A couple of things I've noticed:
If the display label for a "pink box" is long it can be almost impossible to persuade the pointer to change to the "hand" to drag a dependency. Increasing the size of the box with the green handles seems to improve this.
Regardless of how the boxes are layed out on the palette, rendering the reports always rearranges them to a vertical layout.
Kevin
Architecture diagram feedback
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jonathan.carter
- Posts: 1087
- Joined: 04 Feb 2009, 15:44
Hi Kevin,
On the first point, I agree, that can be fiddly. When it is, remember that you can select the pink box (one click) and then push the spy-glass button on the top right of the canvas to open up the usage. I use this a lot when the usage box is small.
On the layout there is a 'feature' of Protege at play here. Am I right in thinking that you are running in a multi-user mode?
In multi-user mode, Protege does not save the layout of the diagram for reasons that I have discussed with the Protege team (and that make sense). Basically, because there is no "OK" button to commit a change on a form in Protege, in a multi-user environment, this could cause mayhem for anyone working on a graphical model, when multiple people are adjusting the layout of the model at the same time!
Therefore, whenever you come back to a graphical model, the layout is reset - and as you say, it's easiest to go with an auto layout.
For these reasons, when the Essential Architecture Reporting tab does the snapshot, it applies an autolayout to the diagrams before they are snap-shotted - and hence the tab asks which layout you would prefer.
Jonathan
On the first point, I agree, that can be fiddly. When it is, remember that you can select the pink box (one click) and then push the spy-glass button on the top right of the canvas to open up the usage. I use this a lot when the usage box is small.
On the layout there is a 'feature' of Protege at play here. Am I right in thinking that you are running in a multi-user mode?
In multi-user mode, Protege does not save the layout of the diagram for reasons that I have discussed with the Protege team (and that make sense). Basically, because there is no "OK" button to commit a change on a form in Protege, in a multi-user environment, this could cause mayhem for anyone working on a graphical model, when multiple people are adjusting the layout of the model at the same time!
Therefore, whenever you come back to a graphical model, the layout is reset - and as you say, it's easiest to go with an auto layout.
For these reasons, when the Essential Architecture Reporting tab does the snapshot, it applies an autolayout to the diagrams before they are snap-shotted - and hence the tab asks which layout you would prefer.
Jonathan
Essential Project Team
Hi all,
I want to discuss a workaround for the client-sever-grafics issue.
We found out, that if an image layout is defined whilst being connected to the server repository directly ( opening the pprj server file), the image is
a) loaded to all clients (everybody sees the layouted grafic)
b) not overridden after publish from Essential Report Tab (layout is not disrupted by horizontal/vertical auto-layout feature)
Surely opening and modifying the server repository that way is a rather dirty approach and need to be handled with care (e.g. server session state).
Could somebody you agree that protege behaves like I described above? Or was it just a lucky break what we've seen here ...
Regards, aba
I want to discuss a workaround for the client-sever-grafics issue.
We found out, that if an image layout is defined whilst being connected to the server repository directly ( opening the pprj server file), the image is
a) loaded to all clients (everybody sees the layouted grafic)
b) not overridden after publish from Essential Report Tab (layout is not disrupted by horizontal/vertical auto-layout feature)
Surely opening and modifying the server repository that way is a rather dirty approach and need to be handled with care (e.g. server session state).
Could somebody you agree that protege behaves like I described above? Or was it just a lucky break what we've seen here ...
Regards, aba
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jonathan.carter
- Posts: 1087
- Joined: 04 Feb 2009, 15:44
I've discussed the behaviour of the graphical form elements with the Protege team and there are design decisions that they have taken when working in client-server, multi-user mode.
Basically, when in multi-user mode, the layout of the graphical diagram is not saved to the server so any layout you perform is reset when you come to re-open that instance. This is a feature of the fact that Protege has no "ok" button on any form to commit a change. Rather the changes happen immediately (generally a good thing!) but this could cause all sorts of issues if 2 users are browsing the same instance at the same time. Therefore, they have chosen not to save any layout information in the server.
The autolayout buttons in the Essential Architecture Reporting tab do NOT affect the repository either. Recognising that the layout that has been defined has not been saved, if you are running in multi-user mode, the reporting tab applies an autolayout in order to produce an image snapshot of the diagram before sending it to the Viewer environment. This is why this autolayout is not changing the diagram.
Personally, when I'm running in multi-user mode and open an instance with a graphical form, I use one of the auto-layout buttons on the graphical widget to lay the model out. Because the layout is not saved in multi-user mode, I treat the diagram purely as a simple means to capture the model, rather than what I would necessarily present to the wider community. The idea is to use the content of this model in the Viewer to provide Views that can be rendered as required.
In my discussions with the Protege team, we talked about the idea of providing an "OK" or "Save" button for graphical form elements but there has been no commitment to implement this to date.
Please note that what you are seeing is no affecting the server session state etc. That is being accurately managed by the Protege server in terms of the Instances and the contents of your repository. It's purely the graphical diagram layout information that is not being saved. The model is safe.
Hope this helps
Jonathan
Basically, when in multi-user mode, the layout of the graphical diagram is not saved to the server so any layout you perform is reset when you come to re-open that instance. This is a feature of the fact that Protege has no "ok" button on any form to commit a change. Rather the changes happen immediately (generally a good thing!) but this could cause all sorts of issues if 2 users are browsing the same instance at the same time. Therefore, they have chosen not to save any layout information in the server.
The autolayout buttons in the Essential Architecture Reporting tab do NOT affect the repository either. Recognising that the layout that has been defined has not been saved, if you are running in multi-user mode, the reporting tab applies an autolayout in order to produce an image snapshot of the diagram before sending it to the Viewer environment. This is why this autolayout is not changing the diagram.
Personally, when I'm running in multi-user mode and open an instance with a graphical form, I use one of the auto-layout buttons on the graphical widget to lay the model out. Because the layout is not saved in multi-user mode, I treat the diagram purely as a simple means to capture the model, rather than what I would necessarily present to the wider community. The idea is to use the content of this model in the Viewer to provide Views that can be rendered as required.
In my discussions with the Protege team, we talked about the idea of providing an "OK" or "Save" button for graphical form elements but there has been no commitment to implement this to date.
Please note that what you are seeing is no affecting the server session state etc. That is being accurately managed by the Protege server in terms of the Instances and the contents of your repository. It's purely the graphical diagram layout information that is not being saved. The model is safe.
Hope this helps
Jonathan
Essential Project Team
