Topics

16

General Board / Automatically alter diagrams to create alternative views ... ?

« on: June 28, 2018, 10:32:15 am »

I was researching diagram layouts when I came across this:
http://sparxsystems.com.au/enterprise_architect_user_guide/14.0/guidebooks/ea_lists_diagrams_and_matrices.html

There is an interesting comment on this page that I'd like to understand:
"The same diagram can be altered to show the detail of the interface that has been rolled-up in the diagram above. This is a powerful facility that allows repository content to be automatically altered to create alternative views for different stakeholders."

Does the "automatically altered" imply that Sparx has a capability on diagrams to show a 'rolled up' view and then 'expand' that rolled up view on the diagram, in an interactive sense?
Or is this comment merely saying that you can draw two different diagrams with two different representations of the same thing (in this case a relationship)?

17

General Board / Advice - to nest or to compose ?

« on: June 27, 2018, 04:02:21 pm »

So I am trying to represent a 'nested' relationship, specifically where an application component has sub-components (using archimate, but could equally apply to UML).
I can capture this different ways:
1. Explicit Composition relationship between sub-component and component: this shows on all diagrams but not represented in project browser (ie elements not nested)
2. Nest the sub-component within the component: shows as indented sub-component within the project browser, but no explicit relationship in the model
3. Do both: but then I'm manually ensuring that the two representations are kept in synch (which means of course that they won't)

I'm leaning toward 1 but I'm interested in hearing about others' experiences and pros / cons.
Also interested in what people use nesting for - other than for the above scenario

18

Suggestions and Requests / Add built-in searches for connections

« on: June 25, 2018, 02:22:06 pm »

The searches in 'Find in Project' (Ctrl-F) find elements but not connections. There seems to be no way to search for connections without using SQL.
Suggest that Connection searches be added to the Common Searches, or the existing searches be expended to also include connections.

** Note that I have tried to put in a formal feature request for this but that page appears to be broken - reCaptcha is failaing with the message "ERROR for site owner:
Invalid domain for site key"

19

General Board / Search for *connections* ... ?

« on: June 25, 2018, 10:38:00 am »

I feel like I'm missing something, but is there any way in Sparx to search for Connections ? (*without* resorting to scripting or SQL queries)
The search options seem to cover a wide variety of Element attributes and a wide combination of strange element types, but nothing for connections (as far as I can see)

Specific use case - find all connections in project / package with stereotype of <whatever I choose>

I'm worried that this feature might be missing due to the quasi nature of connections (ie that they are part of the model but not actuallly in the model)

Thanks

20

General Board / Archimate model validation

« on: June 25, 2018, 09:41:16 am »

EA has support for validating models - which appears to utilise standard UML model rules and is not aware of UML profiles, correct ?
Given that EA implements UML profile awareness for auto-connectors and 'strict' syntax, is there a way to do a package level validation of a UML profile? Specificallyl for Archimate ?

Thanks

21

Suggestions and Requests / New standard element property: ID

« on: June 06, 2018, 08:51:40 am »

Want to raise a thought here before I raise a feature request - in case there is already a way of doing this.

I'd like to have an element ID as a genuine separate element property (ie not text embedded in the name field).  This being a field that can contain an alphanumeric ID for the element, that is (perhaps optionally) displayed wherever the name is displayed - ie in the browser, on shapes and in selections.

This field could be filled automatically or manually, and could be used as a shorthand to identify the element and perhaps refer to some concept or identity outside the model.  For example:
- Project ID to external PMO listing
- Server ID from CMDB
etc

Similar things that I am aware of:
1) Auto Naming: This has most of the capability I am looking for *except* that:
- It is implemented as a substring embedded in the name field - the numbering is created at the time it is applied but can be deleted afterwards
- If auto number is re-applied to a package the rule just adds another number (eg two prefixes) as EA doesn't really know that there is aleady a number (cos it's just part of the name)
- Can only be applied to classes, not StereoTypes
2) Package level numbering: This nicely keeps the numbering out of the name field but doesn't use it anywhere else (as far as I can tell) and there is no control over number (it is after all a package level number)

Happy to hear if people have any other ways to handle this and / or if you think it is a good or bad idea

22

General Board / Help - element colours, defaults and resetting

« on: June 05, 2018, 09:11:08 am »

Can someone explain this to me as I can't figure it out through the manuals or what I read in the forums ...

