The XML Metadata Interchange (XMI) is a standard from the Object Managing Group for exchanging metadata information via Extensible Markup Language (XML). More and more UML tools allow to export XMI data. You can select the tool that best suits your needs. Presently XMI files exported from the following tools were tested.

• UModel
• Magic Draw Cross platform!
• Enterprise Architect (Enterprise Architect HowTo)
• Visual Paradigm
• Modelio
• StarUML Basic support. Let us know if you have issues.
• Eclipse Papyrus™ Supported started for release 2022-12 onwards. Be sure to watch the tutorial video to understand how to use the tool to generate state machine code from it.

In case of any problems send us an example with a problem description.

Cadifra is a fast and lightweight UML Diagram Editor for Windows. It supports the following kinds of UML diagrams: Class, Object, Sequence, State and Use Case. Each diagram is stored in an own file. The SinelaboreRT codegen directly uses the state diagram model file. The state diagram editor is very good for flat designs. But also designs with hierarchy are possible. Supported versions: 1.3.1, 1.3.2 and later

astah* is a lightweight UML editor from Change Vision with excellent support for drawing UML state diagrams. It is written in Java and can therefore run on different operating systems like MS Windows, Mac OS X or Linux. Its state chart editor is powerful but still easy to use. It provides a Java API for direct access of the model file. Therefore it is not necessary to export the model (e.g. in XMI format) but the SinelaboreRT code generator can directly access the model file. This makes the development cycle very fast. One of the nice new features is a free plugin that shows you a state transition table of the state machine model. It gives you a quick overview of where you have modelled state transitions from and to. And where transitions might be missing.

Latest successful tests were done with version 9.2.0 on Mac OS-X. Check the Astah* Howto page for more info what files to copy.

The integrated state machine editor allows very efficient creation of state diagrams. In contrast to the UML modelling tools listed above, the model is not created graphically, but with a tree-based approach. A graphical representation of the model is generated automatically. You can concentrate on modelling! There is no need to move states or transitions around to beautify the diagram.

☞ The integrated editor is well suited for state diagrams of medium complexity. For complex and in particular hierarchical diagrams with many transitions that also cross state boundaries, the use of a fully-fledged UML tool is recommended.

A major advantage of the integrated editor is that strict attention is paid to the generation of correct state diagrams so that code can be generated.