Today I got a number of things done. I’ll describe them briefly but forego the code listings for today. Too much going on.
I created an external way to graphically represent the non-Path components. These work roughly the same way as the data display objects I’ve been using (and am still using for the Arrivals component, which doesn’t even have to be displayed) but take up much less space and display the entities that are within them. The entities in components are also colored differently depending on whether they have finished their process or traversed their queue. A bare minimum of queue information is provided, and this could probably be eliminated for the simple, one-element process component. This method of display should make things much more visually clear to the user.
The incoming and outgoing nodes are included in the representation of each component. This process will be extended to handle display of the Path components as well, for consistency.
The start and end coordinates of all Path components are now set automatically by referencing the incoming or outgoing node on the non-Path component to which they are attached. The start and end locations still have to be established manually where Path components are attached to each other in series. Still, this saves a lot of hassle for the designer. The code for this was added near then end of the verifyModel function.
This new representation allows more complex systems to be represented in less space. Eventually a lot of the labels and internal information can be squeezed out as well, to allow even more information to be displayed. The amount of information to display or not display should be as flexible and configurable as possible.
The original data display objects are still available. I plan to make them visible by user request to monitor more details than are shown in this newly streamlined version.