Wayne Robinson

Thankfully, due to the way I work and the 'clients' I work for I have few requirements to diagramme the applications I work on. However, there is the odd occassion where I need to create documentation for less (or traditionally) technically-minded people.

This usually results in me pulling out OmniGraffle or Visio and fighting with GUI-based design tools for presentation that really just represents fairly simple relationships, but I think I've found an answer.

yUML is a UML digramming tool that uses a simple, text-base DSL to describe your diagrammes, rather than fighting with mice and grids to get everything to fit together nicely.

For example, the below diagramme is generated with this very simple code:

[User]-(Login)
[User]-(Logout) 
(Login)<(Reminder) 
(Login)>(Captcha)

If you want a simple, command line script to generate these images, check out the yUML Me Gem (although you will have to install Gemcutter first).

yUML can also make class and activity diagrammes, so check it out today.

Well, that title definitely sounds like a marketing introduction but I swear, I have no affiliation with Xero apart from thinking that they have some of the best SME accounting software that I've come across.

Being web-based, getting transaction feeds directly from banks, having multi-currency support, simple expense claims, fixed-asset register and most importantly, an API for developers; Xero is highly integrated and, most importantly (and rarely), is actually fun to use.

For the last week or so I have been hacking away at the Ruby xero_gateway library project started by Tim Connor and have been having quite a lot of fun. It's great to take a break from customer-facing software for a while and developing code that will be used by other developers.

If you want to check out Xero, head on over to their main site or their developer's site.

Now, shameless plug, if you are an SME and looking to get some extra efficiency by integrating your current business processes/software with your accounting package, give me a shout and I'm sure to be able to help you get more (time/information/money) from less.