Re: Feature list and idea list(Re: UML comments)

[Cyrille Chepelov <cyrille chepelov org>]

Le Mon, Jun 24, 2002, à 11:23:31PM -0700, James Michael DuPont a écrit:
> I have been testing DIAv090 RC1
> and would like to try this out. What do i need to do? 
> just CVS update and patch?

You can try to recompile from a snapshot tarball -- or indeed sync on the
GNOME anonymous CVS server, as described on dia's site. Please be aware that
version 0.90 has been out for a couple of weeks now (there were a couple
bugs in RC1) [*]
 
> Here is my wish/bitch list while playing with the UML diagram editor :
> If they are not scheduled, but easy to do, please tell me where to
> start looking into it, and I will add them.

One thing you should do to ensure this does not get lost, is to record them
as enhancement bugs in the dia module of http://bugzilla.gnome.org. Of
course, providing patches as well is more than welcome.
 
> 1. duplicate an object with CTRL+DRAG Object

Not done, probably not too difficult, you want to look at
app/ddisplay_events.c/ddisplay_canvas_events(), and
app/commands.c/edit_paste_callback() (and friends).

You can have the state of the control key while getting a mouse button down
event by looking at the "state" field of the GtkEventButton structure.

> 2. edit the class names of UML by clicking on them

Hmmm. Perhaps a bit tricky.

> 3. the USE cases lines cannot be aligned at all.
> 4. the layout algorithm needs to be added, I have been reading the
> source code.

You are more than welcome to code this, if you know how to do that...

> 5. Can we associate a package to a diagram? 
> 6. Click on a package an open the diagram? 


Hmmm. These relate to one more general proposal (a couple months ago), which
was to add an "URL" property to all objects derived from Element, and make
good use of that property (like, display a "link" icon in one corner of the
element if on screen and the element is selected, have link traversal, and
improve the Web page IMAP export plug-in) -- I'm sure similar package links
could be done using this generic facility.


> 7. store a subset of the diagram inside the package icon when it is
> used by another package to represent the important exports.

Wow, this looks like a leetle tricky, though it might be doable.

> 8. XLST transformation on the UML to change
>     <OBJECT id="X" type="UML-Association">
>           <attribute name="multiplicity"> 
>           </attribute> 
>     </OBJECT>
> to 
>     <UML::Association>
>       <Multiplicity></Multiplicity>
>     </UML::Association>
> Or even use XMI?
> My idea was to extend DIA2CODE by then DUMPing the data model into XML 
> from there, after all the XML from DIA was interpreted.

You definitely will love the new XSLT plug-in that was included no later
than yesterday. I even guess the plug-ins/xslt/dia-uml.xsl black magic is
doing something like what you describe.

> 9. Ability to apply filters on saving, so we can save via a perlscript
> or makefile that will process the results.

Could be done rather easily. in app/diagram.c and app/filedlg.c

> 10. Activate all windows that are dia

What do you mean ?

> 11. Activate the toolar and keep on top.

Not sure if this can be done -- it's a window manager function (what the
Win32 default window manager can't be programmed, and can't be replaced ?)

> 12. Have an intergrated UML handbook via URLs for each type of diagram
> element.

Reformulated in a generic way: have a way to associate a chapter of the help
file(s) to each object type. Would be neat!
 
> So that is a first list of things that I was thinking,
> sorry that I did not read *all* the mailling list, 
> I will if you can tell me where to start.

in 1998 ! ;-) 

I guess at one point, it may be interesting to save a couple links to the
archives for the interesting topics which come and keep coming; but's it's a
huge task.

Have fun

        -- Cyrille


[*] that said, I have 0.90RC1 installed on my Windows box at work.
-- 
Grumpf.