As I understand it:
- Elements have a default appearance (border, fill, font etc) associated with their class
- This default appearance can be overriden using a stereotype
- When a new element is placed on a diagram it gets this default appearance (either base or stereotype as appropriate)
- The element can be individually altered to have a specific fill, border colour etc using drawing tools --> This only affects the one element changed
- The colour for an element can also be altered using the Default Appearance dialogue (F4) --> This sounds like it should set the new default appearance for all elements of that class, but it appears to actually only affect the currently selected element (??)
- If the element is changed using this dialogue (F4) then the same dialogue can be used to reset the element to default colours
- However if the element is changed directly using toolbars then this 'Reset to defaults' has no effect
- (Note that above behaviour also holds true for stereotyped elements)

So, to the questions:
- Why is the "Default Appearance" dialogue called that when it doesn't change the default appearance?
- Why does this dialogue not reset appearance for elements which have been manually altered?
- How can such an element be reset to default appearance?

- Are any of the above bugs that I should be reporting? (or am I just not understanding how they work)

23

Bugs and Issues / EA14: Archimate shapescript / rendering issues

« on: June 04, 2018, 01:55:28 pm »

There are several renedering issues withe Archimate3 shapes in EA14 (many / most of which trace back through earlier EA versions and Archimate MDGs).  From what I can tell many people are accepting these or working around the (eg by creating their own shapes) - I can't find any mention of bugs or issues being explicitly raised in this forum.  However givan that Archimate is obne of the major reasons why we are using EA I thought I would formalise the issues we are encountering.  I will raise a formal bug report for these also.

- Text wrapping: The element name is shown in the shapes but word wrapping is inconsistent, often resulting in words extending well beyond the shape boundary
- Motivation shape corners: The motivation (purple) elements have a 'cut off corner' shape which renders poorly when re-sized, the corners stretch proportional to the shape rather than remaining the same size
- General decoration rendering: The rectangle notation decorations are poorly rendered, eg shapes uneven, circles not round, and 'transform' in strange ways as the shapes are moved or re-sized
- Arrow head rendering: Like decorations, arrow heads are poorly rendered, sometimes showing being distorted or showing at odd angles to the line

I suspect that some of the above could be fixed with shapescripts, however the last two rendering issues may be due to the underlying EA rendering engine.

Note: If anyone has suggestions on how to work around the above (short of creating my own shapes) I'm interested to hear them

24

General Board / Multiple elements (virtualised connector ends)

« on: May 31, 2018, 04:09:47 pm »

I was going to file a bug report on virtualised connector ends but then I see there has been a lot of activity already in the bugs forum (I'm looking at you Paolo...) - and I can't tell where they have all got to, ie what has been 'fixed', what is being 'fixed' and what won't be 'fixed'

So - the outcome I'd like is to show the same element on the diagram in two different places; specifically I'm creating a box in box style diagram (Capability Map) using Archimate 3 and I want to overlay other related elements (objectives, requirements etc) on that diagram.  In many cases there is a one to many relationship between one and the other, ie I need to place the objective onto multiple capabilities.

The solutions available appear to be:

Virtualised Connector Ends
Problems I am experiencing:
- 'Reflected' duplicate element doesn't look like original: gets colour and some of shapesheet but not all of shapesheet (?)
- 'Reflected' duplicate element is different size and font to original and can't be re-sized or font size changed
- Can only have one duplicate per element (I have need to overlay one objective on multiple capabilities)
--> Does anybody know if any of these are fixed / being fixed? When ... ?

Instances
- Creates a completely different type of element which doesn't understand or appear to support the Archimate stereotypes so also looks completely different to the original

Visio
- Lots of duplication keeping the two modesl in synch
- Once I go there maybe I won't come back ...

25

General Board / Where does rectanglenotation property come from ??

« on: May 29, 2018, 03:59:05 pm »

Ok - I can see shapescripts that use the rectanglenotation property to control appearance - hasproperty("rectanglenotation","0"))
But where is that property defined ... ?

