Internal MDGs

[Ian Mitchell]

There seem to be a set of files which are installed with EA which look to be the internal MDGs which are built-in to EA.
They are in a folder called /Emergency/internal technologies, and seem to be XML files, as we would expect.
But they are not normal XML text files.
Has anyone managed to get inside one? I'd like to see how the experts create their MDGs - especially how to change icons in the project browser.
Anyone managed to see inside these ?

[Geert Bellekens]

Most of those InternalTechnologies binary files were text files in a previous version.

One of the better and complete MDG technologies is the BPMN 2.0 technology, and that is still in a readable xml format.
When I'm looking for an example I usually take that one.

But I don't think you can change icons in the project browser.
You can associate an icon to your stereotype, but that's it. You can't change that based on some other property. Stereotype x will always have icon y, never icon z.

Geert

[Ian Mitchell]

Thanks Geert - the problem with the BPMN one is that it's HUGE. But I agree, it uses all of the clever bits of MDGs.

[Sunshine]

Didn't find Emergency/Internal technologies/
But did find C:\Program Files (x86)\Sparx Systems\EA\InternalTechnologies.


I haven't looked at these files before. I see what you mean about it appearing binary. Initial thoughts are that perhaps they've have done something simple like zip or base64 encode those xml files to stop prying eyes. However I tried changing the xml file extension to zip but that didn't work. Unfortunately don't have any thing handy to try decode base64.


Like Geert I don't think you can dynamically change the icons in the project browser just set them for a particular stereotype. The only mechanism I can think of to achieve that is to change the stereotype.

[Eve]

They are in a folder called /Emergency/internal technologies, and seem to be XML files, as we would expect.

It should be 'InternalTechnologies' directly under the EA install path. Not sure where emergency comes from.

Most of those InternalTechnologies binary files were text files in a previous version.

Actually, they were binary resources inside the EA executable. They have never been in plain text files.

Most of them are the technologies that are only available for specific editions of EA.

[Ian Mitchell]

Ah - I see.
So I just have to reverse-engineer them from the UI to figure out how they are structured.
This is what eats into my pub time....

[qwerty]

Up to V13.5 there are quite some MDGs (like SysML) included in EA.exe. Just look for the string "MDG.Technology". From V14 on they seem to have move out to the MDGTechnologies folder(s).

q.

[Ian Mitchell]

Thanks Q - I'll go back and look