Nice class diagrams admit good design?

On Evaluating the Layout of UML Class Diagrams for Program Comprehension

“…Eichelberger also points out that the UML standard lacks a specification for the readability of the diagrams [12]. As a result, there are no common agreements on the criteria of readable and understandable layout of class diagrams.…”

“…UML tools have been developed to generate class diagrams automatically from source code. However, few tools can generate "nice" layouts for the diagrams [12].…”

Onion Graphs for Focus+Context Views of UML Class Diagrams

“…Furthermore, the purpose of having context-information in the same view is to facilitate the further exploration and explanation of the elements in the model. We can now introduce secondary notations [9] of node-metrics as used in [6]. The width of a symbol is used to represent the number of classes abstracted and the height of the symbol is used to represent the number of levels abstracted along a relation.…”

“…The quality of a design in the layout algorithm is presented in [6]. Also, there exist algorithms that incorporate other semantic information such as design patterns and architectural importance [1,7].…”

Supporting Collaborative Work by Preserving Model Meaning When Merging Graphical Models

“…So, positioning class symbols in their semantic context overweighted the connections the class had to other classes in the respective diagram [17]. However, there was no preferred direction of connections; though if a diagram depicted classes in a clear hierarchical context, then a top-down direction of connections was preferred [18].…”