Switching and energization state are simulated for demonstration — see real screenshots below.

One package

One circuit model. Four workflows.

Model it. Issue it. Plan it. Execute it. NodeFabric gives engineering, operations, and field crews one shared distribution model for diagrams, switching, clearances, and training.

01 / Diagram

Interactive one-line

Every circuit modeled, revision-controlled, and operable on screen — office or pole.

02 / Simulator

Training on your circuits

Scenarios built from real switching orders, scored, and run without touching the live model.

03 / Compliance

The record, written for you

Clearances, overrides, certifications and every step execution, named and timestamped.

One shared model

Retire the static drawings and siloed exports.

Every role works from the same up-to-date circuit model — not a PDF from last year, a GIS export on someone’s desktop, and a markup nobody else can see.

System engineers

Model the circuit once

Import existing topologies or draw them in the visual Circuit Builder. Every change is a numbered revision with a name on it, and everyone downstream sees the issued drawing immediately.

Operators

See what happens, before it happens

Operate devices directly on the diagram and watch energization — including backfeed from online DER — update in real time. A live sandbox for the plan before any switch is thrown in the field.

Field crews

The control room’s view, at the pole

Every switching step shows the exact device highlighted in the live one-line, from any device with a browser. Pin the circuit before you leave and it still opens where there’s no signal.

Core platform · 12 capabilities

Everything switching touches, in one tool.

Diagrams, the interactive circuit model, clearances, and switching orders read from the same live data — so they can’t drift out of sync.

F‑01

Web-based one-line diagrams

Modern, interactive one-lines for every distribution circuit — searchable, zoomable, printable, and accessible from the control room or the field.

F‑02

Simulated power flow & backfeed

Open a switch on the model and energization is re-traced from the modeled topology — including sections backfed by DER marked online, shown separately from grid-fed line. A simulation of the circuit, not a SCADA telemetry feed.

F‑03

Switching orders

Build orders step by step with an authored restoration section, assign steps to individuals, and execute against the live diagram so circuit impact is visible as it happens.

F‑04

Clearances & hold tags

Place a do-not-operate tag on a device and the platform blocks operating it — in simulation and in a switching-order step alike. Only an operator can override, only with a reason, and every override is recorded permanently.

F‑05

Revision control

Every drawing carries a revision number and a revision block behind it. Compare any two revisions device by device, and restore an earlier one as a new revision — nothing is overwritten.

F‑06

Drawing review workflow

Turn it on and a builder edit becomes a draft, not a live change. Written by, checked by, approved by — three names on the title block, and the author can’t approve their own work.

F‑07

Works where the signal doesn’t

Pin a circuit before the truck leaves and the one-line opens with no connection — read-only, scoped to what was pinned, and expired after 12 hours so nobody works from stale data.

F‑08

Visual Circuit Builder

Drag-and-drop the full distribution palette — breakers, reclosers, sectionalizers, switches, fuses, ties, regulators, transformers, capacitors, loads — plus solar, wind, generators, and batteries.

F‑09

Tie & cross-feeder modeling

A tie switch points at its far-side device — including devices on other feeders at the same station — so alternate sources are explicit on the drawing instead of tribal knowledge.

F‑10

Device & asset data

Each device carries phase, voltage, state and normal position alongside pole, FLOC, line/road, and customers served — and anything off its normal position is flagged on the diagram.

F‑11

Import, export & print

Load topologies in bulk from CSV — multiple circuits per file — with a diff preview before anything commits. Export circuits back to CSV, or a clean one-line to PDF with title block, revision, and legend.

F‑12

Full audit trail

Every status change, step execution, remark, and tag override records who did it and when. When someone asks what happened on last Tuesday’s order, the answer is one click.

How it works

Plan on the model. Execute with the model.

Model the circuit, issue the drawing, plan the switching, and execute it in the field — four stages, one set of data, one record of who did what.

01 / MODEL

Get your circuits in, safely

Import an existing topology and NodeFabric shows you a full diff — added, removed, and changed devices — before anything writes to your circuits. Or skip the export entirely and draw the circuit in the visual builder, wiring devices together on the canvas with validation as you go.

