January 2012
2 posts
3 tags
“While Alf and the team work on the new website, I decided to put in place a...”
– Getting back on the SEO Path – Some great SEO Tools | The Constructivists Speak
November 2011
1 post
September 2011
5 posts
16 tags
All you Need to Know about Flowcharting
We thought of breaking up the usual string of UML diagram posts with a simple post onFlowcharting. If you have been a regular reader of our blog, you would have been privy to a great deal of information on flowcharts, like this one – Learn to unleash the power of flowcharts. While flowcharts are excellent when it comes to business, it would be prudent at some point to pay attention to some of...
21 tags
Say hello to our versatile 3D objects!
As promised in our last post, where we unveiled Creately’s forward thinking Text capabilities, we are now thrilled to offer a fresh new perspective, in this post, on our intuitive KObjects, namely 3D versions of the Cube, Cylinder and Cone. So why is this such BIG news? We’ve listed ‘em out for you below. 1. Cool Features What we actually did was to create 3D objects that have a list of...
20 tags
Creately offers forward thinking Text...
We break our usual slew of knowledge-based posts with a very exciting announcement today. With the latest Creately release, we’ve added on some really smart features that is sure to make your diagramming experience easier and rewarding. While we do have two awesome features to talk about, we’ll concentrate on just one in this post, with the next feature described in a subsequent post later on,...
8 tags
Beyond the Basics of Sequence Diagrams: Part 3
We got the final part of this series right here. While we did spend some time discussing Gates and its use or relevance to Sequence Diagrams, we now concentrate on just two elements known as Combined fragments. Combined fragments (break and parallel) If you do recall, back in the post called – The Basics & the Purpose of Sequence Diagrams ~ Part 2– there was information on...
August 2011
14 posts
19 tags
Beyond the Basics of Sequence Diagrams - Part 2
We wrap up the week with where we left off with Sequence Diagrams and a look into more advanced elements. Today we will concentrate on the use of Gates in Sequence Diagrams. Gates The previous post illustrated how to reference another sequence diagram via sending across data through parameters and also return values. Yet, there’s another way to send across data between two sequence diagrams....
27 tags
Appropriate use of UML notations is very important...
UML Diagram Objects UML Diagram objects and their usage Here is an overview of all the nine different kinds of Modeling diagram objects that are wrapped under the heading of the UML. UML Class Diagrams UML Use Case Diagrams UML Object Diagrams UML Sequence Diagrams UML Collaboration Diagrams UML Statechart Diagrams UML Activity Diagrams UML Component Diagrams UML Deployment...
30 tags
All kinds of UML Diagram Templates from Creately!
UML Diagram Templates Activity Diagram UML Class Diagram Class Diagram State Machine Diagram Use Case Diagram Deployment Diagram Object Diagram State Chart Diagram Abstract Factory Pattern Component Diagram Sequence Diagram ATM Usecase Diagram Posted via email from...
29 tags
Easy to use pre-made web sitemap templates from...
Sitemap Templates Website Map Site Architecture Map Website Design Structure Site Structure Simple Website Map Website Structure Sitemap Web Sitemap Sitemap Structure Site Architecture Website Architecture Site Map Navigation Posted via email from Creately | Comment »
21 tags
Explore the standard Flowchart symbols and their...
Flowchart Symbols Flowchart Symbols and their usage This is an overview of all the flowchart symbols that you will use when drawing flowcharts and process flow. All these objects are available in Creately and you can try out a demo or take a look at some sample flowcharts for more context. Terminal / Terminator The terminator is used to show where your flow begins...
17 tags
Discover a rich Variety of Mind Map Templates!
Mind Map Templates Mind Map Pricing Model Mindmap Mind Map Example Website Layout Mind Map Performance Mindmap Social Media Mind Map Movie Mind Map Memory Map WBS Mind Map Mindmap Template Launch Mind Map Mindmap Example Posted via email from Creately | Comment »
5 ways how Shapes contribute to exceptional...
A few posts back, we illustrated a few tips on how text can be used visually for better clarity and readability. In this post, which uses a presentation done by Enrique Garcia Cota as a foundation, we turn our attention to diagramming shapes and how they can be utilized better. Just like in the last post, we’ve identified 5 tips that can help you draw diagrams more effectively. In order to make...
