TikZ `edge from parent` followed by a node.

Question

The TikZ documentation gives the following example for adding a label on an edge in a tree:

\begin{tikzpicture}
  \node {r}
    child {node {t}
      edge from parent node {label}};
\end{tikzpicture}

Now, I want to tweak the way the edges are drawn. Namely, I want to be able to specify an arbirtary number of wires to link the two nodes. I'm pretty close to it, but I get stuck when I want to label midway, as in the example. My problem is with the following, stripped example:

[edge from parent path={%
  \foreach \n in {0} { (\tikzparentnode) -- (\tikzchildnode) }}]

When this tweak is put, the label of the first example is stuck to the bottom of the picture. My first idea was to add a portion of path so that the node {label} can be attached to something. The closest I can get to is:

[edge from parent path={%
  \foreach \n in {0} { (\tikzparentnode) -- (\tikzchildnode) };
  \path ($(\tikzparentnode)!.5!(\tikzchildnode)$)}]

This terminates the path and starts a new one. Now, label gets positioned at the right place. But here is the odd thing. Let's define a counter to see how many of those paths are actually drawn (the expected value being 1) :

\newcounter{cnt}\setcounter{cnt}{0}
\begin{tikzpicture}%
    [edge from parent path={%
      \pgfextra{\addtocounter{cnt}{1}}%
      \foreach \n in {0} { (\tikzparentnode) -- (\tikzchildnode) };
      \path ($(\tikzparentnode)!.5!(\tikzchildnode)$)}]
  \node (root) {r}
    child {node {t}
      edge from parent node {label}};
\end{tikzpicture}
\arabic{cnt}

With my previous fix, the path is drawn... 2 times! (I noticed that because with multiple wires, it is pretty obvious). Also, if I put a semicolon immediately after {label}, it seems that everything runs smoothly; trouble is, the usual syntax has to work too...

Summing up, my question is:

How can I redefine edge from parent path so that I can use a foreach in it, and still be able to place a label midway between the nodes?

Answer 1

The solution is to suppress drawing edge from parent itself and define the code (inside user-defined pgfkey) of drawing your specific edges, which should be executed as an option to edge from parent. Alas, there's, probably undesired, consequence of making you to explicitly say edge from parent every time you want to draw the label node.

\documentclass{minimal}
\usepackage{tikz}
\usetikzlibrary{trees}
\begin{document}
\begin{tikzpicture}[
    edge from parent/.style=my incredible edge,
    my incredible edge/.code={
        \foreach \n in {0.5,1} {
            \draw (\tikzparentnode.south) .. controls +(0,-\n) and +(0,\n) .. (\tikzchildnode.north);
        }
    }
]
    \node {root}
        child {node {left}}
        child {node {right}
            child {node {child}}
            child {node {child}} edge from parent node[near end] (A) {label}
        };

    \filldraw[red] (A) circle[radius=1pt];
\end{tikzpicture}
\end{document}