Some question about EA

[slamah]

1-Does the EA provide "as-you-go" checking e.g. to disallow illegal symbol connections?

2-Is the user interface customisable? Can you add your own buttons, menus, icons etc. and bind these to actions or commands?

3-Are facilities provided to manage large diagrams? E.g. filters, diagram panners, search facilities etc.

4-If a selected navigation finds no destination, can the tool automatically create an empty or partially filled diagram or table?

5-What repository browsing facilities are there? Do these facilities encourage the reuse of class information?

6-What technology is used for the repository? Is it a commercially available product, or technology proprietary to the tool vendor?

7-Is there an API for the repository? Is this specific to the repository technology e.g. native SQL, or does it provide a higher level of abstraction?

[jaimeglz]

Hi slamah,

I'm answering several of your questions here. I confess that some of the questions are beyond my expertise, because I do not use EA's Automation Interface; but I'm sure other forum members will take up questions relating to the latter.

Q: "1-Does the EA provide 'as-you-go' checking e.g. to disallow illegal symbol connections?"

A: Yes: make sure View -> Options -> Diagram "Strict UML Sintax" is turned on (this is the default). However, it is not as strict as Visio on this. For instance, EA will allow an Object Flow between an activity and a class, which Visio does not allow.

I preffer EA's flexibility, and had lots of problems with Visio 2000 on this, including permanent and uncorrectable sintax error displays.  

Q: "3-Are facilities provided to manage large diagrams? E.g. filters, diagram panners, search facilities etc."

For printing, you can choose the size of the printed page. (By the way, has anyone tried sending a big diagram to a large plotter? All I've done so far is to print large diagrams in several pages, and then stick them to a wall with tape.)

I do not know what a "diagram panner" is, but there are several search utilities: search for an element in the current diagram; show usage (display the list of diagrams where the element is used); search for a name in the project tree...

I would suggest, however, that you download EA's trial version and see for yourself; then you could post more specific questions here.

Q: "4-If a selected navigation finds no destination, can the tool automatically create an empty or partially filled diagram or table?"

A: I don't know what you are reffering to as a "selected navigation", but I suppose this has to do with layered diagrams.  Please see the discussion in the following thread:

http://www.sparxsystems.com.au/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.cgi?board=general&action=display&num=1040308582

I would also suggest you search the forum for answers to matters that have already been disccussed in this forum.

Q: "5-What repository browsing facilities are there? Do these facilities encourage the reuse of class information?"

A: See my answer to Q number 3. Also, in my opinion, the best way to reuse class information is to organize your project tree in such a way that all your classes are under standard packages; for example: "Subject area org chart" for all human actors; "Current tech architecture" for HW and SW actors; "Domain model" for all other real world objects; "Database design" for structural objects, etc.

"Q: 6-What technology is used for the repository? Is it a commercially available product, or technology proprietary to the tool vendor?"

A: EA 3.50 gives you the following choices: MS Access tables for the desk-top version, and MS SQL Server or MySQL for the repository of the Corporate Edition. Check the release info posted by Sparks on Oct. 28 in the Latest News section of the forum.

I hope this helps you in your research effort; but I have the impression that the best way to get most of the answers you are seeking is to get some hands-on experience. The latest evaluation (free for 30 days) version is available  at http://www.sparxsystems.com.au/

Nevertheless, let me assure you that I will continue to follow this thread.

Jaime Gonzalez

[Takeshi_KOUNO]

Now I reply No.2 and No.7:

About No.2,

You can customize buttons of every toolbars(but there are few limitation), and key-binding for every function(menu).

About No.7,

Now EA provides Microsoft ActiveX COM API for EA repository. But current version has only reading functions.

So you can read EA elements by using Microsoft VisualBasic, VisualC++, and so on.

Takeshi KOUNO

[potterm]

Further to Takeshi's comments on Q7...

In fact there are two variants of the Automation (COM) interface within EA, one that is read only, which presents XML views of the model, and a second one that is read-write.  You can download documentation for the read-write interface (including code examples) from the Sparx web site -  I think there's a link to it from the download page.

regards
Martin.