News

UML 2.0 modeling tools begin to emerge

• By Michael W. Bucken
• September 29, 2003

Gentleware took a place among the early leaders in the race to bring out modeling tools that implement the new Unified Modeling Language (UML) 2.0 specs with the unveiling of Poseidon for UML 2.0 this month.

Marko Boger, CEO and founder of Hamburg, Germany-based Gentleware, contends that his firm is the early leader in the race to implement UML 2.0. Boger said the new toolset offers interoperability with other UML tools by allowing for interchange of all model diagrams.

Boger told eADT that the new implementation, first approved by OMG members in April, does correct the flaw in the previous version that disallowed the sharing of diagrams. "The XMI standard was supposed to fix that, but the standard is broken," Boger said. "The OMG wanted to fix that in UML 2.0."

Boger founded Gentleware about three years ago to build a modeling tool that improved on the open-source ArgoUML toolset that faced technical and marketing limits. Boger was involved in the development of ArgoUML but realized early on that the technology wasn't "production ready." The company brought out its first UML modeling tool a year later and quickly took on industry leaders Rational Software and Togethersoft, which have since been acquired by IBM and Borland, respectively.

Observers expect a flood of UML 2.0-compliant tools from companies like Borland, IBM and Telelogic to hit the market within months, though Boger contends that Gentleware's "Internet marketing and sales strategy gives us a radically different price point" than the more established firms.

The multiplatform Poseidon toolset is priced at $199 for the single develop Standard Edition and at $699 for the high-end Professional Edition. A version for embedded systems development is priced at $1,249. The tools are available for download at www.gentleware.com.