3.3 Table Editor
 | See
also the Menu Reference, Section
7.8. |
The
Table Editor
provides a tabular or
form-based view on the elements in graphs stored in the repository. In the
editor, elements of a graph are represented as rows and properties of the
elements form columns. Thus, the Table Editor provides an easy way to view all
the information about elements in a graph in a compact form.
Figure 3-52 shows
an example window of a Table Editor. It shows the graph ‘Sales system', a
Data Flow Diagram.

Figure 3-52. Table Editor.
The Table Editor opened in
Figure 3-52 lists the Process objects of
‘Sales system’, and shows all their properties (i.e. Process ID,
process name, process specification and documentation). The figure also shows a
property dialog opened on a Process ‘Verify orders’.
With the Table Editor you can view and edit properties of
design elements as well as make or view explosions and decompositions between
several graphs. Hence graphs such as requirements specifications or problem
lists, which are neither graphical diagrams nor matrices, are most suitable for
the Table Editor.
3.3.1 Tables
Opening tables
Like all editors, the Table Editor opens, manages and creates
graphs in a similar manner to that described in earlier sections where the
Diagram Editor and Matrix Editor were introduced.
Accordingly, to open a Table Editor:
1) | Select
Editors | Table Editor in the
Launcher. |
2) | Select
a graph, e.g. ‘Sales system’, from the list
(Figure 3-53), and click OK.
Alternatively, you can double click a graph to choose it and close the
dialog. |
3) | Select
a representation from the dialog that appears, and click OK. If you want
to make a new representation select ‘Create new Table’. This
selection opens the selected graph but allows you to make a different
representation version of it. Thus, you can choose a different object type to
show, or a different order and subset of the objects in the
graph. |

Figure 3-53. Dialog for selecting graphs.
 | The
dialog for representation selection does not necessarily appear. It depends on
the representations available and the current dialog options (see Section
2.1.3 Options
Tool). |
As a result, you should now have a
Table Editor open on the selected graph.
 | By
keeping shift pressed during the open operation, you can open the graph without
locking it. This is especially useful in a multi-user environment when you just
want to view the graph and allow another user to change it at the same
time. |
Creating tables
To create a new table:
1) | Select
Editors | Table Editor in the
Launcher. |
2) | Select
the last item, ‘create new graph’, from the dialog
(Figure 3-53), and click OK.
|
3) | As a result a
dialog appears asking you to select a method. Choose a method and click
OK. |
4) | Next
a property dialog opens for the new graph. Fill in the properties and press
OK. |
 | If
the selected method has multiple element types, the Table
Editor asks which element types of the graph should be shown in the table. Thus,
when creating a table for a Data Flow Diagram the editor asks which elements
will be shown, e.g. ‘Process’, ‘Data store’, or
‘External’. |
After you have
answered these dialogs, a Table Editor opens with a new graph.
Managing tables
As in all editors in MetaEdit+, the Graph menu allows
users to create, open and edit graphs. For example, the same function that was
previously used to open a table can be accessed in the Table Editor from
Graph | Open.... Similarly, new tables can be created by selecting
Graph | New... and by following the instructions described
above.
To edit the
properties of the graph
itself select
Graph | Properties..., and a dialog similar to that in
Figure 3-54 will appear. In the dialog,
properties of the graph can be edited and modifications accepted by selecting
OK. See Section
2.3.1 for more
information on such property dialogs.

Figure 3-54. A property dialog for the graph ‘Sales system’.
The
Graph menu also includes functions to view a table in other representations
(i.e. as a matrix or as a diagram) or to browse the table in a Graph Browser.
Basically, the Graph | View functions each open a new editor for the
given representation.
Printing a table
To print a table, select Graph | Print.... You are
first asked for the printer, then for the scale of the printout or how many
pages you want to print over. By default, printing is of the whole used area of
the table on a single page.
When you press
OK in the print scale dialog the
output is sent to the printer. You may also use a print preview tool by pressing
Preview button. The preview tool shows the output a page at a time.
Pressing the
Print button actually sends the output to the printer and
closing the window cancels printing. You can choose to print only the visible
area of the table or the whole table, at a specific scale or over a certain
number of pages. These more advanced features are described in Section
4.2.
You may also export the table to a word processor or
spreadsheet, as described below, and print from there.
Exporting a table
To export the table as tab-separated ASCII or as an HTML table
select Graph | Reports | ASCII Export or Graph | Reports | HTML
Export. These export functions open a report output tool from which the
table can be saved into a file or copied directly into an external program, such
as a word processor, spreadsheets or textual HTML editor.
Accessing reports
All reporting
functions can be accessed
through the
Graph menu. To run reports that are already defined select
Graph | Reports | Run.... To define new reports and access existing ones
choose
Graph | Reports | Create.
Closing a Table Editor
To close a Table Editor select
Graph | Exit, or close
the window like any other window on your
platform.
3.3.2 Objects
Adding objects
Each object (i.e. row in the table) has a pop-up menu that
includes all the functionality that is needed for creating, editing, linking and
deleting elements of the table. The pop-up menu is shown in
Figure 3-55. The menu also includes the
operations for making explosions and decompositions to other graphs.
 | Note
that only objects can be added in the Table Editor. Adding relationships and
roles is not allowed, because the table representation is poorly suited to
handling the binding of a relationship, its objects and roles.
|

Figure 3-55. Pop-up menu in the Table Editor.
To add an
object (i.e. a row) in the Table Editor:
1) | Select
the row above which you want to add the object (with the left mouse button). If
none of the rows is selected, objects will be added to the last row of the
table. |
2) | Open
the object’s pop-up menu (with the right mouse button).
|
3) | Select
Add... from the menu. |
A dialog opens
allowing you to enter information about the new object. When adding a Process in
the graph ‘Sales system’ the dialog looks like that in
Figure 3-56. With the tab
key
(ctrl-tab for text fields) you can move between the fields and buttons of the
dialog.

