OmniGraffle

OmniGraffle is a diagram editor for MacOS X. It comes with Tiger (and previous versions of MacOS as well, I think) and is a very interesting tool.

I didn't play with it enough time to know all its potentials. I just tried to add some objects, and connect them. Placing the objects is a lot of fun. OmniGraffle automatically draws alignment and distance lines between objects while you drag them. This way you can center and dispose objects in the place you want with precision. Connecting objects can be fun when you ask OmniGraffle to automatically display graphs or trees. It includes algorithms to draw vertical or horizontal trees, in both directions, and to draw nice graphs.

Today I found another interesting feature: plug-ins. There are a log of freely available plug-ins in OmniGraffle webpage. Two I found interesting: 1. a tool to create a CD cover based on an iTunes playlist, 2. the Fridge Perl Poesy Kit can be virtually used under OmniGraffle.

Five stars for this nice application. If OmniGroup starts porting this application for windows, Microsoft should take care about Visio.