Request: Undo/Redo enhance!

[slangmgh]

EA is a wonderful product, but the undo/redo function need to be enhanced, like together, it can undo/redo everything user operating.

[pavus]

yes, i subscribe to this - i am very frustrated from unexpected functionality of undo.
even unexpected saving - if i exit and dont save, then any changes are saved (!), any not.
i am very very disillusioned ...  

[pavus]

no-0ne reply ?
what is the use of this forum ?

pavus

[Tjerk]

Hi Pavus,

Changes to the projectbrowser are immediate, changes on a diagram are saved on loading a new diagram. If you exit, all should be saved.

Could you indicate which changes are saved and which not?

Greetings,
Tjerk

P.s.: I would also expect a more mature Undo(/Redo) functionality, many of the users get frustrated by the lack of it. I also know this is a heavy requirement which could take lotst of time to implement and test.

[thomaskilian]

Hi Tjerk,
the undo does not work for deletion of elements. Of course EA asks before really deleting an element. However, a minute later I a bit wiser and know that I should not have deleted it - but: too late. Undo should work in every circumstance - even to undelete element.

BR

Thomas

[Oink123]

 At the risk of just re-iterating what the above posters have noted:

The Undo/Redo functionality of EA needs to be totally re-done. Being unpredictable, it's almost completely useless. And with version 3.60, there is no 'redo', so if something unpredictable *does* happen, there is no recourse.

Undo/Redo is a pretty essential feature in graphics manipulation; it'd be awesome if this could be redone in version 4 .

[wmac]

Yes, I am not happy with unexpected saves.

You delete something and think if you do not save the file it will not be in file but later you see you have been wrong, everything has been applied to database file at the same moment.

These 2 things are among the rare problems I have seen in EA.

Overally I rarely see problems with EA.

Mac

[Pete]

I concur - please improve Undo.

Not mentioned above is the impact on the use of the product. With undo, users feel more comfortable experimenting with new functionality. Without undo the user base will mature through the product feature to become advanced users set much slower than competing products - hence it's not good for EA either.

I'm currently evaluating EA and see this as a significant flaw.

[ShimonSim]

Just want to warn everybody with this request.
I see a big reason for EA lacking of this feature - it is build on Jet engine that is database and usually what ever was deleted from database it is gone. If you want to have undo/redo feature you should look into file based software like Visio. Just warning - for big  (I mean just a little bigger ) projects those programs are slow. I think that performance gain that EA has over other programs, I worked with, is on expense of this feature (undo/redo).I vote for performance.
Of cause if they can manage to get both would be great.
Shimon

[sargasso]

I agree.  Having worked with JET DBs since Access v1.0 I am very well aware of how hard it would be to implement undo throughout EA to the level people here are suggesting.
It is also a core feature - it would cost Sparxs an immense amount of effort and time to rewrite EA to include such free-format undo/redo capability.

Given the functionality and price of EA compared to both the ridiculously overpriced heavyweight commercial offerings (you know who) and the free but functionally impared ARGO based alternatives I reckon exercising a bit of care with the delete key etc is a small negative compared to Geoff and his people's stunning product.
I would much rather see Sparx focus on functional issues rather than this.

(just my 20c worth)
B

[thomaskilian]

Bruce,
I guess you are right    I revoke my opt for this feature.

Thomas

[thomaskilian]

btw. I remeber that Rose also does have very poor undo  

[wmac]

Yes, now that I think it will be very hard to change things because of the Jet DB file.

But isn't it possible to queue some actions in memory and then save them to database at specific times (i.e saving etc.) ? Though I know a big change of architecture will be needed and it would not be possible quickly.

I think this should happen at a time but as I told later I am overally very happy with the product (more more than rational).

And yes , when I work with rational I need to put 30% of my mind on Rational's UI. (To prevent problems happening now or later).

At the time being I'd like to see some more automation like conversion of sequence diagram to collaboration (rational does it for a while) etc.

I also like to see some improvements in code engineering (toward a more professional thing) . It will be great if we can constantly work on code and model and have them in sunc with each other (specifically I am thinking about C# and PHP myself).

Mac

[angel-o-sphere]

I dont think that using a data base or not makes any difference in supporting undo/redo or not.

In fact while EA is the best CASE tool in respect of features (espcialy if you dare to compare it with beasts like Rational Rose) it is absolutely astonishing to me why its undo/redo is simply said: the worst I've ever seen.

I dont know how easy DB migrations are, but the simplest way (with some drawbacks of course) is to have for every item in the DB a flag "deleted".

For all commands changing the DB you create a Command object according to the GoF Command Pattern.

The commands can be written to the DB as well, depending on how long you like to keep them sitting around.

On saving/quitting you delete all items marked as deleted and remove the Commands from the DB.

I guess one mixed up "deleting" a business object from a "diagram" with a "DELETE FROM ..."

Regards,
  angel'o'sphere

[Bruno.Cossi]

Angel'o'sphere,

that would be correct if undo/redo had to work only for deletion of the objects - how about modifying them? This is much more complex a thing than one would realize.

Do not take me wrong, I would much like the undo/redo enhanced!

Bruno