Table of Contents

Using Mouse Gesture

Using Mouse Gesture

Mouse gestures are visual modeling tools that help you to draw and manage your diagram with just a click of your mouse. There are three types of mouse gestures, the drawing gesture, the command gesture and the connection gesture.

Applying Mouse Gesture

To apply mouse gesture, simply hold down the right mouse button and move the mouse to form the gesture indicated by a blue path. When you release the button, the gesture will be executed automatically.

If you use a drawing gesture, an element will be created on the diagram. If you use a command gesture, the command will be directly executed. The connection gesture allows you to create connections quickly with just your mouse.

The following table shows the results of applying drawing, command and connection gestures.

Gesture	Example
Drawing
Command
Connection

There are 11 basic gestures supported by VP’s products. The following table shows the description of gesture path.

Gesture	Description of Gesture Path	Gesture	Description of Gesture Path
	Down – Right		Down – Left
	Clock-wise Rectangle*		Counter Clock-wise Rectangle*
	Folder Shape*		Right – Left#
	Down – Up#		Right – Left – Right – Down – Left – Up*#
	Left – Down – Right – Down – Left (squarish S)		Right – Down – Left – Up - Right
	Left – Down – Right – Up - Left

Remark:

The node is the start point of each gesture.
* Start At Any Point
# Bi-directional

Note: For the gestures marked with “Start at Any Point”, such as Clock-wise Rectangle, you can draw the gesture starting from any corner.

For the gestures marked with “Bi-directional” like Right - Left, you can draw the gesture starting from left or right.

Using Drawing Gesture

By applying drawing gesture, you can directly create the element by drawing on the diagram.

Let’s create a Product class on the following class diagram.

On the class diagram, hold down the right-mouse button, move the mouse to form the clock-wise rectangle gesture which forms a blue path on the diagram.
Release the button, a new Class element is created automatically.
Rename the class to Product by double-clicking on the newly created class.

Creating Attributes and Operations

Gesture	Command
	Create Attribute
	Create Operation

To create an attribute in a class, simply hold down your right click and drag from right to left. If you drag outside the class the setter and getter property will be set to true.

To create an operation hold down your right click and drag from left to right. If you drag outside the class the operation will be public. If you release the mouse inside the class the visibility will be protected.

Using Command Gesture

By applying command gesture, you can execute command to the diagram such as layout the diagram.

Let’s execute the auto layout as an example.

On the class diagram, hold down the right-mouse button, move the mouse down-right to form the gesture indicated by the blue path.
Release the button, the class diagram is laid out neatly.

Using Connection Gesture

By applying connection gesture you can easily link elements in a diagram together with just your mouse instead of having to choose from the diagram toolbar.

Here is part of a diagram. We have added two actors on the right and want to connect them to the system.

on the actor, hold down the right mouse button and drag a line across to the usecase you want to connect to. A blue line will appear.

Release the button and a connector will be created immediately.

The finished diagram.

Mouse Gesture Supporting Resource

In order to assist in applying mouse gesture to the diagrams, a Mouse Gestures dialog box is provided to show the mouse gesture available for different diagrams.

Opening Mouse Gesture Dialog Box

To open the Mouse Gesture dialog box, simply click Help > Mouse Gestures... from the menu.

Checking Mouse Gesture

The Mouse Gestures dialog box shows the mouse gesture available on the selected category. When you select a category, the name, description and the drawing path for each gesture available for the selected category are displayed on the dialog box.

Note: If you mouse over the row of each Gesture, it shows the animated drawing path.

Let’s see the animation resulted by mousing over the row of the gesture for Package:

Animation

To check the available mouse gestures for each category, simply select one from the drop-down menu of Category.