Figure 3-56. Dialog for adding a process.
Adding existing elements
To add an existing element into the table select Add
Existing... from the table related pop-up menu. This works as in other
editors.
To add an existing element:
1) | Click
the left mouse button at the row of the table above which you want to add an
element. |
2) | Open
the pop-up menu with the right mouse
button. |
3) | Select
Add Existing... from the menu. As a result a dialog, like that in
Figure 3-57, opens allowing you to pick
elements that are already defined in this
graph. |
4) | Choose
one or more of the elements in the list and press
OK. |

Figure 3-57. Selecting an existing object to add.
The
dialog in
Figure 3-57 also has
additional functions for more complex reuse situations: to fetch information
from other graphs, even if they have other representations, i.e. a matrix or a
diagram. These options can be selected from the last two items in the
list.
The first of these, ‘
Get some objects from
another graph’ opens a new dialog
(
Figure 3-58) for selecting a source
graph from which elements are to be reused.

Figure 3-58. Selecting a source graph for reuse.
 | Please
note that only those elements can be reused whose type is shown in this table.
If you select an incompatible graph the tools opens an empty dialog showing that
no objects can be reused from that
graph. |
The second reuse option,
‘Get some objects of type ‘Process’, offers a list of
all the currently loaded elements which match the table’s element
type.
For example, in a Data Flow Diagram when the selected
object type is ‘Process’ a dialog list like that in
Figure 3-59 opens. It contains a list of
all processes that are used in any graph.
 | The
dialog also includes those processes that are part of the table that is already
opened in the Table Editor. Also, objects of that type may exist that have not
yet been loaded, and hence not appear in the
dialog. |

Figure 3-59. List of all processes to be reused.
When you
press OK, the objects selected will be added into the table. If you edit
any of these objects, i.e. change the information about the object through a
property dialog, the change will be immediately propagated to that object
elsewhere, and therefore also available to all graphs and tools that use the
same object.
Editing elements
Information about each element can be edited by selecting
Properties... from the pop-up menu. There are also two shortcuts: double
clicking with the mouse and pressing Enter on the keyboard.
You can also move and copy elements in the table through
the Cut, Copy, and Paste functions that are available in
the pop-up menu. Note that these functions can also be accessed through
Edit menu, and are only effective within the current Table
Editor.
Deleting elements
To remove a design element, select it in the table and then
choose
Delete from its pop-up menu. Note that
there are different deletion policies that you can choose through the Options
Tool (Section
2.1.3).
3.3.3 Subgraphs
Like other editors, the Table Editor provides functions to
level graphs and to link objects in a table to other graphs. (See also Sections
3.1.4 and
3.2.4 for linking in the Diagram Editor
and Matrix Editor).
In the Table Editor you can either view or make the
decomposition links (
Subgraphs | Decomposition...), or view and make
explosions between objects in
a table and other graphs
(
Subgraphs | Explosions...). These functions can be accessed as in other
editors through the object related pop-up menu and
Edit
menu.
3.3.4 Viewing and formatting
Viewing a table
The View function allows you to hide or show selected
properties of elements by hiding or showing columns of the table. Viewing also
affects the printing functions so that printing follows viewing
settings.

Figure 3-60. Dialog for choosing properties to be shown.
View
| Selected ... opens a selection dialog like in
Figure 3-60, allowing you to choose the
properties to be shown in the table.
Sorting a table
Other specific functionality related to tables includes
sorting, setting column widths and fonts. These functions can be accessed
through the
Format menu. The table can be sorted by
Format |
Sort....
Figure 3-61 shows a dialog
for selecting a property to be used as a sorting key as well as a sorting order,
i.e. ascending or descending.

Figure 3-61. Sort table dialog.
Setting column widths
Column widths of the table can be adjusted in two ways. The
first way, Format | Autowidth, adjusts all column widths according to the
longest values of properties on columns so that they can all be seen.
The second way,
Format | Widths..., opens a dialog
for setting each column width.
Figure 3-62 shows the Column Widths
Tool
. With the tool you can set a width for each column,
to some of the columns or to all columns. The
Save button accepts the
settings allowing you to continue to set different widths for other columns, and
Save & Close saves the current settings, closes the Column Widths
tool, and applies all saved settings to the table.

Figure 3-62. Column Widths Tool.
Setting fonts
In some cases, it may be necessary to set the font of the
table. For that purpose, Table Editor offers a tool for selecting fonts. By
selecting
Format | Font... a dialog such as that in
Figure 3-63 opens, allowing you to
choose a font for your purposes.

Figure 3-63. A dialog for selecting fonts.