[Uml-devel] Umbrello usage issues

[Steve G]

Hello,

Overall, I really like the program and I see it as being an invaluable aid.
During the project, I ran across several usability issues that I wanted to
bring into a discussion. I am using the version shipped in 3.4.2. I don't know if
any of these are on the future roadmap or already done. But I wanted to bring
them up just in case.

1) There should be a way to set the order of the diagrams. They currently are in
the sequence in which they were drawn. I'd like to get it: use cases, class
diagram, each sequence diagram from the use case in the order of the use cases, a
collaboration diagram for each seq diagram. I don't see any way to change that
order.

2) Ability to add documentation to each method or attribute. Right now, you can
only document the class. I'd like to use that as the overall theory of why that
class exists. I'd like to add documentation to each method that outlines any
concerns about usage of the method or issues the coder should take into account
while implementing the method.

3) Activity diagram swimlanes. I don't see how to add them. I'd like to use them
to indicate which class handles each part in a complex activity.

4) If you use a box to try to imitate swimlanes in activity diagram, it won't let
you select anything once the box is in place. It seems to be on top of
everything. I wished it was considered to be on the bottom and not the top.

5) Class diagram inheritance lines. I wished there was a way to create orthagonal
lines to dipict the classes instead of direct lines.

6) Ability to set volatile on attribute. This would not show up on the class
diagram, but would be in the generated code.

7) Can't define more than one constructor. I needed to make a class that uses a
constructor that takes a parameter to be the main way to instantiate the object.
I needed to make the default constructor private to avoid abuse. When I tried to
do this, it errored saying that a method with that signature already exists.

8) Ability to generate documentation straight from Umbrello. It seems like it
could be simple to create a temp dir, gen code, and then run doxygen on the temp
dir to create documentation, and then cleanup the temp dir. This can be done by
the user in those steps, but most commercial tools let you gen docs straight from
the modeler.

9) Ability to pick doc style. Some people want Javadoc style and others may way
other styles like Qt-Doc or KDOC. It would also be nice to select output style
like html, pdf, latex, xml, rtf.

10) Ability to autogen collaboration diagram from sequence diagram already drawn.
The main value is looking for circular dependencies. All the info needed for
collaboration diagram is in a sequence diagram.

11) Ability to use an instance name in sequence diagram. I seem to only be able
to use the generic class.

12) Sequence diagram doesn't have the X symbol to show destruction of a class. In
the meantime, I suppose I could imitate it using a label, but it should be
directly supported by the tool.

Hopefully you find this feedback useful. I work on several open source projects
and I'm glad to see such a full featured engineering tool such as Umbrello. It
makes other projects more professional.

Best Regards,
-Steve Grubb

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