Comments on: A Free Open Source Alternative to Microsoft Visio http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/a-free-open-source-alternative-to-microsoft-visio/ Cool Websites, Software and Internet Tips Thu, 20 Jun 2013 01:46:43 +0000 hourly 1 By: Sebastian http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/a-free-open-source-alternative-to-microsoft-visio/#comment-431694 Sebastian Wed, 13 Jan 2010 14:01:45 +0000 http://www.makeuseof.com/?p=26170#comment-431694 ARIS Express is another alternative, which is also free-of-charge (http://www.ariscommunity.com/aris-express). It can also import Visio files for further editing.

]]> By: Yvan http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/a-free-open-source-alternative-to-microsoft-visio/#comment-414029 Yvan Sun, 25 Oct 2009 15:22:03 +0000 http://www.makeuseof.com/?p=26170#comment-414029 I was surprised at how well OpenOffice Draw does flow charts. In addition to common shapes, you can add connector nodes to any shape or image making it quite flexible.

Unfortunately it doesn’t import Visio files.

]]> By: Gates VP http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/a-free-open-source-alternative-to-microsoft-visio/#comment-410428 Gates VP Sun, 11 Oct 2009 16:28:19 +0000 http://www.makeuseof.com/?p=26170#comment-410428 I’ve had very good success with Gliffy
gliffy.com/
it’s actually a Flash app hosted in a browser, bit it worked very well for me.

Even worked great for exporting and eventually printing.

]]> By: Pavel http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/a-free-open-source-alternative-to-microsoft-visio/#comment-409977 Pavel Fri, 09 Oct 2009 12:08:06 +0000 http://www.makeuseof.com/?p=26170#comment-409977 This is another free alternative – http://www.nevron.com/Products.DiagramDesigner.Overview.aspx

It has much more features and types of shapes, as well as the ability to apply automatic layouts on the created diagrams.

]]> By: Sergey http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/a-free-open-source-alternative-to-microsoft-visio/#comment-409793 Sergey Thu, 08 Oct 2009 08:51:01 +0000 http://www.makeuseof.com/?p=26170#comment-409793 Recently i’ve discovered a super-simple, super-light weight “diagram designer”
http://meesoft.logicnet.dk/DiagramDesigner/

It’s also free. It is very basic, but very intuitive. Also it can export to many formats, including wmf, emf, and various bitmap formats.

Highly recommended

]]> By: Bill http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/a-free-open-source-alternative-to-microsoft-visio/#comment-409631 Bill Wed, 07 Oct 2009 17:43:01 +0000 http://www.makeuseof.com/?p=26170#comment-409631 In response to dig_boy in order to get around the box manipulations and resizing I’ve found it works best to simply export the diagram as a png and print it in gqview (in linux) and it works great. I actually used DIA to create an entire diagram of our companies disaster recovery, failover and load balancing network topology and it works great. Even printed it out on a plotter printer in 36×24 poster size and it still looks great. Hope this helps

]]> By: dig_boy http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/a-free-open-source-alternative-to-microsoft-visio/#comment-409544 dig_boy Wed, 07 Oct 2009 13:10:10 +0000 http://www.makeuseof.com/?p=26170#comment-409544 I was using Dia up to Version .096.1 and I liked it for the most part but got entirely fed up with its export and printing capacities. It was abysmal at printing text within boxes — it would always crowd the text or overspill the box when it looked fine on the screen. It also was impossible to get the margins to come out right on teh first try. Exporting to images left Dia-crisp images looking terribly pixelated to the point of unusable. And metafile export was just plain buggy wrong. Please note that I was only doing dirt-basic box diagrams with lines.

I really wanted to like the program but it just couldn’t do the things I wanted… and then I found EDraw Mind Map (http://www.edrawsoft.com/) – a free version of its pay product – and my whole world changed. It is a top-line product that may not overlap Dia or Visio with its features but did the kind of things I needed. I never worried about printing or image export again. Love it! For the record though – I hope Dia has gotten better since 096.

]]> By: Lanni http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/a-free-open-source-alternative-to-microsoft-visio/#comment-409532 Lanni Wed, 07 Oct 2009 11:30:30 +0000 http://www.makeuseof.com/?p=26170#comment-409532 The program seems to have all the merits. I haven’t fully explored the software, however the site could use some revamp. The program has the ability to create more than one image. Given that fact, I would suggest providing a wider view of the programs capabilities in this site. I’ll make reference to images “via4″ and “dia5″. I recognize the reference you would wish to make to the relative comparison to a “pay for” program. Why not display a few more options provided by “freeware” software. Give the people a choice. Pay for “this,” or be happy with “Free.”

]]> By: Pradeepraj http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/a-free-open-source-alternative-to-microsoft-visio/#comment-409530 Pradeepraj Wed, 07 Oct 2009 10:53:07 +0000 http://www.makeuseof.com/?p=26170#comment-409530 Will i be able to open a VSD file using DIA? Could someone confirm if is there any other alternative softwares which can open a VSD file for editing?

]]> By: Joseph http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/a-free-open-source-alternative-to-microsoft-visio/#comment-409508 Joseph Wed, 07 Oct 2009 08:02:01 +0000 http://www.makeuseof.com/?p=26170#comment-409508 I love DIA, it’s what I use as it works on both my Windows and Linux machine, allowing me to use a common interface for both of them. I never thought about it as a Visio alternative to be honest, but I guess it can classify as that :) Glad to see that someone has taken notice of this wonderful program.

]]> By: lefty.crupps http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/a-free-open-source-alternative-to-microsoft-visio/#comment-409395 lefty.crupps Tue, 06 Oct 2009 17:13:26 +0000 http://www.makeuseof.com/?p=26170#comment-409395 > Open source is a wonderful thing
Open Source is a development model; the Free Software licenses is what allows you to have access to this application and (if desired) the source code :)

]]> By: Gary http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/a-free-open-source-alternative-to-microsoft-visio/#comment-409355 Gary Tue, 06 Oct 2009 15:30:53 +0000 http://www.makeuseof.com/?p=26170#comment-409355 DIA also comes in a portable version at PortableApps.com. Here is a link to the application: http://portableapps.com/apps/office/dia_portable

]]> By: Igor T http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/a-free-open-source-alternative-to-microsoft-visio/#comment-409289 Igor T Tue, 06 Oct 2009 13:47:04 +0000 http://www.makeuseof.com/?p=26170#comment-409289 Dia is a little limited in terms of quality of the pictures. If you want quality output I would use inkscape. Inkscape has the problem of not having stencils…

Also Dia does not allow rotation of pre saved stencil drawing which is really cumbersome…

If anyone knows of any plugin for inkscape to allow for stencil support it would be nice :-)

I

]]> By: Thomas P http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/a-free-open-source-alternative-to-microsoft-visio/#comment-409254 Thomas P Tue, 06 Oct 2009 12:43:38 +0000 http://www.makeuseof.com/?p=26170#comment-409254 Nice article. However, Dia is not the only or most popular alternative. For other open source alternatives to Visio go to http://www.osalt.com/visio. Or just use main page on osalt.com to search for virtually any open source alternative.

T

]]> By: Ross Goodman http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/a-free-open-source-alternative-to-microsoft-visio/#comment-409250 Ross Goodman Tue, 06 Oct 2009 12:29:58 +0000 http://www.makeuseof.com/?p=26170#comment-409250 You can also simply copy the installed directory onto your USB stick and take it with you !

Ross

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