Creately Blog

Easy UML diagrams with Creately

We’ve had support for UML designs and diagrams for a while here at Creately. And we’ve found that many of our users really like collaborating on UML designs with their Teams through Creately. With built-in commenting, easy embeds for your project wiki and PDF exports, Creately is perfectly suited for almost all types of software and design documentation.

Little Niggly Issues

Unfortunately, there were a few issues and limitations with our UML support. Little niggly things that were marring your experience with Creately. So we’re spent the last forth-night going through all the reported issues with a fine tooth comb to make Creately for UML an easy to use and perfectly functional UML modelling software. This is just the beginning. Expect a whole lot more from Creately for UML in the coming weeks.

What have we Improved?

Without going into too much detail, I’ll list out some of the fixes we’re included in this release of Creately UML.

1. Resizing UML shapes - Previously, when you resize a UML shape like a Class or Package, the new size is not correctly saved, resulting in diagrams getting a little messy when they are re-opened later. This fix was particularly challenging for UML objects, as they support Filtering data properties in the diagram - making them dynamic shapes that resized as you added more Attributes and Members. Issue Fixed.
2. Copy & Pasting a UML shape resulted in the copied shape being resized to its default size. This has been fixed, so the next time you make a copy of any UML object, you’ll get an exact copy. Issue Fixed.
3. Limit on the size of the Attributes and Operations you can enter into a Class and Object Shape. We’ve removed this now, so you can model large classes with no problems. Issue Fixed.
4. Adding more attributes and operations to UML shapes, didn’t always automatically resize the shapes, resulting in a muddled image. Now all UML objects will automatically resize to fit all visible data properties. Issue Fixed.

   

5. When working with Filters on UML shapes, turning on the attributes or properties in a small shape would cause the text to spill out of the shape. Now all shapes automatically re-size to accommodate filtered text. Issue Fixed.

We’re working very hard to make Creately an ideal solution for all you software and design teams out there. So watch this space as we introduce new features and fixes that will make your team’s life a whole lot easier when it comes to working on UML designs, Mockups, Wireframes and Sitemaps.

@charanjit

Multiple Connectors between Entities & Shapes

Many of you are using Creately to put together some wonderful UML, entity relationships and other diagrams that require multiple connectors be connected between the shapes. That’s something you can do real easy with Creately’s magic Gluepoints.

Here’s a 1-min video that shows how to use gluepoints in Creately to create multiple connection points betwen shapes that stick to where they should be and are smart enough to route themselves when you move your objects around.

Hope this was useful. Drop us a line with more video tutorial suggestions, or if you have any questions.

@charanjit

Creately UML Online Keeps Getting Better

With the bug fixes that went into production last week, we introduced a whole new bunch of Smart Shapes to help make your UML diagrams faster and easier than ever before to draw and share in Creately.

You can check out the new features for online UML and Class Diagrams on our site, but I’d like to give you a quick run through of all the new UML capabilities.

More UML Shapes

Many more smart shapes for UML including KObject sets for:

• Class Diagrams
• Activity Diagrams
• Collaboration Diagrams
• Component Diagrams
• Deployment Diagrams
• Entity Relationship Diagrams (ERD)
• Object Diagrams
• State Chart
• Use Case Diagrams

New Smarter Connectors

UML diagrams are easier than ever before. With Creately’s Smart Connectors, the right arrowheads, line types and object relationship types are automatically selected depending on the UML diagram you’re creating.

1-Click Twitter Button

Sharing you UML designs has never been easier. Invite your team to collaborate on directly Creately or just publish your diagrams to a special short-URL to Tweet your diagrams directly from Creately.

So if you haven’t tried it yet, check out Creately for collaborative UML diagramming.

@creately

Photo: Adapted from joone4u