I am trying to create a PAB of only Node PCs, however I do not want Capella to automatically nest one Node PC into another when I drag one onto the other. In other words I want more control over when a Node PC is to be truly nested (i.e. hierarchically placed below another in the project explorer tree) or not. Sometimes it makes more sense to have the diagram illustrate one Node PC being part of (i.e. contained within) another, but not have it reflect that in the project explorer tree.
I know how to work around this by expanding the size of the ācontainerā Node PC āoverā the ones that I want to illustrate as āinsideā the container Node PC, followed by a manual FormatāOrderāSend to Back action (or something similar) on the container Node PC (which is a little annoying). However, when any of the contained Node PCs are moved or repositioned in the PAB, Capella immediately executes a nesting action automatically, which ruins the tree in the explorer.
Is there perhaps some way (or setting) that prevents Capella from performing this automatic nesting?
Capella is a modeling tool (as opposed to a drawing tool) so there is a strong semantic meaning attached to its graphical representations, ie when a Node is represented as being inside a Node, then the actual nesting within the semantic modeled is implied.
The fact that it does the trick when expanding the size of the container is unfortunateā¦ (or maybe fortunate in your case).
I am not sure I can imagine your use case where āSometimes it makes more sense to have the diagram illustrate one Node PC being part of (i.e. contained within) another, but not have it reflect that in the project explorer tree.ā, so I would be curious to know more, just out of curiosity.
Technically, there is no way of preventing this, beyond asking us (Obeo) to do a dedicated Capella customization for you. This customization may deactivate this behavior, but then you may still want to be activated in some casesā¦ So the actual feature you need may not be as simple as ādeactivate itā.
Another idea could be to use āNotesā instead. Note a great workaround though, but have a look at the ā[LCBD] Architecture Driversā diagram in the IFE example that comes with Capella if you donāt see what I mean.
There are a few different diagram editing modes. Standard Mode, Visibility Mode and Layouting Mode. In layouting mode no changes are made to the model i.e. what is in the project explorer. On the top of the diagram editor there is a symbol that looks like a breakdown (one splitting into two). You can select the mode using this dropdown menu. Perhaps you can do what you need to in the layouting mode.