[ANN] BabySRE (Squeak Reverse Engineering) posted on SqueakMap

Chris Muller afunkyobject at yahoo.com
Wed Dec 22 06:21:16 UTC 2004


Nice work Trygve!  I, too, am beginning to enjoy the fruits of objects visually
connected automatically via my Maui project, but in a slightly different way.

I really like this, may I offer a few suggestions?

- When an object is dropped in the diagram, if there is a direct reference to
another already in the diagram, it would be most-helpful if it would discover
and add the link automatically.  This should work even for collections and
Dictionary's.

- This tool looks prime for backtracing 'pointers to this object'; to assist
discovery of why an object is not being garbage collected.  I'd think this to
be an easy enhancement, and the payback is tremendous.

- Separate the act of opening a grid-windows from placing the objects in them. 
Register a new "SRE collaboration diagram" under the Open.. menu.  That way, I
can effectively build a diagram from multiple sources (inspector, debugger,
expression, etc.) and place them in the diagrams I want.  Perhaps it should
still open one automatically only if there is not a single one in the current
World; otherwise, don't open one.

- Work out what should happen when an object is dropped in that already exists.
 Maybe it should only allow one to reinforce the identity concept..?? 
Something to think about anyway.

- I see I can already type directly in the diagram, so why not skip the interim
dialog that prompts for the name and just give it the default name.  It can
then be changed right in the diagram if desired.

- (less imporantly) ability to zoom out

Wow, I didn't mean to go overboard.  This many suggestions means I really like
this tool.  Thanks for putting it together and sharing it.

Cheers,
  Chris



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