Messages

1

General Board / Composite Elements - A Question

« on: June 07, 2004, 08:18:37 am »

Hi all,

When I mark a class as a "composite element" EA automatically creates a new diagram and links the class to it.  Is there any way to link a composite element to an existing diagram instead of the new one?

Jon

2

General Board / Re: Conceptual Class Diagrams

« on: May 12, 2004, 01:21:40 pm »

Thomas,

Yes, data modeling, procedural programming, RDBS, etc for a long time now.  Like many I'm finding the transition a learning experience. If I was starting from the very beginning with requirements, use cases, etc I think i might have an easier time of this.  As it is my task is to pull some sort of class diagram from the file maintenance program - maybe that simply can't be done?

The two use cases I'm trying to realize in the class diagram are titled "Manage Vendor/Item" and an extended "Create Vendor/Item".  From what I've read so far those are poor names for use cases but again, all I have to work with is a file maintenance.

I guess what I'm missing then is where does the CRUD finally show up when moving through the process of use case analysis, conceptual class diagrams, etc?  

Jon

3

General Board / Conceptual Class Diagrams

« on: May 12, 2004, 11:36:42 am »

Can anyone offer examples of a class diagram that describes the simple CRUD of a typical "maintenance" program.  I'm probably approaching this the wrong way, but I've got to start somewhere - I am documenting the current functionality in a fairly large legacy Purchasing system.

For example, "file maintenance" program that allows full CRUD of Vendor/Item relationships.  The key objects as I see them are:

Vendor/Item - Ties a vendor to an item and allows the system to keep track of the vendor's product/item ID and stores two categories of costing classes for the link.
Item - Item must exist to have a valid Vendor/Item.
Vendor - Again, must exist to have a valid Vendor/Item.  This also provides a couple of default values for Vendor/Item attributes.
Inventory Control -  Determines whether or not the delete of a Vendor/Item should also look for an "Interchange" and delete it as well.
Interchange - Can be associated with a Vendor/Item and may need to be deleted (see above).
a couple of categories of cost class objects - If the Vendor/Item has cost methods assigned they have to point to valid cost classes.

From this list I created a class diagram with one class per object and filled in some relevant attributes.  But, I'm not sure what (if any!) operations need to be given to these objects.  I'm also not sure how to describe some of the other details like what happens when deleting a Vendor/Item.  Right now the classes look like simple data containers...  

I've been doing a ton of reading both on the web and in a couple of UML books.  I have a feeling that I'm approaching this the wrong way, but again, I'm new to modelling and need to start somewhere.

Any comments or help would be greatly appreciated.

Jon

4

General Board / Re: Tagged Values - Question

« on: May 05, 2004, 11:15:55 am »

Thanks Michael, that's what I was hoping.  I've already written a SQL script to insert the necessary t_objectproperties records into the SQL Server repository, just to make entering the data a bit easier.  I suppose I can always go back and write a few more scripts to populate the appropriate complexity, etc properties.

Speaking of the Complexity property, I was going to use it but there are only three values and I need to be a little more specific than that.  Is there a way to manage the default complexity levels?

Jon

5

General Board / Tagged Values - Question

« on: May 05, 2004, 09:31:23 am »

I have a number of use cases that have been created via analysis of a large legacy system.  I need to go back and assign complexity, priority, size and a few other  data points to each use case.

I'm thinking I should add them to the use case objects as tags.  Is this an appropriate use of tags?  

As an alternative I could store this information in the use case objects' note field, but then it's not very accessible (through SQL queries, this is the corp. edition w/ a DBMS repository) unless I write a small script to parse the notes...

Any advice is welcome!

Jon

6

General Board / Example Model(s)

« on: February 24, 2004, 10:25:25 am »

Hi everyone,

I'm evaluating EA for my development team and so far I prefer this to the (admittedly small number of) other modeling tools that I have examined.  

I am attempting to create a model of a simple API that will open portions of a legacy application to third party integrators.  The target language is C# and I have been able to generate very simple class files but the solution as a whole is simply not coherent.

The example Models that came with the corporate trial version have been useful, but I would really like to find an example of a model that generates to .Net/C#.  Is anything like this available?

Regards,

Jon

7

Uml Process / Re: Associate Class questions

« on: May 19, 2004, 09:13:24 am »

Thanks Thomas,

I had already created the Warehouse-Item association class following the steps you describe.  

Now, imagine that the Warehouse-Item association class on the left side of a new relationship and a Vendor class is on the right.  EA allowed me to connect the two with another association class.  This second association class holds Vendor-Warehouse-Item attributes.  The diagram looks a bit odd, but it describes what I need it to.

If EA allowed me to do it then it's legal UML, right?  

Jon

8

Uml Process / Associate Class questions

« on: May 19, 2004, 07:15:58 am »

I've run into a case where I have attribues for a three-way association, that is there are attributes specific to a combination of a Vendor class, a Warehouse class and and Item class.  I'm not quite sure how to model this in a class diagram.

I've already got an associate class that holds attributes specific to a Warehouse and Item pairing.  Is it legal to take this WarehouseItem associate class and create an associate with the Vendor class?  Is there a better way to approach this?

Jon