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Ask HN: What do you use for diagramming in software engineering?

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Re: Ask HN: What do you use for diagramming in software engineering?

#31

Post by qpiox »

Modelio is open source and has one of the best support for UML2. I have been using it for several years. It also has jython scripting support to write automation for mass modifications in large models. I have managed to learn how to use jython to create a script to automatically generate java source as hibernate jpa entity classes just the way i like it in just one day. This was made much easier with the builtin metamodel browser so that you learn how your whole project model is constructed internally. https://www.modelio.org

Re: Ask HN: What do you use for diagramming in software engineering?

#32

Post by icc97 »

jefe_ wrote: post #22

Omnigraffle is by far my favorite, unfortunately only available on Mac OSX. I use Windows more lately and struggled to find a comparable offering. Then discovered Lucidchart https://www.lucidchart.com/ and have grown to enjoy it quite a lot. It offers common Cisco and AWS networking icons, and has some nice exporting options and the auto-expanding canvas. There are some quirks but it is cheaper and in my opinion clea…

I've been trying out Lucidchart, I've been finding it frustrating, albeit the charts do come out looking nice.

Personally I prefer Pencil [0], it suffers from 'another electron app' syndrome, but I've grown to really like it. It's probably predominantly a UX tool but it has more fine control over elements than lucidchart does, plus it's open source.

[0]: http://pencil.evolus.vn/

Re: Ask HN: What do you use for diagramming in software engineering?

#35

Post by zxexz »

ttd wrote: post #26

I'll put in a plug for an offline diagramming tool that I created, Vexlio ( https://vexlio.com ). It has some neat features like embedded LaTeX equation editing, nice snapping, and a program mode (so you can draw diagrams in Lua code if you prefer that to mouse work).

I love Vexlio! I use the Windows version whenever I'm doing diagramming on Windows.

As somebody who predominantly uses Linux, I was wondering if you have Linux support on your roadmap? I'm rarely actually in a situation where I could use Vexlio on OSX or Windows, but of you had Linux support I would literally be using it daily (and I'm sure I'm not the only one).

I used to use it in Wine, but it took a lot of finicking to get it working and behaviour was just a little too nondeterministic when it worked.

Re: Ask HN: What do you use for diagramming in software engineering?

#36

Post by imhoguy »

For manual diagrams Dia or Gliffy with Confluence. Unfortunatelly manualy side-made diagrams get out of sync quickly as codebase is a live thing.

When the code is primary source of truth it is better to use some on the fly visual analysis. In my current place we use Softagram to mainly analyse bird eye level changes at reviews, but it also helps during staff onboarding.

Re: Ask HN: What do you use for diagramming in software engineering?

#40

Post by jimpudar »

scruple wrote: post #39

Mostly draw.io but I am very keen to check out Pencil the next time I need to diagram something based on what I've seen.

We use Confluence for our Wiki and have draw.io integration. This works really well as all our diagrams are editable by anyone forever.

I used to use Visio on Windows and had an excellent experience.

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