Beyond the Basics of Sequence Diagrams: Part 1
How to reference another Sequence Diagram We basically looked into and covered the basics of sequence diagrams last week. This should be enough information when it comes to modeling most of the interactions that will take place in a common system. At this juncture, the natural route to take would be to look into more deeper aspects of sequence diagrams. What we will be looking at would be to...
5 tips on How to use Text as a Visual treat!
A few posts back, we spoke of how Lines should be used for better readability, aesthetic appeal and clarity. In this post, which borrows a few ideas from the excellent presentation done by Enrique Garcia Cota, we focus on on of the most understated elements used in diagramming – Text. When it comes to the use of text in diagrams, we’ve identified 5 general rules that you should stick to when...
Reuse your custom Styles with just a Click!
One of the key factors that defines your diagram’s prettiness is the styles you have applied on the objects in your diagram. When you want to draw your diagrams, may it be a flow chart, mind map, uml or anything at all, you would prefer to focus on getting that idea in your mind into a nice picture that everyone can understand without having to worry about colors and lines and what not. Here at...
The Basics and Purpose of Sequence Diagrams ~...
As we mentioned in the last post – The Basics and Purpose of Sequence Diagrams ~ Part 1, we did discuss three of the main elements (i.e. Lifelines, Messages andGuards) that were related to Sequence Diagrams. In this concluding post, we will take a look at the elements known as Combined Fragments. These would consist of Alternatives,Options and Loops. 4. Alternatives This type of elements...
The Basics & the Purpose of Sequence Diagrams ~...
We last spoke about UML Diagrams a few weeks back in this post – Understanding the relationships Between Classes. While this particular post focused on Class Diagrams per se, we thought it would be apt to move onto Sequence Diagrams today, which we have also touched on with the post – 10 common Mistakes to Avoid in Sequence Diagrams. The structure of this post is such that we will delve into the...
7 Tips on the Proper Usage of Lines
Carrying on from our last post, i.e. Choosing Color to Improve your Diagrams, we thought we’d delve into another aspect of Diagramming, which is on how Lines should be used for better readability, aesthetic appeal and clarity. This post is inspired by an excellent presentation done by Enrique Garcia Cota, which forms the basic foundation for what you are about to read. While some of these tips...
16 tags
Choosing Color to Improve Diagrams
It is a well known axiom that color is one of the most important components of diagramming. Whatever diagram type you do use, the utilization of a color scheme can make it either excellent or mediocre. This post will offer you a few simple but potent ways in which you could use color to great effect. 1. Color can be Used as a Differentiator One of the main ways in which a color...
19 tags
Top 10 Tips that will Increase Visitors to your...
When it comes to generating more traffic for your site there is no formula as such. If you design a site that is competent and consistent, your visitors will atleast stick around and may be tell others about your site. Using Creately, we’ve done a colorful mockup along with 10 mandatory points, which can be found after the mockup, of what a good site should have. 1. Have a really good...
July 2011
9 posts
22 tags
A simple video tutorial ~ How-to draw Org Charts...
We have a series of tutorial videos, but with the continuous developments and feature upgrades to Creately these tutorials look a tad bit outdated. So we thought of coming up with new tutorial videos to highlight some of the predominant updated features. Starting from this week, you can expect a series of video tutorials demonstrating how-to draw different kinds of diagrams with Creately. ...
18 tags
Guidelines for UML Class Diagrams - Part 2
Today, we continue from where we left off on the topic Guidelines for UML class diagrams ~ part 1. We spoke about the relevant guidelines for General issues, Classes and Interfaces; in this post we will discuss the remaining 3. 4. Aggregation and Composition Guidelines As it is known an object is made up of other objects. If you were to consider as examples where an airplane consists...
12 tags
Murdoch and the News of the World Saga - A Visual...
In keeping with that age-old cliche – a picture is worth a thousand words – we did a nifty visual timeline of the latest scandal (i.e. the News of the World saga) to hit global TV screens. As you can see below, it’s way easier to explain things visually. Moreover, think of the numerous ways in which you can exploit various data sources and show information with more clarity via...
16 tags
New Features and Fixes : New Languages, Shape...
Hot on the heels of our Confluence and JIRA plugins, we got some sweet news today. Unlike our usual slew of releases, we got some incredible updates for both Creately online and Creately Desktop, which you should grab hold of asap! Remember how we told you about how Creately got faster with its response time some time back? Well, now we’re eager to let you know that we put in some hard work to...
