Open source UML editors lag proprietary leader

Hmm, could it be some specific OSS projects are lagging a little bit? I think that it is entirely possible. But to be honest, the argument for improvement is never something that I felt was being put onto deaf ears.

Normally when one decides to contribute to an open source project, the first step is to download the sources and study them. This can be a tedious job, especially if the project is large. It would be more useful if the project leaders would provide a graphical representation of the project, which would enable current contributors to keep an overview of the developing software, and would help potential contributors to see how each part of the software is interconnected with other parts. Most commercial software developers provide such graphical representation, and do so in a standard manner, with the Unified Modeling Language (UML). However, only a minuscule number of projects in SourceForge.net (which boasts of being the largest open source projects repository) describe their software in UML. Part of the reason may be that OSS UML editors are not up to the job.

UML defines diagrams that can describe nearly every aspect of software, from class structures to individual procedural activities to collaboration amongst classes, and even how software eventually is to be deployed. [Read the rest]