Free uml tools
Here are 5 free UML modelling tools you can use. I use the JUDE community version. I found the user interface easy to learn and the product was also feature rich and simple. The products are not necessarily arranged in any specific order and the list is certainly not exhaustive.
Have fun designing
JUDE – community: http://jude.change-vision.com/jude-web/product/community.html
UMLet: http://www.umlet.com/
Argo UML: http://argouml.tigris.org/
BOUml: http://bouml.free.fr/download.html
Visual paradigm – community: http://www.visual-paradigm.com/product/vpuml/editions/community.jsp
There are a lot more (Poseidon, Jdeveloper, …) but after trying nearly all of them (free and commercial) and lose a lot of time, I prefer the one that are based on scripting tools see
http://reboltutorial.com/blog/yuml/
http://reboltutorial.com/blog/easy-yuml-dialect-for-mere-mortals/
NetBeans has a good UML plugin, which is also free and of very good quality IMO
I like VP but the CE is free non-commercial use only. I like Netbeans plugin that have really nice Reverse Engineering of Java code – that is a plus. There is also one for Eclipse – UML2 Tools project: http://www.eclipse.org/modeling/mdt/?project=uml2 – still in Incubation, but it is worth trying, if you use Eclipse.
IntellIj can now render some UML diagrams. I like Poseidon or Argo UML.
I use the ArgoUml for a school project, and i think it is not a good option
This is a very nice UML tool. A best example of how beautiful and fast a Java SWING application can be. The best SWING application I’ve ever seen. By the way, the creator of this tool has authored “Core Java Volume ! & II ” published by Sun.
Worth having a look at it. Hope you will.
http://sourceforge.net/projects/violet/
@Ragavan
It does lack some features that other UML tools provide though. Auto Alignment, operation notations, custom stereotypes, code generation from UML diagrams etc.
The violet tool certainly looks nice. I agree that it looks too cool for something written in swing
The look and feel seems to be from a “Blue vista” theme. Googled it and it did not result in anything
Great UI
Another useful tool is StarUML. It hasn’t been updated for at least 5 years, but still I think it’s one of the best out there.
You will fin more UML tools on http://www.softdevtools.com/modules/weblinks/viewcat.php?cid=54
StarUML is the best free UML tool I have found. Not very fancy and no recent updates, but it gets the job done well. http://staruml.sourceforge.net/
Some webapp love : http://yuml.me
Useful list. I’ve used StarUML, ArgoUML in the past but think JUDE Community Edition is the best I’ve come across.
something similar to http://yuml.me is http://www.umlgraph.org/
@Ragavan
I use violet too. It’s just wonderful for drawing quick diagrams that don’t need code to be generated.
Other lists of UML tools (open source, eclipse compatible, textual based,…) here: http://modeling-languages.com/content/uml-tools
I’ve got to add http://creately.com to this list. Creately provides smart shapes that recognize the UML artifacts and makes it easy to add connectors and relationships between Objects, etc. Check out the range of UML support here – http://creately.com/Draw-UML-and-Class-Diagrams-Online