The ORM Foundation

Greetings,

I would like to send a new version of my ORM file so that you can take a look at it.  I don't necessarily want any critique on the state of the diagrams, although if the current data is causing this, I'd like to know that.  I'm still only about 33% of the way of just getting the diagrams constructed (basically, still at CSDP step 1...).  Tons of clean up yet to go...  But, now the tool windows, or something related to them, are crashing VS2008.  The Spy window has the dreaded red X displayed and if you go to close the window, VS aborts.  It aborts with annoying regularity.  It also crashes for reasons I don't have a clue as to why...

Thanks,

Steve

I can't even get close to the dreaded red X with this model. VS crashes just trying to paint it. Unfortunately, this tracks to a .NET bug with the System.Windows.Forms.LinkLabel class (more specifically the SetMeasurableCharacterRanges GDI+ API, which has an artificial upper limit). Making it even worse is that it waits until the paint to crash (as opposed to where the Text or Visible properties are set), so it is somewhat hard to catch.

This is triggered by drawing the LinkLabel in the DiagramSpy window. The LinkLabel is the list of diagram names that displays when no diagram is selected. Apparently, once you get enough diagrams with sufficiently long names (I'm conjecturing on the name length), the LinkLabel just can't handle it anymore. This occurs when:

• A document is first activated, or is reactivated (switching between two ORM documents will activate/reactivate), and the Diagram Spy window is visible.
• You show the Diagram Spy window using the Tool Windows submenu and it is currently showing no diagram
• You select the Diagram Spy tab
• You delete the diagram currently showing in the spy window and the window is visible

It does not occur if you show the window with a 'Select in Diagram Spy' command from the model browser or another diagram. So, to avoid the bug, hide the diagram spy window before deactivating your document, reopen it using a 'Select in Diagram Spy' command, and close it before closing VS.

Has anyone else seen this, or is it just Steve with his 56 diagram model?

-Matt

PS Steve, with this many diagrams, you might want to use the 'Diagram Management' extension to better manage your diagrams.

PPS I have a 10 line hack fix for this (overrides LinkLabel.OnPaint, catches the overflow, and clears the links), but I don't have time to do anything more about it today.