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Author Topic: Displaying Notes in Activity diagrams, not working  (Read 5594 times)

EricP

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Displaying Notes in Activity diagrams, not working
« on: July 30, 2009, 09:07:40 pm »
Right clicking on a Class diagram symbol (or most other UML symbols supported by EA) and selecting Properties, there is a space for Notes.  I can make those Notes appear on the class diagram symbol by right clicking on the diagram background and selecting Properties->Elements->Notes, and/or by right clicking on the class diagram symbol and selecting Feature Visibility->Notes and Render Formatted Notes.  (I was never sure when to do one and when to do the other, but it doesn't really matter as long as I can get formatted notes to show up in the class diagram symbol).

I find that in Activity diagrams, I often can't do that, and that is creating some problems here.

For example, with Activity, Send, and Receive symbols, if I put in some Notes there appears to be no way I can make those Notes appear in the body of the symbol, even though I can still right click on the symbol and select Feature Visibility->Notes and Render Formatted Notes (so, selecting Notes, with or without Render Formatted Notes, doesn't seem to do much).

With a Datastore symbol, the Notes appear, possibly because the Datastore symbol looks like nothing more than a Class symbol with a Datastore stereotype.

In general, being able to add Notes to the body of a UML symbol has been greatly helpful in documenting my designs.  Is there something I am missing, that will allow showing Notes in the body of Activity (and related) symbols also?

Version of EA is 7.1 build 831.  As always, I'm willing to upgrade to the latest EA if it fixes this problem, though I really prefer not to change versions of my tools in the middle of a project unless there is a good reason to do it.

Thanks...

Eve

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Re: Displaying Notes in Activity diagrams, not wor
« Reply #1 on: July 31, 2009, 08:43:46 am »
Currently, notes can only be displayed on a symbol that is using rectangle notation.

You can set you activities to use rectangle notation if you really want this.

Krzysztof Swiatkowski

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Re: Displaying Notes in Activity diagrams, not wor
« Reply #2 on: July 31, 2009, 09:46:39 am »
Eric, there is also another way of putting contents of element notes on a diagram. You can use note element with notelink to an element (like activity or signal).
When you right click on a notelink there is a function to "link the note to an element feature". You can select Element note, and the text from the element will appear on a diagram.
This is not as nice as the inside text but in some cases when special symbols are used (like activities, signals) it may be better for general understanding of diagram.

HTH
Kris
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EricP

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Re: Displaying Notes in Activity diagrams, not wor
« Reply #3 on: July 31, 2009, 09:54:06 am »
Quote
Eric, there is also another way of putting contents of element notes on a diagram. You can use note element with notelink to an element (like activity or signal).

Good evening, Kris.

Yes, that's what I'm doing for a workaround for now.  As you say, not as nice as having the note inside the diagram symbol, but better than nothing.

Thanks...

EricP

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Re: Displaying Notes in Activity diagrams, not wor
« Reply #4 on: July 31, 2009, 10:59:43 am »
Quote
Currently, notes can only be displayed on a symbol that is using rectangle notation.

You can set you activities to use rectangle notation if you really want this.

Good evening, Simon.

My first reaction was that I didn't really want to use rectangle notation because I wanted to be able to distinguish different shapes.  Then I discovered that the rectangle notation has the proper shape as a little icon in the upper right corner (at least for activity symbols, haven't tried it with anything else yet).  So, that's fine and gives me the ability to display notes... perfectly fine compromise for now.  Thanks...