Modifying the Collection of an Item

You can extend the PowerDesigner metamodel to, for example, add new properties to an existing object (extended attributes), to create new objects (extended objects), and to create new connections between object types (extended and calculated collections and extended compositions). These latter collection extensions are not included, by default, in the object book report items in the Available Items pane of the Report Editor and must be added by hand.

Note: If you create extended or calculated collections in your model and use the Report Wizard (see Creating a Report with the Report Wizard) to create your report, the generated report automatically creates a list for each type of extended and calculated collection inside the book item for each affected metaclass.

You can add any object list or book inside any other object book to allow you to represent any extended or calculated collection. Since there is no control over the location where you drop report items, and you are responsible for the global consistency of items and collections in your report. Once you have dropped the appropriate item, you can modify its collection and select a calculated or extended collection.

In the following example, a calculated collection is created on the operations metaclass that retrieves the diagrams where messages using a given operation are displayed. To display these diagrams in the report, a diagram item must be inserted inside the operation book item and the appropriate calculated collection selected for its collection:

In the following example, in order to manage the "schedule" and "event" concepts, the extended object <<event>> has been created, along with an extended collection of extended objects <<schedule>>. The Extended Object report item is added to the report and filtered on the stereotype Event (see Refining the Selection of Objects for a Report Item) and the List of Extended Objects is added to the Extended Object book, with its collection set to Schedule:



  1. Drag and drop the appropriate book or list item under the selected book item in the Report Items pane.
  2. Right-click the book or the list item and select Collection to open its Collection dialog box.
  3. Select a collection in the Collection list and click OK to return to the Report Editor.