Opinions about flow charting software???

I have tried flow chart software in the past, but it wasn't very easy to
use. Anything out there now that is as easy as paper & pencil?

Thx
Scott Kelley

I think Microsoft Visio is pretty good.
I had a bit of trouble with it when starting, but now that I have my
"Favorites" shapes all organized, its a breeze.

I don't know how good Visio is for large and complicated flowcharts,
but for simple flowcharts its really good and fast. I stopped using
paper and pensil, because an error causes you to redraw the flowchart
which wastes time.

In addition it has the usual Microsoft look to it and can export/import
in many standard formats.

My opinion: it sucks. I like to use large paper (butcher paper or
sometimes just 11x17 out of the copier) and a pencil. While sketching
flowcharts and deciding the code flow, nobody expects cosmetic
perfection. It only needs to look pretty if it's going into a
specification, whitepaper or something a suit might read. (In the
latter case, it is safe to redact the flowchart into three boxes: START
-> (Patented algorithm) -> END - since they won't understand anything
deeper than this).

It's much easier (for me) to sketch with a pencil and then, if
necessary for publication, transcribe the final edited result into a
piece of software. I HATE maintaining flowcharts electronically.

Actually you can do it in Microsoft Word: Insert | Picture | Autoshapes
Flowchart.

Not very elegant, a pain to use and difficult to maintain, but if yo
wanted to document a completed design, then most likely it is on you
desktop for no extra cost.

-Aubrey Kagan

On Thu, 1 Dec 2005 21:00:02 -0800, "Scott Kelley" <scottk@iccom.com>
wrote:

I've used Visio a lot, & can recommend it.

Another that I used to use was called AllClear, from a company called
Clear Soft. It was interesting, in that you write a brief "script" &
the program generates a chart based on the end character of each line.
I found it very useful, after I got the hang of it, & actually used it
to check logic in application designs. I don't know if it's still
around or not.

JM

"Scott Kelley" <scottk@iccom.com> wrote in message
news:l-udnSODe6dpSRLeRVn-vw@centurytel.net...
Yeah - any text editor and pseudo-code.

I gave up using flowcharts agout 25 years ago for various reasons:
- they don't enforce good structure
- they're always out of date (the code gets tweaked, and the flowchart
doesn't)
- the lack of any real means of generating/maintaining them
electronically, i.e. alongside the rest of the project.

I switched to using pseudo-code, i.e. a generalised structured language.
Example:

IF button pressed
THEN
get keypress
deal with keypress
ENDIF

Eventually I wrote C that was clear enough that it performed both roles and
was self-documenting, so I dropped the pseudo-code - but it still gets
rolled out for non-technical people's use.

HTH,

Steve
http://www.fivetrees.com

Steve at fivetrees wrote:

Flowcharts work better (for me) when illustrating complicated nested
loops.

It doesn't really matter, either one is just a logical aid in designing
software.

Scott Kelley wrote:
I do a lot of contract maintenance and use Visio when I'm
learning new code. I especially like that I can insert links
to other pages/files of related Visio pages and files as well
as to other reference documents.

New code? Pseudocode.

Ken Asbury

On 2 Dec 2005 06:47:45 -0800 in comp.arch.embedded, "larwe"
<zwsdotcom@gmail.com> wrote:

FWIW, I find Nassi-Schneiderman diagrams much clearer than flowcharts
for such purposes, and they help prevent you from making most of the
mistakes flowcharts allow. Google's first hit
(http://users.evitech.fi/~jaanah/Intr.../3gl_nassi.htm) does a
pretty good job describing them.

Regards,

-=Dave

--
Change is inevitable, progress is not.

larwe wrote:
ever used flowcharting software that generates the code for you ?

Stef

Scott Kelley wrote:
Freeware:

look for DIA, available on all platforms,

or

my favourite Diagram Designer
http://meesoft.logicnet.dk/

I used the latter one to experiment with codegeneration
(for JAL, Delphi, PICbsc) from finite state machines.
So maybe one day that'll added to Diagram Designer.

Stef Mientki

"Scott Kelley" <scottk@iccom.com> wrote in message
news:l-udnSODe6dpSRLeRVn-vw@centurytel.net...
Edge Diagrammer is alot more user friendly than Visio for flowcharting.

"Scott Kelley" <scottk@iccom.com> schrieb:

graphviz dot, can be used by doxygen.

Oliver
--
Oliver Betz, Muenchen (oliverbetz.de)

Scott Kelley wrote:

Didn't flowcharts go out in the 80's???

That was the last time I used one - for a uni assignment...

Regards,
Mark

On 2 Dec 2005 01:26:32 -0800, "Telenochek" <interpasha@hotmail.com>
wrote:

If you want something like Visio, rather use SmartDraw.
http://www.smartdraw.com
It can do everything that visio can do (Even load/save visio format),
and is a hell of a lot cheaper than Visio. The full version with all
libraries goes for US$99.

Regards
Anton Erasmus

Anton Erasmus wrote:

Can it be set up to snap symbols and lines to a grid?

--
Guy Macon <http://www.guymacon.com/>

On Sat, 17 Dec 2005 18:46:02 +0000, Guy Macon
<http://www.guymacon.com/> wrote:

Yes,
And the grid is not slightly different every time one reloads the
document after the app had been exited and restarted -- the way
it happens in Visio. You can download a fully functional demo to
evaluate before you buy.

Regards
Anton Erasmus