flow chart diagrams : tools / best practices

Question

Are there any free online tools out there to make visio kind of diagrams. I would like to practice my flowchart skills. Are there any good sites or books or articles out there that discuss best practices for flowchart diagrams.

Answer 1

Dia is an open source option: http://projects.gnome.org/dia/

Answer 2

+1 for Dia. It's also cross-platform, which won me over. Another advantage of Dia is that the diagrams are stored in compressed XML.

I had a project where I needed to diagram something in the database, and I was able to write a program to create Dia-compatible XML from the database, which saved me a HELL of a lot of typing and drawing. I just had to reposition and resize the objects.

Answer 3

http://www.umlgraph.org/

Found no other better solution. Program your charts. Makes beautiful sequence diagrams.

Answer 4

Gliffy is an online flowcharthing program.

Personally I use Dia, an open source Visio kind of clone (it works under Windows, Linux and MacOSX).

Answer 5

Open Office includes a program call Draw which is really nice.

Answer 6

Already answered here;

Here is some:

• StarUML - http://staruml.sourceforge.net/en/ (Free)

• Enterprise Architect from Sparx Systems (Not free)

• Violet

• Umbrello UML

• ArgoUML

• Dia

Here is a complete list of over 50 UML designer (free and not) Wikipedia list:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_UML_tools