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Tech Talks - The Importance of Reliability
I was the 2nd presenter in line to have a go on the Tech Talk session series atCinergix. I decided to make the focus of the presentation to center on a QA Quality Factor which is known as “Reliability”. Generally, if something or someone is described as being “reliable” it gives an idea of being trustworthy and dependable. Reliability which is a time-bound component implies successful operation...
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Guidelines for UML Class Diagrams - Part 1
A few months back, we gave you a heap of informative articles on UML design that started with this. If you have not read it, we do urge you to do so since it does offer a nice introduction to class diagrams, which is the focus of this post. When it comes to system construction, a class diagram is the most widely used diagram. A class diagram generally consists of interfaces, classes,...
19 tags
Now, it's Creately for JIRA!
Well, this has been quite an exciting month for us! We had our Creately for Confluence go live last week, and today, we’re happy to announce the beta release of Creately for JIRA, a diagramming plugin for everyone’s favourite issue tracking and project management software, Atlassian JIRA. Creately for JIRA helps your development team to improve the quality of detailing on their JIRA issues by...
16 tags
3 ways to make your Org Charts better
We did speak quite a bit about Org Charts a few posts back, but in this post we thought of letting you all in on 3 simple points that can to help make your Org Charts more focused and clearer. 1. Know the difference between Vertical and Horizontal A vertical organizational structure denotes a strict top down or bottom up structure. Typically, a rigid top down vertical organizational structure...
17 tags
Creately for Confluence goes LIVE!
How cool is this? As posted a few days back, we announced Creately for Confluence in Beta. While that really was some cause for celebration, we have now officially gone LIVE! We’re sure you already checked out our brand spanking new page, but if you haven’t, check it out here. The best part about all this is that you can indulge in the same user loved experience that Creately has become so...
June 2011
6 posts
13 tags
Manage your project better with Org anization...
A while back, Indu did three amazing posts on the different types of org charts. While org charts has been the topic of focus this week, we ruminated a bit on how we could use organigrams like never before. True, we did talk about how we could use org charts in an unorthodox manner in our last post, but we wanted to push the envelope a bit further. You see, there are various tools that are...
17 tags
How functional structures benefit in bringing...
Most organizations today spend thousands of dollars on business solutions to manage their business assets, but they sometimes fail to manage the most important asset – the workforce. Understanding the structure of the organization is important, understanding the roles people play, how they interact through formal and informal processes and the relationships they build are crucial to the...
19 tags
5 Reasons why HR Managers love Organizational...
HR managers in companies have been using organizational charts for decades to fulfil a very basic but significant function. These managers have used org charts to form the modus operandi of a company, where questions of “Who is Who?” and “Who does What?” are answered. Organizational behavioral experts are aware of the issues that arise when lines are vague when it comes to job roles and...
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Creately for Confluence in Beta!
Here at Cinergix we feel like we’re on Cloud 9 right now! Yes, after weeks of arduous hardwork, we’re extremely delighted to announce the Beta release of Creately for Confluence, a plugin for everyone’s favourite collaboration platform, Atlassian Confluence. This is an online diagramming plugin which lets you create and edit diagrams directly inside Confluence with an easy-to-use in-browser ...
30 tags
Plan your website before you start building it :...
Considering the rationality of creating a website is important, but it is even more important to have a clear plan for the website designing before that. The more planning you do, the easier it is to make decisions. Not taking enough time to plan and jumping straight to website development is one of the biggest mistakes you can make when designing a new website. The different stages of...
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Choosing the Key Ingredients for the Perfect...
Putting together a sitemap is akin to cooking up a perfect dish. We mentioned sometime back how a sitemap is more to do with the thinking behind a website, whereas a wireframe and mockup is all about “dressing up” your site in frills and lace. But this does not mean that drawing up a sitemap should be a boring affair with a minimum level of effort being put in. To be honest, there are some best...
May 2011
12 posts
15 tags
8 ways on how the creators of Creately have used...
Scouring through cyberspace, Google has managed to cough up a gazillion articles on wireframes and mockups but not much on sitemaps. We thought it was time to give you a taste of what the humble but potent sitemap was capable of. We’ve used all the methods below with great success, and we thought it would be useful to let you in on some unconventional knowledge using a conventional tool (Note,...
