Peter Kolbus wrote > First: My experience so far has been that Prefuse can create simple > shapes (boxes, ellipses, etc) and does an excellent job with those in > forced ("spring-loaded") layouts, but won't be appropriate for shapes as > complex as UML classes and components, since Prefuse shapes are defined > via enumeration (Constants.SHAPE_*) rather than subclassing. > I know. In fact: a) Boxes are enough to generate simple graphs (of classes, of dependencies, of xml schema). b) I think - I can write my own Renderer class - that will support UML-like borders (the CONSTANT.SHAPE_ - is mostly too inform prefuse about area of the object - for collisions c) We can use only "simple" renderer to prepare only outline. And then (in far feature) use the coordinates to prepare UML (XMI) file. > A second concern that I have for Piotr with the use of Prefuse for > static diagrams is that Prefuse uses the AWT for rendering; this may > cause problems on a UNIX build host that doesn't have a running X > server. This is based on a vague memory, but it bears testing if this > sort of environment is a priority. > I hope I can use the layout algorithms without any display (swing) - but calculate the coordinates - and use them - to render image. > Finally, in static diagrams, there is a certain polish provided by > snapping shapes to a grid, and having shapes that align with each > other. With Prefuse, the user immediately gets the sense that edges in > the graph are springs, so the smoothness of the animation gets a higher > priority. > If user don't like the automatic layout - he will have to lock all nodes... - and he will get exactly what he want. > I can't say that I have any better toolkits in mind, though, so I'm not > going to argue whether Prefuse is the best platform available for the job. > > Peter > Piotr
--------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]