There are some archimate shapes that support rectangle notation and some that don't, the ones that do presumably have this property and therefore get the "Use Rectangle Notation" menu option. But I can't find that property defined *anywhere*
- It doesn't show up in the Element Properties dialogue or pane
- I can't find it defined as an attribute or tagged value in the base class (eg Class, Activity)
- Some stereotypes which are based on Class have the property but others also based on Class don't (suggesting it is in the stereotype)
- But I can't find it defined as an attribute or tagged value in the Archimate 3 MDG stereotypes

So, does anyone know where this is defined? How I can add it to my shapes?

(and terminology - is there somewhere that clearly explains the difference between an element property, an element attribute and a tagged value they are used somewhat interchangable but are also very different things)

Thanks
Matthew James

26

Bugs and Issues / EA14: Diagram 'quick filter' contains not always working

« on: May 28, 2018, 02:35:34 pm »

EA Build 14.0.1420
Win 10 10.0.16299

When using the 'quick filter' (not sure what the correct name for this is Layout -> Filter) the 'Contains' options dosn't always work, it behaves as 'Equals To'
It seems to work with some fields (eg name, alias) but not others, notably Stereotype.

Behaviour:
- Choose the fileter on 'Stereotype' and 'Contains'
- Type a partial stereotype name in the filter string field and all elements are hidden
- Clear the filter string and all elements are shown
- Type the full and exact stereotype name in the filter string field and only elements with the matching stereotype are shown, all others hidden

27

Bugs and Issues / EA14: Dropdown list scroll bars not working

« on: May 25, 2018, 03:41:20 pm »

EA Build 14.0.1420
Win 10 10.0.16299

Several dropdown lists don't function correctly with the mouse.
Behaviour:
- Click on the arrow to drop down the list
- Scroll bar ignores mouse clicks and drags (ie drag on bar, click on end arrows, click on bar all ignored, bar doesn't move)
- Scroll bar does recognise mouse hover (ie bar changes colour as mouse hovers over)
- List does recognise mouse (ie list elements highlighted as mouse hovers over, list element selected on mouse click)
- Keyboard (arrows, enter) work correctly to scroll and select from the list

Speciifc repeatable examples: Element Change Type, Legend Element Applies To

(I can't imagine no-one else has noticed this, so sorry if this has already been posted - I did look but couldn't find it)

28

General Board / Colour and shapescript inheritance in UML profiles

« on: May 23, 2018, 01:51:01 pm »

So - I've created a UML Profile to extend an Archimate shape (ie a non-UML shape).
This I've done (based on instructions) by Extending the base Activity class and Generalising the Archimate shape - Archimate_BusinessFunction.

Mostly this is working fine but the colour inheritence is interesting - the new stereotype is inheriting the default fill colour from the Activity class, but the shapescript from the BusinessFunction stereotype ... is this normal or have I done something wrong ?

Of note:
- The UML profile has bgcolor="-1" which (I believe) says 'inherit from ancestor'
- Obviously there are two ancestors in this case, however I would have thought that appearance would be inherited from the stereotype ancestor not the class ancestor
- I can work around this by explicitly setting the colour for the new metaclass, but this then loses the benefits of inheriting appearance

Thoughts ?

29

General Board / Archimate shapes and composition

« on: May 09, 2018, 11:59:18 am »

Is there any way to represent the 'box in box' style of composition using archimate in Sparx ? (see picture linked below)
http://pubs.opengroup.org/architecture/archimate3-doc/ts_archimate_3.0.1-final-rev_files/image034.png

I'm looking for the same behavior as provided with the UML elements using composite child diagrams and 'show composite in frame'.  From what I can see all the options and menu items are there for archimate elements and diagrams but they just don't work. I've read several other posts around this and discussion of compartments (which seem to be core to support this feature) and I get that archimate is not UML, however this is standard archimate representation.  Even if it could be achieved with the 'grouping' element that would be a start.

Any suggestions?
Note I am on Enterprise Architect v12 and using Archimate 2.0 - does any of the above change with newer version of EA and / or archimate 3.0 ?

Thanks
Matthew James