※ This article is written by a Japanese engineer at Astah who is trying to learn English.
Hello, this is Lily.
Are you using the latest version 7.2 of Astah?
I wrote the memories that developed it.
Remote development for the first time
I currently live in a place more than 100 kilometers away from the company.
I am working alone at home. I used to develop it with an excellent engineer in the past. As soon as I was in trouble, I could ask a good engineer. I was anxious at first that I could not question.Team members and development policy changed at the same time. I was confused. But even if we are far away, the owner of the product supported me. I was convinced that version 7.2 was released safely.
New function implementation “Gap Expander/Remover”
Gap Expander/Remover was previously available only for certain diagrams. That developer became a different team. Therefore, I developed the continuation.
I read the code. It was reusing the move command. I first imitated this and developed new it. But there was a problem.
- It takes time to process if there are many ancestors
- Entry point / Exit point deviates from container
- It has the same problem as the move command
- Region’s dotted line does not move as I think.
Move command has processing to change parent of state. However, I think that this processing is unnecessary for this function. I consulted the product owner to add another mechanism. The specification I thought is below.
- The element in the direction of movement from the start line is the object to be moved (in the case of “push”).
- It will be resized if the starting lines overlap and it have “moving child”.
- If any of the elements the minimum size, it can not move any further.
I persuaded the product owner. The implementation of this mechanism took a long time. However, processing speeded up faster than before. Bugs are getting less. At first it was planned to correspond only to the Statemachine diagram. However, the simple mechanism was reused in all diagrams.
Accept
Other engineers implemented a new feature, so I accepted it. Accept is cautious.
- Is it easy to use?
- Is not it contradictory to other functions?
- Is there side effect on it?
- Is the model version the same?
Specification may change by 180 degrees by accept. That is sad for engineers. I use energy to inform, but I will do my best to make better ones.
Fix defect
I wanted to fix more bugs, but few team members. I spent too much time working on the feature of the new version. It would be sad if your request could not be fulfilled.
The following bug fix is given priority.
- It can not be avoided.
- A problem many people encounter.
- I got an inquiry again.
I want to hear everyone’s request. I would like to be a better engineer.
Now I am developing the next version. Tell me the impression of version 7.2.
Astah in 5min 
This is interesting to know, the challenges to develop remotely and yet deliver a great product. I think this is in part thanks to the trust given by the project leaders, having confidence in that their team will make it happen.