Preview every change before it’s committed
Multiple circuits per file, tolerant of messy source data
Organized by station, with cross-feeder ties modeled explicitly
Export back out in the same format, anytime

Upload preview — 2 circuits in file

CIRC1 Will replace

14 devices in file

2 added 1 removed 3 changed

421D1 New circuit

8 devices in file

ViewCSV IMPORT — DIFF

StateUNCOMMITTED

Sheet01 OF 04

CIRC1 — revision block

WrittenJ. Moreau

CheckedR. Okafor

ApprovedT. Kim

R4Added REC-CIRC1-9, retied SW-628 JUL

R3.1Corrected pole # on FUSE-414 JUN

R3Feeder split at TIE-702 MAY

DrawingCIRC1 — ONE-LINE

StatusISSUED

Sheet02 OF 04

02 / ISSUE

A drawing with a title block, not just a Save button

A one-line that gets operated against needs what a paper drawing has: a revision number, a record of what changed, and names against it. Every edit writes a revision — major issues advance the number, minor amendments hang off it — and nothing is ever overwritten. Turn on the review workflow and a builder edit parks as a draft until it’s checked and approved; the crew keeps operating against the issued drawing in the meantime.

Written by / checked by / approved by, on the record
Four-eyes enforced — nobody approves their own drawing
Device-by-device diff between any two revisions
Restore an earlier revision — recorded as a new one, never a rollback in place

03 / PLAN

Switching orders with names on every step

Create the order, author the switching steps and the restoration steps that put the circuit back, and assign each one to a person. Orders move through a review pipeline — drafted, checked, approved, scheduled — with the preparer barred from approving their own order. Execution then runs step-by-step against the live diagram.

Prepared by / checked by / approved by, stamped automatically
Steps freeze once submitted; pulling back to Draft reopens them
Per-step remarks, with out-of-sequence execution flagged on the record
Clearances issued and released against the order, with holders named

Switching order SO-2291 — execution

Open TIE-CIRC1-708:41 JM

Close SW-CIRC1-608:52 JM

Open REC-CIRC1-2 — in progress— RO

Verify load transfer— ––

Restoration

Close REC-CIRC1-2, reopen TIE-7— ––

OrderSO-2291 — CIRC1

PreparedJ. MOREAU

Sheet03 OF 04

Field viewOffline · pinned 41m

Step 3 of 6 · assigned to you

Open REC-CIRC1-2

Hold tag — do not operate Crew on the line · placed by R. Okafor, 06:15

Back Blocked — override

ViewSO-2291 — STEP 3

DeviceREC-2

Sheet04 OF 04

04 / EXECUTE

Give the crew the diagram, not just a checklist

Switching instructions used to be text-only — paper, or relayed over the radio, with no way to see how the device in front of you connects to the rest of the circuit. NodeFabric puts the control room’s diagram directly in front of the crew executing each step — and stops the step when a hold tag says the device must not be touched.

Every step shows the exact device, highlighted, in context
Tagged devices are blocked; overriding takes an operator, a reason, and a record
Completion flows back to the shared order instantly
Any device with a browser — nothing to install, and it keeps working off-signal

The product itself

Everything above, as it actually looks.

The one-line at the top of this page is a simulation, and the panels above are illustrations. These are screenshots — a 12.47 kV substation and a 31-device feeder, modeled, switched and recorded in NodeFabric.

A real feeder with the sectionalizer opened. Nineteen devices downstream are highlighted as backfed by the solar array and battery rather than de-energized, with an abnormal-configuration badge and a backfed-equipment count in the corner. — **Backfeed, caught before the crew finds it** Opening the sectionalizer does not go dark — the solar array and battery hold nineteen devices energized from the wrong direction, and the model says so before anyone reaches the pole.

The NodeFabric one-line for feeder MILLBROOK-4412: a source, station recloser and regulator feeding a trunk that sections down through an airbreak switch, a sectionalizer and a mid-line recloser, with fused single-phase laterals, a capacitor bank, a solar array and a battery, and a normally-open tie to the adjacent feeder. Conductors are colored by phase. — **A real feeder, compiled from its connectivity model** The diagram at the top of this page is a demonstration. This is the same view on an actual circuit — 31 devices, 1,110 customers, phase coloring and the tie to the next feeder.

