Capture requirements from Microsoft Word

[Graham_Moir]

For the basic functionality that the discussion in this thread started on, I have submitted a v8 beta bug requesting refinement of the functionality described by Simon so that title/notes of the target requirement element are populated.

[Graham_Moir]

Now that version 8 has been released, I've given this a try.

It looks as though nothing has changed though. Using Simon's suggestion
- the requirement gets created and the highlighted text is displayed as the title of the element (but that's not too helpful with a paragraph of text)
- the text gets buried in the tagged values, I can just about see it,  but I can't find a way to edit it
- when the properties dialogue is brought up the title/short description is the default e.g. "Requirement3) and the notes field is blank  

For me, while I understand the argument for full traceability and integration with source documents,  this current functionality is so close to being what I would like right now, but at the same time so far away, that it is very frustrating !

[Graham_Moir]

I've raised this formally as a v8 bug.

[Krzysztof Swiatkowski]

While the functionality is neat it has two serious flows:
1. After dropping text it seems to be stored in some strange place. It is not a tagged value it is a name but it cannot be accessed in any reasonable way.... until you try to edit requirement in project browser (pressing F2) and then you hit OK. From now on requirement name is reflected in properties.
2. For such functionality it doesn't make much sense to copy the text into a name field that has 255 chars limit, you could take either first line or 80 chars as name and put rest in notes. Otherwise the part of the text is gone. (I should also point out that context menu of such long item spans over 1500 pixels in width )

BTW does it help a bug to be reported many times? Should I report it too or will your report do?

Regards
Kris

[Paolo F Cantoni]

...
BTW does it help a bug to be reported many times? Should I report it too or will your report do?

It seems so...

Sparx (from previous postings on related subject) appear to take no cognizance of support in the user forum.

Only formal support via the formal mechanisms (links below) are taken into account.

It's entirely too tedious (more EAUI), but that's the current functionality.

So report away... - just add a note here that you've done so otherwise there'd be NO visibility that there has been support for the bug report.

Paolo

[Graham_Moir]

Kris is correct regarding the 255 character limit etc..  and I've sent in additional information along these lines in the bug report.  

The suggestion - included in the report - is to make this work like RAQuest,  in other words,  if there is only one carriage return/line feed,  the text is added to the Notes field of the element,  otherwise if there are multiple cr/lf then use the text up to the first as cr/lf as the title/short description, and put the rest in the Notes.

[Graham_Moir]

FYI - Sparx have come back to me on this.  The issue as logged has been split into 2.

1)  Name/Short description not populated correctly - Bug.   Reference 10045519

2)  Suggestion to populate the Notes field or Title/Description AND the Notes field depending on the number of carriage returns.   This is being treated as a feature request, which I suppose it is, although I would argue the current approach is a design bug in fact - anyway no reference provided.  

If anyone feels strongly about this functionality, then I suggest you also log the issues with Sparx with the usual intention of trying to create a weight of opinion about it.

[beginner]

Did that work in any case?

I'd be happy to see this implemented but  have absolutely no insight in the design process driven for EA. I doubt it's a lotto machine. Or just some of these marketing thingies.

b.

[Graham_Moir]

There are a couple of lines in the version 9 release notes that suggest this might have been addressed !  
So perhaps the guys at Sparx do listen sometimes    

======
Creation of Elements by dropping text onto a Diagram improved

• Now supports text and note elements, by setting the Notes field instead of the name
• Multi-line text will set the name to the first line, and notes to anything following that
• Opening properties dialog before reload will now show the correct name

======

[Graham_Moir]

I've tried this in the released version of EA 9 and it works pretty well - along the lines that were suggested in the bug report/feature request.  Only one additional thing I would add which is to replace non-printable characters such as tabs with spaces, otherwise job done.