Version: 1.2.2 (using KDE KDE 3.2.3) Installed from: Mandrake RPMs OS: Linux In addition to boxes, some other primitive drawing objects would be handy in Umbrello. Particularly bad is the lack of ability to draw such arbitrary elements like: * straight lines (with various formatting: solid, dotted, dashed styles; different colors; adjustable thickness) * segmented lines (by adding nodes to straight lines by double-clicking on them like we currently do for associations and others) * arrows (lines with specific ends) * ellipses (with formatting like in straight lines, plus fill options - solid color, "no fill", possible bitmap/pattern fills)
Created attachment 8792 [details] Example drawing shapes
Created attachment 8793 [details] The same drawing shapes in OpenOffice Draw .SXD format
Boxes are used for grouping items together, what would these other drawing objects do which can't already be done in UML?
Need a good reason for them
Well, in practice UML diagrams are sometimes augmented by some non-UML elements to better communicate non-technical concepts. On a whiteboard you often end up sketching some non-UML elements to communicate something to the non-technical types. A UML diagram can be used not olny for code generation, but also (even more often) to better express ideas of a complex system to many viewers. And one might need to sketch something from the real like, like a desktop computer, or a bush, or a car e.g. to place outside the system box on a use case diagram. Such a diagram works much better with imagination of non-tech types from the management.