klighd

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KlighD – Kieler Light Weight Diagrams

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Transient Visualization of Complex Data Models

Eclipse Day Bangalore Sep20, 2014 Prabhat K (RBEI)



Transient Visualization of Complex Data Models

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Outline

Motivation

Tools in Practice

Experiences and Best Practices

Conclusion




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Graphical Editors/Viewers/Visualisation




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Badly Layouted Diagrams ! Do they make sense ?




Kieler Overview

• Kieler stands for Kiel Integrated Environment for

Layout in Eclipse RichClient

• Why Kiel ? – CAU University in Kiel, Germany.

•Kieler is a research project about enhancing the

graphical model-based design of complex systems.

•The basic idea is to consistently employ automatic

layout in all graphical components of the diagrams within

the modeling environment

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Major Parts of The Kieler Project




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Major Parts of The Kieler Project

1. Semantics

Provides an infrastructure to define execution semantics for a meta model. Simulators etc.

2. Pragmatics

Synthesis of diverse views on those models tailored to different stakeholders and different purposes

3. Demonstrators

Ready to use demonstrators to test and demonstrate tech from semantics and pragmatics

3. Open Kieler

Demonstrators that were open sourced to create a separate set of useful tools like – Debugviz,

KlazzViz and EcoreViz

Layout

‘This will usually be things like moving nodes around to make

space for other nodes, taking care of edge routing etc. Good

layout algorithms are necessary to be able to free the user from

tasks like this that don't actually contribute anything to the final

model’




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Transient Diagrams

• What are transient diagrams and why are they important ?

• Visualization of complex models involving little or no editing

Kieler has presented the paper on the concept of Model Driven Visualization by presenting a meta model

for graphical views and an infrastructure for configurable automatic layout.

This enables the transient views approach, in which we are able to efficiently derive and draw graph

representations from arbitrary models.

This solves a lot of problems in layouting and generalises the way diagrams have to be drawn for them to be

layouted properly. KlighD is Kieler project’s implementation of LightWeight /Transient Diagrams




Examples - Transient Views

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How is it different ?

Graphviz

• Tool it is very limited in terms of rendering and layout, which makes it useful for debugging and rapid prototyping, but

insufficient for more complex visualizations.

GMF and Graphiti

• Both are designed for composing models by dragging and dropping figures onto a diagram canvas.

• They require a fully-edged editor setup in order to simply show diagrams

• GMF's Notationmodel has no means for specifying rendering primitives like Lines, Triangles etc but point to edit parts

• The arrangement of figures (micro layout) must be realized in Java code in both frameworks

• GMF Tooling requires a tight coupling of model and view




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How is it different ?

KlighD adds rendering specification as well as layout directives to the graph view

model and hence allows to express all the details in the generated view.

It proposes to employ the transient views approach, which consists of the direct

synthesis of graphical views out of existing models.

This inverts the traditional graphical editing approach, in which a model is constructed

using a graphical view




GMF based Diagram View

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Transient KlighD Views

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The KGraph – Modelling Perception

How do we percieve things ?

Are we lost in details or do we focus on specifics ?

Difference between looking and seeing…

How do we model real world scenarios to views ?

KGraph Model is at the heart of Kieler Project




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KGraph MetaModel




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KRendering Shapes MetaModel




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Layout Information




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View Model

KlighD – Kieler Light Weight

Diagrams


Diagrams




SwitchController


Diagrams


Diagrams

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Zooming and Panning Capabilities

• KlighD provides excellent Zooming

and panning abilities

• Optimized for viewing huge diagrams

• The view model can be dynamically

modified to reduce complexity




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Example – ECore Visualization




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Example – UML Visualization




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Kieler Layout

Infrastructure for Meta Layout (KIML)

KIML serves as the foundation of automatic layout in KIELER. It provides the

connection between diagram editors on one side, and layout algorithms on the

other side. New bindings for editors can easily be added, as can be new layout

algorithms.

Layout Algorithms (KLay)

KLay is our effort to provide Java-based implementations of layout algorithms.

The most popular algorithm is probably KLay Layered, a layer-based layout

algorithm for data flow diagrams.(Layered, Tree, Planar, Forced)

Web Services (KWebS)

KWebS makes layout algorithms accessible to any application by providing them

as a web service. KWebS supports several different input and output formats.

Our research group hosts an instance of KWebS, but with the KWebS server,

you can host one yourself as well.

http://rtsys.informatik.uni-kiel.de/confluence/pages/viewpage.action?pageId=328078


http://rtsys.informatik.uni-kiel.de/confluence/display/KIELER/KLay+Layered





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Demos




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Thanks !

Competence Required to get your hands dirty –

1. Eclipse Plugin Dev

2. Xtend2




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References

The Kieler Project Wiki

http://rtsys.informatik.uni-kiel.de/confluence/display/KIELER/Overview

klighd

Technology

industrial property

business solutions limited

robert bosch engineering

event of applications

kieler project1

way diagrams

meta model

transient views approach