big trees in TikZ - avoiding the “grouping levels” limit

Question

I have a problem with the following code:

\begin{tikzpicture} [level distance=4mm]
    \path [
        every node/.style={ball color=red,inner sep=1.5pt},
        level 2/.style={sibling distance=22mm},
        level 5/.style={sibling distance=3mm}
        ]
        node{} child foreach \perI in {1,...,6} {
            node{} child { node{} child { node{} child {
            node{} child foreach \perII in {1,...,5} {
                node{} child { node{} child { node{} child { node{} child {
                node{} child { node{} child { node{} child { node{} child {
                node{} child { node{} child { node{} child { node{} child {
                node{} child { node{} child { node{} child { node{} child {
                node{} child { node{} child { node{} child { node{} child {
                    node{}
                }}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}
            }}}}
        }
    ;
\end{tikzpicture}

When I compile it with pdflatex (using MiKTeX), I get the following error message:

! TeX capacity exceeded, sorry [grouping levels=255].

I guess I hit a bound on the level of recursion .. Is there some way around this?
Note that I actually need an even longer tree (48 levels in total) - do not ask why, long story..

My only idea is to generate the long path under the second foreach command in advance and then re-use it in each node, i.e. 30 times - but I do not know how to do this.
(I tried \path[save to=\tmpPath], but it seems to save it with absolute co-ordinates, so I did not manage to get the 30 copies I need.)

Answer 1

You could use a chain instead of children for the long path at the bottom. If you use node distance=\tikzleveldistance, on grid, join, the placement of the nodes will be the same as for the tree levels, and you'll get connecting lines between the nodes.

This will compile using pdflatex:

\documentclass[border=5mm]{standalone}
\usepackage{pgfplots, pgfplotstable}
\usetikzlibrary{chains}

\pgfplotstableread{volcano.dat}\datatable



\begin{document}
\begin{tikzpicture} [level distance=4mm]
    \path [
        every node/.style={ball color=red,inner sep=1.5pt},
        level 2/.style={sibling distance=22mm},
        level 5/.style={sibling distance=3mm}
        ]
        node{} child foreach \perI in {1,...,6} {
            node{} child { node{} child { node{} child {
            node{} child foreach \perII in {1,...,5} {
                node [start chain=going below]{}
                \foreach \perIII in {1,...,25}{
                    node [node distance=\tikzleveldistance,
                        on grid,
                        on chain,
                        join
                    ] {}
                    }
                }   
            }
            }}
        }
    ;
\end{tikzpicture}


\end{document}

Answer 2

Check this

\begin{tikzpicture} [level distance=4mm]
    \path [
        every node/.style={ball color=red,inner sep=1.5pt},
        level 2/.style={sibling distance=22mm},
        level 5/.style={sibling distance=3mm}
        ]
        node{} child foreach \perI in {1,...,6} {
            node{} child { node{} child { node{} child {
            node{} child foreach \perII in {1,...,5} {
                node{} child { node{} child { node{} child { node{} child {
                node{} child { node{} child { node{} child { node{} child {
                node{} child { node{} child { node{} child { node{} child {
                node{} child { node{} child { node{} child { node{} child {
                node{} child { node{} child { node{} child { node{} child {
%                    node{}
                }}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}
            }}}}
        }
    ;
\end{tikzpicture}