15 tags
Untitled
Scouring through cyberspace, Google has managed to cough up a gazillion articles on wireframes and mockups but not much on sitemaps. We thought it was time to give you a taste of what the humble but potent sitemap was capable of. We’ve used all the methods below with great success, and we thought it would be useful to let you in on some unconventional knowledge using a conventional tool (Note,...
21 tags
First a Sitemap then a Wireframe, right? Why not...
When it comes to ideating a website design, the usual MO for most is to conjure up a sitemap (which can be defined as a set of pages of a web site, which is accessible to both crawlers and users) before proceeding towards the design of a wireframe. This would be a logical and the most natural way to proceed, however, there is no reason why you cannot do both in tandem. This is certainly...
24 tags
A new Creately Desktop Release amid Wesak
Today, we interrupt our usual slew of posts on diagramming and diagram types to make a new release announcement for Creately Desktop. Thanks to some really great customer feedback, we’ve been able to take all your concerns and include it into the latest Creately Desktop release. Some of the improvements include bug fixes, ensuring the process of syncing is smooth and trouble-free, while minute...
16 tags
Why are Wireframes so important?
While some of our recent posts walked you through the art of wireframing and its benefits, have you ever wondered why we’re going on and on about wireframes? Well the reason is rather simple. Wireframing is a valuable stage of any web design project, and now let’s take a step forward to understand why it is so important. Wireframes are blue prints that illustrate the elements of a web site....
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The Art of Wireframing: A 10-step Guide
While our last post was all about highlighting some benefits and uses of wireframes, today’s post will focus on some tips that need to be taken into consideration when dealing with the process of wireframing. While some of them may not be focused directly on designing per se, there are certain elements like gathering feedback and adhering to a set objective, which are important to say the least....
21 tags
Some Benefits and Uses of Wireframes
From flowcharts to UML diagrams, we’ve offered quite a bit of important reading material for you out there. Our last post focused on wireframes and this present one also revolves around this really useful tool. To start things off we thought we’d focus a bit on the uses and benefits of wireframes. You see, for the layman, the topic of wireframes may relate to just web designers and software...
18 tags
Why you should annotate Wireframes
As we all know, clarity is the main goal of any wireframe or UI mockup. What we seek to elucidate via this post is that when structuring a wireframe you need to ensure that you focus on the client requirements ensure that the design is clear and uncomplicated and you concentrate on annotating the design. Simple points but certainly potent points to ponder. If you have experienced rejection...
15 tags
Part 2 : 15 Mistakes you would unintentionally...
This is the final post of our two-part series on Flowcharts. Part 1 can be found here. Remember what really matters is having clarity and attention to detail when drawing flowcharts. In keeping with this train of thought, check out the rest of the interesting mistakes that we have compiled below. 9. Define alternate paths clearly In certain flowcharts, processes do tend to fork. For the sake...
18 tags
Part 1 : 15 mistakes you would unintentionally...
We just finished with Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3 on the basics of UML diagramming. We now have a two-part series on Flowcharts. This is a very straightforward post, which you will find useful when it comes to getting your diagrams picture perfect. When it comes to flowcharts, one of the most significant things to consider is the element of clarity and attention to detail. Flowcharts, as we all...
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Part 3 : The ABCs of UML diagramming
This is the final post in this series, which was first kicked off last week. Just to remind you where we left off in Part 1; we talked about various UML building blocks, such as Things and what it encompasses. Things are further subdivided into (a) Structural, (b) Behavioral, (c) Grouping and (d) Annotational. In Part 2, we carried on our discussion of Things while leaving the aspects of...
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Part 2 : The ABCs of UML diagramming
As promised in the last post, we will be detailing the (b) Behavioral, (c) Grouping and (d) Annotational part of Things in this post. (b) BEHAVIORAL Behavioral things encapsulates the dynamic parts of all UML models. These behavioral things are shown below: Interaction: This is known as a behavior, which consists of messages that are exchanged among certain elements to finish a task that...
April 2011
13 posts
12 tags
Part 1 : the ABCs of UML diagramming
Consider this the prequel to Part 1 and Part 2 of what I posted earlier on UML diagrams. I do believe that these posts are perfect in the sense that they would give you the “big picture” of the UML universe. I understand what was posted earlier on may have been complex to a certain degree, which is why this particular post is intended for those who are just getting their hands wet with UML ...