The Designer user interface is where many of us spend most of our
working lives. Not surprisingly, we can get a bit irritated when it
does not work in a sensible way (breaking the solid and unarguable
principle of least astonishment), or when it just does not work
correctly.
It looks as though Metastorm have taken heed of our complaints
and our suggestions. There are many new ways that the user
interface has been improved to make our working lives that much
easier.
I am sure good karma will be heaped on those that designed these
additions on a daily basis.... |
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The Designer will have multiple editing modes. This will allow you to
work as before, for example, or work using a swim lane layout,
based on roles. This will make the transition to Metastorm BPM
much simpler for non-developers. Most analysts are very familiar
with the swim lane approach, so can take to process design much
more quickly that if they have to learn another paradigm.
If this editing will be allowed in the 'Managers' Edition', which we
very much hope will be the case, the tool will become far more
widely used, we believe.
Unfortunately, one potential problem we can see is the inability of
the Designer to format new elements in the 'hidden' map styles. It
could get messy very quickly if not handled right. Hopefully some
intelligent handling will be incorporated. |
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At last you can edit element names in place. I assume this is only
on the map, although I'd love to see field captions included. |
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There are several neat changes to make your life easier. One we
mentioned was the in-place editing. Another is the ability to enter
code by selecting parts of the element. We assume this only works
on the Map.
As an example, if you click on the start of an Action, this opens the
'When action started' visual editor. Another example is the ability to
switch to the Form directly when editing the Action properties
related to the Form.
This is the kind of thing that seems trivial, but it can transform
drudge tasks into a real pleasure. |
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You can swap instantly between the Explorer bar and Component
bar. This may not seem like much, but for us Component Bar die-
hards, it is a boon. Currently the Explorer bar is very useful,
especially for finding elements in large and complex maps or forms.
Switching to it, however, is rarely worth the bother. It has been one
of my wish list items ever since the Component Bar was replaced to
have a quick switch mechanism. Finally we have it. |
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At last we have a 'snap to grid' alignment option. This has been
long awated. What I hope is tha this is still an option a,d not
forced, and that we can set the grid size and thus granularity of the
snapping behaviour. There is nothing worse than not being able to
position what you want, however useful the snapping is to some. |
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The alignment options are now more powerful. There are a number
of additional options such as 'contract fields'. This sounds like it
cannot be bad. The alignment options jest get better and better, as
far as we can tell. |
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You can extent the ribbon bar, apparently.
I have avoided these ugly screen-wasting things for a long time. I
avoided Office 2007 precisely because I really could not be bothered
to learn where all the items were all over again (and because I was
not keen on paying Microsoft yet again for exactly the same
software and exactly the same functionality as I have had for over
10 years).
My problem is that it is not extensible, and I think that the
Metastorm BPM may not be either, despite claims? I look forward
eagerly to seeing it in action. |
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You will now be able to drag and drop actions between Stages. At
last! We can forget the 'Move' menu for good! |
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1. Introduction
