gaphor 1.2.0

Gaphor is the simple modeling tool written in Python.

Gaphor

Gaphor is the simple modeling tool for UML.

Gaphor is a simple and easy to use modeling tool for UML. It is aimed at beginning modelers who want a simple and fast tool so that they can focus on learning modeling of software and systems. It is not a full featured enterprise tool.

:bookmark_tabs: Table of Contents

• Background
• Install
• Usage
• Contributing
• License

:scroll: Background

Gaphor is a UML modeling application written in Python. It is designed to be easy to use, while still being powerful. Gaphor implements a fully-compliant UML 2 data model, so it is much more than a picture drawing tool. You can use Gaphor to quickly visualize different aspects of a system as well as create complete, highly complex models.

Gaphor is designed around the following principles:

• Simplicity: The application should be easy to use. Only some basic knowledge of UML is required.
• Consistency: UML is a graphical modeling language, so all modeling is done in a diagram.
• Workability: The application should not bother the user every time they do something non-UML-ish.

Gaphor is built on Gaphas, which provides the foundational diagramming library. It is a GUI application that is built on GTK and cairo, PyGObject provides access to the GUI toolkit, and PyCairo to the 2D graphics library.

:floppy_disk: Install

Windows

To install Gaphor on Windows you an use the latest Gaphor.exe installer. There are two versions:

1. Full Windows installation
2. Portable installation

Linux

To install Gaphor in Linux use Flatpak:

1. Install Flatpak
2. flatpak remote-add --user --if-not-exists flathub https://dl.flathub.org/repo/flathub.flatpakrepo
3. flatpak install --user flathub org.gaphor.Gaphor

macOS

We are still working on packaging GTK with Gaphor and it is currently an installation pre-requisite.

1. Install homebrew
2. Open a terminal and execute:

$ brew install gobject-introspection gtk+3

Then install Gaphor on macOS using the latest gaphor-macOS.dmg installer.

Note: Sometimes launching the app the first time after installation fails due to macOS security settings, please attempt to launch it a 2nd time if this happens.

PyPI

If you have the latest stable version of Python installed and the Gaphor dependencies installed, you can also install Gaphor using a wheel from PyPI.

If you don't have the latest stable version of Python and the Gaphor dependencies installed, follow the development environment setup instructions in the next section and instead of cloning the repository, create a virtual environment, and then execute the following:

$ pip install gaphor
$ gaphor

Development

Windows

To setup a development environment in Windows:

1. Go to http://www.msys2.org/ and download the x86_64 installer
2. Follow the instructions on the page for setting up the basic environment
3. Run C:\msys64\mingw64.exe - a terminal window should pop up

$ pacman -Suy
$ pacman -S git mingw-w64-x86-64-gcc mingw-w64-x86-64-gtk3 \
mingw-w64-x86-64-pkg-config mingw-w64-x86-64-cairo \
mingw-w64-x86-64-gobject-introspection mingw-w64-x86-64-python3 \
mingw-w64-x86-64-python3-importlib-metadata mingw-w64-x86-64-python3-gobject \
mingw-w64-x86-64-python3-cairo mingw-w64-x86-64-python3-pip \
mingw-w64-x86-64-python3-setuptools mingw-w64-x86-64-python3-zope.interface \
mingw-w64-x86-64-python3-coverage mingw-w64-x86-64-python3-pytest

Ensure /mingw64/bin is added to your PATH:

$ export PATH=/mingw64/bin:$PATH

Clone the repository.

$ cd gaphor
$ source ./venv -S
$ poetry run gaphor

Linux

To setup a development environment with Linux, you first need the latest stable version of Python. In order to get the latest stable version, we recommend that you install pyenv. Install the pyenv prerequisites first, and then install pyenv:

$ curl https://pyenv.run | bash

Make sure you follow the instruction at the end of the installation script to install the commands in your shell's rc file. Finally install the latest version of Python by executing:

$ pyenv install 3.x.x

Where 3.x.x is replaced by the latest stable version of Python.

Next install the Gaphor prerequisites by installing the gobject introspection and cairo build dependencies, for example, in Ubuntu execute:

$ sudo apt-get install -y python3-dev python3-gi python3-gi-cairo
    gir1.2-gtk-3.0 libgirepository1.0-dev libcairo2-dev

Clone the repository.

$ cd gaphor
$ source ./venv
$ poetry run gaphor

macOS

To setup a development environment with macOS:

1. Install homebrew
2. Open a terminal and execute:

$ brew install python3 gobject-introspection gtk+3

Clone the repository.

$ cd gaphor
$ source ./venv
$ poetry run gaphor

:flashlight: Usage

Creating models

Once Gaphor is started a new empty model is automatically created. The main diagram is already open in the Diagram section.

Select an element you want to place, for example a Class, by clicking on the icon in the Toolbox and click on the diagram. This will place a new Class item instance on the diagram and add a new Class to the model (it shows up in the Navigation). The selected tool will reset itself to the Pointer tool if the option ''Diagram -> Reset tool'' is selected.

Some elements are not directly visible. The section in the toolbox is collapsed and needs to be clicked first to reveal its contents.

Gaphor only has one diagram type, and it does not enforce which elements should be placed on a diagram.

Create a New Diagram

1. Use the Navigation to select an element that can contain a diagram (a Package or Profile)
2. Select Diagram, and New diagram. A new diagram is created.

Copy and Paste

Items in a diagram can be copied and pasted in the same diagram or other diagrams. Pasting places an existing item in the diagram, but the item itself is not duplicated. In other words, if you paste a Class object in a diagram, the Class will be added to the diagram, but there will be no new Class in the Navigation.

Drag and Drop

Adding an existing element to a diagram is done by dragging the element from the Navigation section onto a diagram. Diagrams and attribute/operations of a Class show up in the Navigation but can not be added to a diagram.

Elements can also be dragged within the Navigation in order to rearrange them in to different packages.

:heart: Contributing

Thanks goes to these wonderful people (emoji key):

Arjan Molenaar 💻 🐛 📖 👀 💬 🐛 🔌 ⚠️	wrobell 💻 ⚠️ 🐛 🎨	Dan Yeaw 💻 ⚠️ 📖 📦 🚇 🐛 💬	melisdogan 📖	Adam Boduch 💻 ⚠️ 🐛	Enno Gröper 💻	JensPfeifle 📖
Alexis Howells 📖	Encolpe DEGOUTE 🌍	Christian Hoff 💻	Jordi Mallach 🌍	Tony 🚧	Jan 🐛	Brock Tibert 🐛
Rafael Muñoz Cárdenas 🐛	Mikhail Bessonov 🐛	Kapil Thangavelu 🐛	DimShadoWWW 🐛	Nedko Arnaudov 🐛	Alexander Wilms 🐛	Steven Liu 🐛
Rui Maciel 🤔	Enno Zickler 🐛	tronta 🐛

This project follows the all-contributors specification. Contributions of any kind are welcome!

1. Check for open issues or open a fresh issue to start a discussion around a feature idea or a bug. There is a first-timers-only tag for issues that should be ideal for people who are not very familiar with the codebase yet.
2. Fork the repository on GitHub to start making your changes to the master branch (or branch off of it).
3. Write a test which shows that the bug was fixed or that the feature works as expected.
4. Send a pull request and bug the maintainers until it gets merged and published. :smile:

See the contributing file!

:copyright: License

Copyright (C) Arjan Molenaar and Dan Yeaw

Licensed under the Apache License v2.

Summary: You can do what you like with Gaphor, as long as you include the required notices. This permissive license contains a patent license from the contributors of the code.