An ‘Object Node’ construct can be added to an ‘Activity Diagram‘ via drag-and-drop.
- Within an ‘Activity Diagram,’ click the ‘Object Node’ icon in the ‘New’ tab of the left sidebar and continue to hold down the left mouse button.
- Drag the ‘Object Node’ icon over to the adjacent diagram canvas.
- Release the left mouse button while over the diagram canvas to drop the new ‘Object Node’ and add it to the diagram.
- Select the generating ‘Entity’ construct, then click one of the green circles and continue to hold down the left mouse button.
- Drag the green circle to your newly created ‘Object Node’ construct.
- When the ‘Object Node’ highlights bright green, release the left mouse button to add a generated by/generates relationship.
- Select your newly created ‘Object Node’ construct, then click one of the green circles and continue to hold down the left mouse button.
- Drag the green circle to the receiving ‘Entity’ construct of your choice.
- When the receiving ‘Entity’ highlights green, release the left mouse button to add the appropriate relationship. Releasing over the “Trigger” section will automatically add the received by/receives relationship with the Trigger relationship attribute, while releasing over the “Optional” section will automatically add the received by/receives relationship with the Optional relationship attribute.
- Once added to the diagram with the proper relationship, enter a meaningful ‘Name’ for your new ‘Object Node’ via the ‘Attributes’ tab of the left sidebar (focused automatically for convenience).
- Click the ‘Save’ button located on the toolbar to persist your changes to your project’s database.
* Note: The above process describes using the ‘New’ tab of the left sidebar, which automatically generates a new entity to represent each new diagram construct. If you would like to reuse existing entities from your database to represent a new construct, use the ‘Existing’ tab instead.
For more information on this construct and how it is represented in the database model, see Activity Diagram Constructs.