Automatic placement of link labels in diagrams

Abstract

While diagrams play a central role in the software lifecycle, computer-based modeling tools are often not used in practice. At least to some extent, this is due to their lack of exibility and support of recurring and tedious \model administration" tasks. Such tasks, like the rearrangement of existing model elements to provide the space required by a new element or the manual adjustment of lines after moving an element, distract the user from the actual modeling activities. In this paper, we present an approach to relieve the modeler from the painful manual placement of the labels accompanying the links in a diagram by handing this task over to the modeling tool. Additionally, we give a short overview over other modeling activities that come along with the creation and manipulation of a diagram but should be handled by the tool and not the user.