Visual Studio Hacks

Generate Code from UML #81

Chapter 10, Work with Visual Studio Tools

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HACK

Figure 10-34 shows a class diagram that documents a Vehicle class hierar-

chy. This rather simple example shows an abstract base class named Vehicle

that contains a few properties (Make, Model, Year) and methods (Acceler-

ate, Decelerate, Drive, Start, Stop). The class diagram then shows other

implementation classes and their relationships to one another.

Generate the Code

Now that you’ve created a class diagram in Visio, follow these steps to auto-

generate the code in Visual Studio:

1. On the File menu, click UML

➝ Code ➝ Generate. The Generate dialog

box will appear.

2. For Target Language, select C# (or C++ or Visual Basic).

3. Type a Project Name and select a Location to put it in.

4. Check the “Add classes to Visual Studio Project” checkbox.

5. Select the template to use. The template list contains several Visual Stu-

dio Project types to choose from.

6. Type a Solution Name and check the Create Directory for Solution

checkbox.

7. Select all classes for which you want to generate code.

8. Click OK. A sample Generate dialog is shown in Figure 10-35.

Figure 10-34. Class diagram of Vehicles class hierarchy

Vehicle

+ Make : string

+ Model : string

+ Year : string

+ Accelerate()

+ Decelerate()

+ Drive()

+ Start()

+ Stop()

Car

Van

Sportscar

Minivan

ExcursionVan

+CargoNet : bool

+DualSlidingDoors : bool

<<inherits>>

<<inherits>>

<<inherits>> ...