Another of my wacky but potentially useful ideas. As usual I've not done any homework to see if anyone's come up with it before, but I can say it was a new thought to me at least. And it is...

Animated UML

Having played with Wink a little recently, and probably inspired a little by a comment at a recent design meeting that a particular UML diagram was a lot more understandable when walked through than if seen cold, I was thinking that certain UML diagrams might benefit from having their creation animated by taking screenshots at key points. Wink can do this, and also has the facility to add "callout" text boxes for extra explanations, amongst other things. The benefits would seem to be:

  • Easier to follow a particular chain of events, or thought process behind a design
  • Ability to focus on a particular part of a large model in isolation, ignoring bits that are not relevant at that point

I'll try to get around to putting together a simple example and posting it, but in the meantime would be most interested in what other people think...

Update: And here is the example (requires Flash). Enjoy...