Going Dotty

There's a new big thing in my sphere of interest: Dotty.

For the uninitiated: Dotty, Neato and Lefty are a family of products from Graphviz that take pretty simple text files and generate directed or un-directed graphs.

For the initiated: No, I can't believe I've never found it before either!

It was name checked during the Google LTAC by at least one presenter, and they reminded me that I'd heard its name quite some time ago and meant to look it up. When we were looking at a diagramming problem just a few weeks ago and I figured I should track it down. I was by no means disappointed.

Basically we wanted something that would graph our MVC workflow configurations to make them more readable.

That is, our MVC structure allows us to string arbitrary tasks together: perform x, if result is y, go to task z, if result is h go to task i.

The idea is to keep these configurations as simple as possible; they're only really receiving user input and then prodding objects, but still, there are some complexities. This is especially true when branches split and rejoin. For some reason, XML files or a PHP arrays can be difficult to read ;-)

Quite a long time ago we wrote a small application that would graph them in HTML, but we never liked its results. When paths split and rejoin, the HTML representation wouldn’t show the rejoin.

So, as I say, we picked up Dotty.

Simply genius.

For directional graphs the Dot output is stunning. We can pass it a file in (the trivially simple) Dot language and it'll produce great looking diagrams.
For example, the file:

digraph finite_state_machine {
 node [  fontsize="12",  fontname="arial"]
 edge [ fontsize="8", fontname="arial"  ]
 EntryPoint [ label="EntryPoint (BuildSheepFromInput)", shape="diamond" ];
 EntryPoint->SaveEditedSheep [ label="DEFAULT" ];
 SaveEditedSheep [ label="SaveEditedSheep (SaveEditedSheepTask)" ];
 SaveEditedSheep->SaveCheese [ label="DEFAULT" ];
 EditSheep__EntryPoint [ shape="box" ];
 SaveEditedSheep->EditSheep__EntryPoint [ label="ERRORS" ];
 SaveCheese [ label="SaveCheese (SaveCheeseTask)" ];
 SaveCheese->GetCheeseType [ label="DEFAULT" ];
 GetCheeseType [ label="GetCheeseType (GetCheeseTypeTask)" ];
 DisplayWensleydale__EntryPoint [ shape="box" ];
 GetCheeseType->DisplayWensleydale__EntryPoint [ label="WENSLEYDALE" ];
 GetCheeseType->DisplayCheddar__ComposeMessage [ label="CHEDDAR" ];
}

Would produce:


Stunning!

It's not difficult to write code to generate the DOT files, and the output from neato (the same as dot, but for undirected graphs) is just as high quality.

Of course, as soon as I saw the output the cogs started moving in my mind... I'm now on a bit of a brainstorm on what can come next: How about ER diagrams generated from the database schema and published on an internal site. Generated documentation is never out of date, and it's a damn site easier having it generated of the fly than it is to load up Visio and get THAT monstrosity to do the job for you.

Anyway, the ER diagramming library will be open source, and it IS on its way... I promise.

(Note: if you want more info on dotty, take a look here)

Technorati Tags: software, development, database, diagram, dot, dotty, neato, er, Robert+Baillie, documentation

Run Done, and other news

Well, it's done. Finally the running season's finished for me after completing the Rainforest Foundation's 10km run.

My target for the year was to beat 55 minutes, and I managed it twice. Sunday's run was finished in 54:01, but I managed to beat that 3 weeks ago in the Nike Run London event... 53:23. So say I'm pleased is an understatement!



Aside: To those people protesting against Nike at the event: You have my sympathies, you really do, but it was a Nike 10km 2 years ago that go me running. I'd not long before given up smoking and the Nike run gave me a real incentive to get myself fit again (I say again, but really I'm not sure I've ever been that fit).

Now that doesn't mean that Nike is a great company that gave me my health, or anything like that. But it does illustrate a point... the vast majority of the people at the event were runners, and Nike took the time to organise a great run, probably not an audience that's going to be swayed by your argument. As I said to the protesters on the day, and I really mean this: You organise a 10km run, and I'll run it. An anti-globalisation 10km run in the middle of the most multi-cultural city in the world...

Anyway, next year I'll be stepping it up a touch more and the aim is to get under 50 minutes. The first run's booked already.

And the other news? Well, over the last few weeks I've been trying to get some coding done on a small open source project. It's a PHP library that will generate documentation on arbitrary relational databases. It's in its early stages right now, but I thought it was time to mention it and see if there's any interest out there.

It'll produce bog standard HTML documentation as well as dotty files that you can use to generate diagrams like this:



It'll be available soon...

Doing things I'm not very good at

Well, last night was my last training run before my next 10Km run. And this time I've got a target...

When it's come to official timing, I've managed a 10Km in just over 58 minutes. This time I want to get it to under 55. But what's the point in me doing a run if that's the kind of time I'm going to manage? Odds on bet the winner will do it in something like 35 minutes; I'm not unfit, it's just that I'm not a very good runner; I eat fairly well and am generally pretty healthy, so I don't need to do this in order to keep fit.

I do it because I'm not very good at it. Because running reminds me that I'm not the best at things that I do. It's blindingly obvious that there are people out there that are vastly superior to me on the track. In fact, there are 60 year olds out there that are faster than me. When I did my one and only half marathon I was beaten by a veteran speed walker.

But I'm getting better. I'm learning more about running and training, and I will get faster. One day I may manage under 45 minutes... and then I'll have to pick something else.

The last run of the year will be the Rainforest Foundation 10Km, and if you know me (and want to), you can sponsor me.

Countries I've visited

A friend pointed me in the direction of this little beauty: A site that generates a map of the world showing the countries you've visited.

I've got to admit that the comments on the site are more actual fun than the map, but still...

So here's mine:


Not that impressive.

Fingers crossed, if all goes to plan, in 18 months it'll look more like this:



Though still, it'll look nothing like as impressive as Tom Kyte's "countries I've in which I've given presentations" ;-)

Make your own mind up

Earlier today Bob Binder made a comment on my test conference entry that included a (not too complimentary) summary of his talk. In response to his comment I made a statement that I want to make absolutely clear to everyone else...

I thought that every single one of the talks at the conference was worth attending.
Every one had value, and I think you should watch every one on Google video.

If any comment on an individual talk makes it sound uninviting it doesn't mean it wasn't a good talk. The conference quality was far above the norm, and every talk is worth seeing. And you can, they're on Google Video

Other than that, I invite comments from the speakers, other attendees and anyone that might disagree with me. Just because I have an opinion, doesn't mean that I don't want to hear yours! But don't expect me to agree with you ;-)