ProductsUModelUML Project Documentation

Creating and maintaining documentation for any software project can be a tedious and time consuming task. UModel® 2012 steps up the pace of productivity by generating documentation files for you automatically.

Documentation is an important part of your software development project – to measure progress toward completion, to communicate functionality among team members, and to provide a project roadmap later on when the application needs to be updated. UModel® 2012 accelerates this step by automatically generating documentation for you in HTML, Microsoft Word, or rich text (RTF) formats.

For quick on-the-fly documentation to communicate among team members, UModel® 2012 lets you export project diagrams as image files. A selection in the Project Menu lets you generate complete project documentation at any time:

UModel UML Project Documentation

The UModel® 2012 built-in project documentation design offers a high level of user control, flexibility, and customization. The Main tab in the Generate Documentation dialog lets you select the output format and and image processing options for the built-in UModel project documentation design.

The Include tab provides extensive options to customize the project documentation for your needs. In an early development iteration you might want to focus on a single diagram type – state machine diagrams or sequence diagrams, for instance, as you work through all the issues of application flow. Later on during code engineering, you may want to focus exclusively on class diagrams.

When your project is complete, the Select all Diagrams and Select All Elements buttons help you quickly generate a complete record of your project.

You can also select the level of details to include for each element. For instance, checking the box for Hierarchy diagrams greatly assists understanding of class definitions.

Whichever output format you choose, UModel® 2012 adds links to aid navigation. Links to the generated source code files are also included in your project documentation.

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In HTML documentation, hyperlinks attached to elements in your project diagrams link to the approriate diagram within the documentation. The screen shot below shows the browser view of a hyperlink in a package diagram that opens the corresponding class diagram for the package.

UModel project documentation created in word processor formats also includes links that help users quickly follow the thread of a subject of interest.

Selecting the Index option adds a document summary with links you can navigate to the major sections.

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Using the UModel built-in documentation design, you can also control the appearance of project documentation by individually specifying the type style and size of each text block.

Stylesheets for Complete Customization of Project Documentation

If your documentation needs require greater customization, you can use an SPS stylesheet to instruct Altova StyleVision® 2012 to create completely customized documentation for your UML project.

Example files installed with UModel include a sample stylesheet to use right away, or that can be your starting point for your own customized format using all the flexibility of StyleVision. A stylesheet can let you embed images into your UML project documentation – such as your company logo – and headers, footers, or blocks of standard text.

Stylesheet-based documentation enables PDF output and includes support for all the options of the Include and Details tabs of the the UModel Generate Documentation dialog. The StyleVision interface uses color coding and provides advanced entry helper windows for viewing, editing, and assigning the style and layout properties of each element in your design.

Accelerate completion of your own software development projects by generating project documentation with UModel® 2012. Download a free 30-day trial today!