Messages

1

Suggestions and Requests / Re: A need to reposition Swimlanes

« on: November 01, 2004, 03:28:03 pm »

I use boundaries to move around blocks of diagram objects quickly.  If you have 6 swimlanes, and you want to move #6 to #3, you:

• create boundaries around the objects in swimlanes #3 to #6.
• Rearrange the swimlanes.
• Then move the objects in bulk by moving the boundaries.
  
• When finished, delete the boundaries.
  

It sounded too scary when you had to use Align in some way.

Have fun!

2

General Board / Re: How to convince my boss?

« on: November 04, 2004, 11:36:44 am »

I own Rational Rose and EA and although cost of the tool isn't a factor, it's the availability of other features like issue tracking, requirements tracking, etc.  You can buy other tools to do these things for you but for me and relatively small environments EA fits the bill.

Rose also uses a fairly stactic Use Case View, Logical View, Component view and Deployment View for its highest package organization.  While that's okay for certain kinds of modeling, it's restrictive.  That restriction has been removed from Rose XDE but the standard modeler it hasn't.

The other nice thing already mentioned is that the SparxSystems team is very responsive to requests and bugs, and it usually takes less than a month to get in the fix.

But on to the world of support, I've been trying to move my license of Rose from my desktop to my laptop.  Navigating the IBM support area online is just about impossible.  In 8 months of trying, I cannot figure how to do this short of paying big-$$$ for a support call.  It used to be free and easy with Rational.

I recommend EA to anybody doing UML.

3

General Board / Re: How to drop a line point on an association

« on: November 04, 2004, 11:12:04 am »

Ctrl Click is the fastest and most convenient, but you can also right-click the point on the association and click "Toggle Line Point at Cursor".

4

General Board / Re: Saving settings for every users

« on: November 01, 2004, 03:37:45 pm »

I define those settings in the Model Template.  I have special settings for data types, language settings, predefined packages and classes, etc. in there so I don't have to reset them every time I create a new model.

5

General Board / Re: Show attributes/methods on a boundary/controll

« on: March 10, 2004, 10:37:33 am »

Interesting ... I've always used boundary and control to represent three layers, as in the parts of an MVC pattern, where <<boundary>> with the view (a screen) where the attributes are value physically on the screen, and the methods represent the event handlers for the screen elements (like buttons).  <<control>> is the implementation of how the screen reacts to user input, so that when somebody clicks OK, the logic for validating the screen isn't on the screen, but in the controller.

Should I be labelling them differently, because it sounds like we are talking about different things.

6

General Board / Show attributes/methods on a boundary/controller

« on: March 10, 2004, 02:49:04 am »

If I create a class with the stereotype of "boundary" or "control" the attributes and methods do not appear in class diagrams.

Does anybody now how to make them appear?

7

General Board / Code Generation involving associations

« on: March 08, 2004, 06:58:22 pm »

I have the following specification:

I am generating code for btAudioFile.  Excluding the attributes, I see only one association getting defined:

      public ArrayList patterns;

I would expect to also a definition for track as:

      public btAudioTrack track;

Am I expecting too much from the code generator, or am I making a mistake in the way in which I specify the association?

Any help would be appreciated.  Thanks.

8

Automation Interface, Add-Ins and Tools / Export XRef to Configuration

« on: November 09, 2004, 04:43:24 pm »

Does anybody have a cross reference table that tells me what items the "Export/Import Reference Data" actually exports and imports?  I'm specifically looking for the tagged values export/import.

Thanks

9

Automation Interface, Add-Ins and Tools / Re: Message parameters

« on: October 26, 2004, 10:04:39 am »

The "name" field for the connector contains:

xyz(name, datetime)

You'd have to look at the method, to determine the type of return, in this example, it is an "int" type.

While the "TransitionGuard" field contains:

retval=value;params="Freddy",new DateTime(2004,10,15);

So the resulting code might be something like:

Code: [Select]

int value = SomeObject.xyz("Freddy",new DateTime(2004,10,15));

10

Automation Interface, Add-Ins and Tools / Re: Message parameters

« on: October 26, 2004, 08:27:01 am »

In automation, this is how you do it.

If your connector refers to an operation, the connector TAG "operation_guid" will identify the GUID for the operation.  You can get the details of the method by:

• Determining the element on the supplier end of the connection.
  
• Scanning through the MethodsEx for the element until you find a matching GUID.  (Note: Methods EX contains a list of all inherited methods, not just the ones created for the current class.)
  
• Once you have the method, you can evaluate its parameters via EA.Method.Parameters.
  

If it doesn't refer to an operation, you have to have some kind of syntax for parsing the "name" for whatever you are specifying in the message text.

Have fun!

11

Automation Interface, Add-Ins and Tools / Re: How to parse sequence diagram?

« on: October 26, 2004, 08:42:47 am »

The only risk I can see in parsing the tables is if Sparx decides to change how they store stuff, your routines might fail.  At least there is consistency in the Automation interface, or at least I hope so.

12

Automation Interface, Add-Ins and Tools / Re: How to parse sequence diagram?

« on: October 25, 2004, 02:33:03 pm »

As near as I can tell, the best way is to do the following:

• For each diagram, you will have a DiagramID.
  
• Scan through the DiagramObjects, and find the appropriate elements for each object.
  
• Scan the connections for each element.
  
• Only consider the sequence connections with a diagram ID you are currently evaluating.  (It appears that the diagram ID is only specified for "Sequence" and "Collaboration" messages, and set as zero for other types of diagrams.)
  
• Sort the connectors according to SequenceNo.
  

This gives you the sequencial order of connectors on the diagram.  Unfortunately it appears that you cannot get the message activation details or to determine the hierarchical sequence numbers.

If your connector refers to an operation, the connector TAG "operation_guid" will identify the GUID for the operation.  You can get the details of the method by:

• Determining the element on the supplier end of the connection.
  
• Scanning through the MethodsEx for the element until you find a matching GUID.  (Note: Methods EX contains a list of all inherited methods, not just the ones created for the current class.)
  

I haven't been able to find a GetMethodByGUID call in the repository or class.

Have fun ...  

13

Automation Interface, Add-Ins and Tools / Re: Automation Model as EA model??

« on: September 20, 2004, 01:28:18 pm »

I thought there was pretty good documentation for access to the automation objects in the EA User Guide.  Where you looking for some other kind of documentation?

Information on Automation is here:
http://www.sparxsystems.com.au/AutIntVB.htm

Link to documentation is here:
http://www.sparxsystems.com.au/bin/EAUserGuide.pdf

14

Automation Interface, Add-Ins and Tools / Re: Code Generation of Linked Attributes

« on: September 22, 2004, 08:12:19 pm »

While you're at it, can you add a couple of things that can be referenced in a linked attribute.  

• Specifically accessing the source aggregration so I can tell whether the linked attribute is a shared or composite aggregation.
  
• A way to access the notes of an association.
  
• A way to access the tags of an association.
  

Thanks.

15

Automation Interface, Add-Ins and Tools / Re: Code Generation of Linked Attributes

« on: September 22, 2004, 02:03:53 pm »

I cannot get at the Linked Attributes.  If I try to create a custom template, "Linked Attribute" does not appear.

If I say:
%list="Attribute__ListAttributes" @separator="\n\n" @indent="\t"%

I only get the attributes, I don't get the linked attributes.

(I'm hoping it doesn't come down to having to build one of those unsupported ADD-IN's).