ArgoUML

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ArgoUML

Latest release:	0.24 / 12 February 2007
OS:	cross-platform (Java)
Use:	Software development
License:	BSD
Website:	argouml.tigris.org

ArgoUML is a UML diagramming application written in Java and released under the open source BSD License. By virtue of being a Java application, it is available on any platform supported by Java.

Software Development Magazine gives annual awards to popular software development tools in various categories. In 2003 ArgoUML was a finalist in the "Design and Analysis Tools" category. It received a runner-up award, beating many commercial tools.

However, as of version 0.20, ArgoUML does not conform completely to the UML standard^[1] and is lacking full support for some diagram types including sequence diagrams^[2]. The release 0.24 was described as a bug fix release solving the most serious problems in version 0.22, for a total of 172 bug fixes^[3].

Amusingly, Argo development has suffered from poor design. "Undo" has been a perpetually requested feature since 2003.

1 Releases
2 Features
3 Weaknesses
4 See also
5 References
6 External links

[edit] Releases

Previous stable releases:

0.10.1 (July 2002)
0.12 (October 2002)
0.14 (August 2003)
0.16.1 (August 2004)
0.18.1 (April 2005)
0.20 (February 2006)
0.22 (August 2006)
0.24 (February 2007, current)

[edit] Features

New Features in v0.20:

UML 1.4 - Enhanced extensibility features of UML 1.4
Sequence Diagrams
AndroMDA compatibility
Quality - Hundreds of bugs have been fixed
Most functions now support Multiple selection of modelelements
Drag and Drop from the explorer tree into the diagram and within the explorer tree

Other Features:

All 9 UML 1.4 Diagrams supported
Platform Independent: Java 1.4+
Click and Go! with Java Web Start (no setup required, starts from your web browser)
Standard UML 1.4 Metamodel
XMI Support
Export Diagrams as GIF, PNG, PS, EPS, PGML and SVG
Available in ten languages - EN, EN-GB, DE, ES, IT, RU, FR, NB, PT, ZH
Advanced diagram editing and Zoom
Built in design critics provide unobtrusive review of design and suggestions for improvements
Extensible modules interface
OCL Support
Forward Engineering (code generation supports C++ and C#, Java, PHP4, PHP5, Python, Ruby and, with less mature modules, Ada, Delphi and SQL)
Reverse Engineering / Jar/class file Import
Cognitive Support
- Reflection-in-action
  - Design Critics
  - Corrective Automations (partially implemented)
  - "To Do" List
  - User model (partially implemented)
- Opportunistic Design
  - "To Do" List
  - Checklists
- Comprehension and Problem Solving
  - Explorer Perspectives
  - Multiple, Overlapping Views

[edit] Weaknesses

No undo feature.
Models sometimes cannot not be re-opened. Incrementally save-as-copy.
No self-calls in sequence diagrams
Must create a class diagram to be able to create a sequence diagram.

[edit] See also

List of UML tools
Poseidon for UML - a commercial descendant of ArgoUML
ATL - an open source QVT language able to transform UML models produced by Argo/Poseidon
StarUML - StarUML is an open source project to develop fast, flexible, extensible, featureful, and freely-available UML/MDA platform running on Win32 platform.