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From: Dave on 21 Sep 2005 19:02
My company is currently using Rational Rose Modeler 98i and I am
looking into some professional UML modelers available to see which one
my company could upgrade to. Rational technical developer/Realtime
seems to me a logical choice but I'm having some trouble migrating the
state diagrams. In Rose Modeler 98i state diagrams and activity
diagrams are treated in a similar fashion, but in Rational rose
realtime it no longer the case. The state diagram from Rose 98i is
still loaded as an activity diagram, and I haven't found a way to
convert that into a statechart diagram.

I read that some UML modelers support the XMI format, so I used
MIA-transformation to convert the Rose model into XMI format, although
I'm not sure if an UML modeler could import this output file, at least
JUDE and ArgoUML seemed to be unable to parse the output from
MIA-transformation.

That aside, I'm looking at some UML modelers and see which one is a
good alternative to Rational software, here's a list of modelers I've
found on the web. If anyone have used them before I would be grateful
if you could provide your comments on your experience using the
modeler.

Rational Rose XDE Developer
Rational Rose Realtime/Technical Developer
I-Logix Rhapsody
Softeam Objecteering
Togethersoft Together
Mega Mega-Development
ArgoUML
EclipseUML

Ideally, I would like to have a UML modeler than supports import from
and export to XMI format, so we won't become dependent on a particular
UML modeler. Also, some code generation in C++ would be good

Any help is appreciated, thanks in advance.

Dave

From: H. S. Lahman on 22 Sep 2005 10:58
Responding to Dave...

> My company is currently using Rational Rose Modeler 98i and I am
> looking into some professional UML modelers available to see which one
> my company could upgrade to. Rational technical developer/Realtime
> seems to me a logical choice but I'm having some trouble migrating the
> state diagrams. In Rose Modeler 98i state diagrams and activity
> diagrams are treated in a similar fashion, but in Rational rose
> realtime it no longer the case. The state diagram from Rose 98i is
> still loaded as an activity diagram, and I haven't found a way to
> convert that into a statechart diagram.

Rose/RT is distinct from newer versions of Rose Modeler. It is a
translation tool that was integrated with Rose Modeler. (ObjectTime was
bought by Rational several years ago to establish a position in the
translation market) That integration preserved the original ObjectTime
view of model development.

AFAIK, all the current Rational UML repository releases support XMI. So
if you just want a UML drawing tool that supports XMI, you should look
at a plain Rose Modeler/Developer upgrade. (Hopefully Rational would
provide a migration path from Rose Modeler 98i, but that is a pretty
ancient version.) However, I think the future of Rose is going to be
under Eclipse so if I were upgrading I would want to go directly to RSM/RSD.

[I can't really comment on the tools in your list because it could be
construed as disingenuous since PathMATE is a direct competitor for some
of them.]


*************
There is nothing wrong with me that could
not be cured by a capful of Drano.

H. S. Lahman
hsl(a)pathfindermda.com
Pathfinder Solutions -- Put MDA to Work
http://www.pathfindermda.com
blog: http://pathfinderpeople.blogs.com/hslahman
(888)OOA-PATH



From: tim@DELETEMErobotcrazy.com on 22 Sep 2005 16:43
Telelogic Tau can import XMI.

Tau is particularly strong with State machines and supports UML1.x, 2.0
and SDL. I believe its widely used within the telecoms industry.

AFAIK there is no way to translate from activity to a state chart
diagram within TAU. Tau can build a statechart and stimulate the chart
with user-defined values and scenarios. You can embed and import
external code to support the state machine. To simulate the state
machine, it actually generates code which is built by your compiler.
Any code you import/embed is in the final build.

It is possible for you to drive the statemachine, while monitoring
within the Tau environment, with another application - although I have
no experience of this.

Tau developer (part of the G2 suite) will generate C/C++ code.

From: Dave on 23 Sep 2005 09:34
I finally managed to download the Rose XDE Developer (1 GB!) and it can
open Rose Model (98i) and export XMI, but the UI is integrated with
eclipse and look pretty different. On the other hand, the Rose/RT
(called Technical Developer on IBM's website) UI is almost identical to
the ancient Rose Modeler 98i my company is using. So I guess I'll have
to get used to the new UI, or pick something other than Rational

From: H. S. Lahman on 23 Sep 2005 10:52
Responding to Dave...

> I finally managed to download the Rose XDE Developer (1 GB!) and it can
> open Rose Model (98i) and export XMI, but the UI is integrated with
> eclipse and look pretty different. On the other hand, the Rose/RT
> (called Technical Developer on IBM's website) UI is almost identical to
> the ancient Rose Modeler 98i my company is using. So I guess I'll have
> to get used to the new UI, or pick something other than Rational

Actually, that's small compared to RSD & RSM! B-) Those involve about
a dozen files each that are each integer factors larger. Even with the
high speed DSL option it took me two days to download the entire suite.

FWIW, I have heard a rumor that Rose/RT is being completely rewritten
for Eclipse, which might account for why it has the original interface
from when Rational bought ObjectTime (i.e., resources are committed to
the rewrite). But that is strictly conference scuttlebutt.

However, I do know that Rose itself is being reincarnated under Eclipse
as RSM so that there will a single integration backplane for CM and SQA
tools that is tool-independent. The drawing tool and repository are
essentially done but work continues on the MDA side. Whether just a
Rose version will continue to be supported outside Eclipse when that is
done I don't know.

[FWIW, the people at Pathfinder doing tools work tell me that Eclipse is
tedious to set up initially but once it is in place, tool integration is
pretty easy and life for the application developer is greatly improved.]


*************
There is nothing wrong with me that could
not be cured by a capful of Drano.

H. S. Lahman
hsl(a)pathfindermda.com
Pathfinder Solutions -- Put MDA to Work
http://www.pathfindermda.com
blog: http://pathfinderpeople.blogs.com/hslahman
(888)OOA-PATH



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