Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Software for Making Company Diagrams?

Posted by Cliff on from the vectorized-documentation dept.

gaudenz asks: "We have a network with Linux, Solaris, Mac and Windows and need a software to paint simple diagrams, such as used in deployment. The actual requirements are simple: The tool must export to postscript, support fonts, boxes with multiple lines of text, and connections between these boxes. We found Visio with VMWare to be the best solution, JGraphpad 5 looks promising, too. Since diagrams are a common thing in development companies I was hoping others have made a comparison, too, and may come up with some other ideas to solve this problem."

6 of 59 comments (clear)

  1. xfig by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative

    http://www.xfig.org/

  2. LWN Strikes Again by MBCook · · Score: 3, Informative

    Once again, the great LWN has something to help you. Check out part 1 and part 2 of "The Grumpy Editor's Guide to diagram editors". I have no expiriance with any diagram software, so that's all that I can offer you.

    --
    Comment forecast: Bits of genius surrounded by a sea of mediocrity.
  3. Kivio Works for me by Kick+the+Donkey · · Score: 5, Informative

    I use Kivio. Works well. And is relativly feature rich. I believe is supports most of what you're looking for.

    --
    /. is a bunch of nerds at a million typewriters. It's not a political conspiracy determined to undermine your beliefs.
  4. Dia by irenetheno · · Score: 4, Informative
    I switched to Linux as my primary desktop a few months ago (chose Fedora Core 2).

    Recently, I was creating an OpenOffice.org document and needed a couple of diagrams.. After
    searching through the menu for a few moments, I came across Dia.

    Dia fits all of the listed requirements from what I can tell. Its interface and features are very
    similar to Visio IMO.. In addition, It loads much much faster than Visio.

    I created two mini-network diagrams quite easily on my first use. I exported those to PNG
    (EPS is available in a couple of formats) and inserted/scaled them into my document.

    Overall, I was quite impressed.

  5. Graphviz by Polo · · Score: 3, Informative

    You might want to look at graphviz:

    http://www.research.att.com/sw/tools/graphviz

    I've used the mac os x port and found it will create graphs from possibly script-generated input files in a simple syntax.

    1. Re:Graphviz by fm6 · · Score: 3, Informative

      I got interested in Graphviz when I did a Tech Writing contract that required me to use Doxygen. One useful feature of Doxygen is that it can feed inheritance and dependency information to graphviz to create cool diagrams for your API manuals. Alas, Graphviz only knows how to connect nodes with simple arcs. That means you can't follow standard conventions for creating things like org charts. And even if you're not that picky, you need more contro over placement and line drawing if you're going to readable charts with more than a very few nodes.