A recloser selected on the one-line, with a side panel showing its state, normal position, voltage, SCADA flag, pole number, line, FLOC, asset description, upstream and downstream devices, notes and hold tag controls, plus a warning that opening it will de-energize one device and island the solar array and battery. — **What the device is, and what opening it will do** Pole, FLOC, line, rating and SCADA status on one panel — and the consequence of the operation stated before anyone commits to it.

Switching order SO-2026-0118 mid-execution. A banner reads that order details are locked because the order is In Progress and only status changes can be saved. Completed steps carry a green check with the name of the crew member who performed them and a timestamp. — **Steps freeze once the order is live** Executed steps carry the name and the minute. The order details lock themselves the moment execution starts.

Revision history for the feeder: three entries — a baseline, a minor edit adding a capacitor bank, and a major CSV import from a GIS resync — each with a summary, a device count, and separate names for who changed, checked and approved it. — **Three names on every revision** Changed by, checked by, approved by — three different people, with the device counts and the reason attached.

The visual Circuit Builder with the Millbrook feeder loaded onto its canvas, and a palette of sources, switchgear, equipment, station and generation symbols down the left. — **Draw it, or correct what came out of GIS** The same model the operators run against, edited on a canvas — no CAD license, and every save is a numbered revision.

The printable record for closed switching order SO-2026-0117: header with circuit, duration, location, purpose and separate prepared-by, checked-by and approved-by names; a table of switching steps with the performer and time on each; and a restoration step flagged out of sequence with an explanatory remark. — **The audit trail, already written** Every step, who threw it, and when — including the one taken out of sequence, flagged with the reason. Nobody types this up afterwards.

Captured from a running instance against Millbrook Electric Cooperative — a demonstration utility. Circuit, devices, orders and names are synthetic; no customer data appears on this page.

Training · included with utility plans

Train on the circuits you actually operate.

Scenario-based training built on the same one-lines your organization already uses operationally — not a generic simulator with someone else’s circuit.

Scenarios & progress

From real switching orders to training scenarios

Trainers build scenarios — including directly from real switching orders — and trainees practice against them without touching the live system. Performance is scored and tracked across scenarios over time, and certifications live alongside the training records with expiry reminders sent before they lapse.

Practice runs never touch the live circuit model
Trainee scoring and progress across scenarios, over time
Certification tracking with expiration visibility — who’s current, who’s coming due
Automated expiry reminders and a compliance report you can export to CSV

Compliance — certifications

Switching Authorization — J. MoreauCurrent

Switching Authorization — R. OkaforDue in 30 days

Grounding Procedures — T. KimExpired

Scenario: storm tie transfer · last 4 attempts

62718496

ReportCERTIFICATION STATUS

PeriodQ3 2026

ExportCSV

Pricing

Start solo. Bring your team when you’re ready.

Every Individual account starts with a 7-day free trial — no credit card required. Utilities are priced by system size on an annual agreement.

Individual

For solo engineers modeling circuits and trying NodeFabric before their team adopts it.

$99/ month

7-day free trial · no card

1 seat, 3 circuits
One-line diagrams & simulated power flow
Visual Circuit Builder, DER & tie modeling
Revision history with diff & restore
Import, preview, CSV & PDF export
Switching orders & clearances
Drawing review workflow (needs a second reviewer)
Training & compliance

Start free trial Sign up at app.indexenergysystems.com. Nothing to install.

Teams

Utility

For utilities running switching across a full team — control room and field, priced to your system.

Custom

Annual · priced by system size

Everything in Individual
Unlimited seats & circuits
Switching orders with assignments & audit trail
Clearances, hold tags & override records
Optional written / checked / approved drawing review
Role-based access for admins, operators & crews
Training & compliance included
White-glove onboarding & circuit import

Request a demo Send a meter count and we come back with a walkthrough, figures, and a pilot scope.

Get in touch

See NodeFabric on your own feeders.

Tell us about your system and we will set up a walkthrough on your own circuits — then follow up with pricing and what a pilot looks like.

Already using NodeFabric? Sign in to the app.

This opens a message in your email client. Nothing is sent from this page.
Or write directly to info@index-labs.com.