Enhancement Suggestions

I have some complex transformations. There are some suggestions that would be a huge help. I have mentioned some of these before in other post. Some of these would appear to be simple to implement and others would be much more difficult but a great enhancement to a future version.

1. Show input and output field names in transformations. I have multiple transformations with 20+ outputs.It gets very confusing. I envision something like this:



2. The same type of information (the field name) either on the transformation or a popup when the mouse is hovered over the object when in Process Data mode. Again - it is easy to loose track of what is what in large transformations. Something like this:




or



3. A sub-transformation transformation that enables the user to drop on the canvas, set inputs and outputs, and open a canvas to drop other transformations on. This would enable us to create a group of transformations that are related then use that group of transformations as one transformations in the current transformations canvas.

4. The ability to store sub-transformations in the repository for reuse in other transformations.

5. The ability to set a different color for certain connecting lines. Again it gets complex in larger transformations. Currently, even selecting the line does not highlight or bold it.

6. Outputs on target objects. Sometimes (and I do have this situation this time) we have data that needs to flow through to other fields. We can do this currently by linking a transformation multiple times to the target fields. However, with a large number of these the canvas gets very cluttered. This would be something like transformation --> target field 1 ---> target field 2

7. Arrange Horizontal and Arrange Vertical buttons that actually does something worthwhile. Stacking the objects on top of each other is worthless. That is the typical result. And with no undo we have to cancel and start over. Something like align left, align top, align right, and align bottom would be very helpful. So would a snap to grid on the canvas.

8. Be able to look at more than one row in the Process Data command. I would love to see a second tab at the bottom that would show rows like the source one does except for the processed data.

9. Source and Target field drop-downs at the top of the canvas that would allow us to select a field and have that field selected in the canvas. This is very important when dealing with lots of fields. Trying to find a field on a busy canvas is a pain.

10. Zoom the canvas. Zoom in and out.

11. Rubber band selection of a group of objects - should work like standard windows interface design where you can select from any direction and not need to hold the control key down to do anything with that set of selected objects.

12. Field in objects properties to make a note of what that object does. It is in some and not in others.Literals is one example that does not have a place to note the use.

You can look at GoDiagram from Northwoods for functionality ideas on the canvas and objects. Unfortunately this is for .net and will not be helpful in your dev environment. www.nwoods.com/components/dotnet/godiagram-overview.htm

Thank you for the suggestions

We will have have a look at these one by one and ask you a lot of questions.

There is a lot of room for improvement, and the ones you have highligted are not the only ones we want to make better.

Thank you,
Mike

Thanks Mike.

Please do not take any of this feedback as dissatisfaction with the tool. I am very glad to have found it.

I have other suggestions also. I do look forward to more in-depth discussions when the time is right.

Regards, Charles

Charles

We have implemented some of your suggestions

Number 1 and 2 Field names are shown as hints now (Popups)
Regarding suggestion 11 it is already works as you suggested.

Mike

#1 & #2 - the solution is a big help for lookups. Can this be done for calculations? Showing the code is nice but I wonder if showing the fields like lookups now do would be better? This is why in the initial suggestion I thought that replacing the 1, 2, etc with the actual field name of the input / output was a better solution.

#11 does not work as I suggested. Following Windows design guidelines the user can select multiple items from any direction, not from the top left down (this is the only way I have been able to make this work). In addition, no keys have to be pressed (ie the control key) in order to select items. Nor does any key have to be pressed to move the selected group of items.

Visio is one example of this. Powerpoint is another example of how it should work. Even windows explorer does this.

Perhaps this is a limitation of Delphi?

#1 & #2 - the solution is a big help for lookups. Can this be done for calculations? Showing the code is nice but I wonder if showing the fields like lookups now do would be better? This is why in the initial suggestion I thought that replacing the 1, 2, etc with the actual field name of the input / output was a better solution.

Yes this will be done for calculations as well (eventually)

Mike