Enterprise Architect: Export UML Diagrams in high quality

Question

With Enterprise Architect (Version 9.2), I created some Class and Sequence UML Diagrams. Now I need those Diagrams in a Word document.

My first approach was to just cut them out with the Windows 7 Snipping Tool and paste them into the document. But for printing purposes the quality was way too poor.

The second approach was to "Save them as Images" as offered in Enterprise Architect. But with this, the quality was even worse.

The third way was to export them into a pdf file. With this the quality was quite decent and I could import those pdfs into Inkscape and then convert them into *.png files to import them to word. The problem is, that Enterprise Architect kinda fails with the fonts. Meaning the picture itself has high-quality, but it tries to convert the font of the classes and then I have some spaces between letters where there should be none.

So long story short - is there a way to export my UML Diagrams from Enterprise Architect to a common picture format like .png or .tiff, while retaining decent quality?

Uffe · Accepted Answer · 2016-02-17T08:25:11.640

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As I'm sure you're already aware, you can save a diagram as an image in several formats, including PNG but not TIFF.

The quality of the images can be controlled in the options (Tools - Options), "Diagram" tab. The "Image Memory Limit" controls the amount of memory the image conversion process is allowed; increasing this should improve the quality of large diagrams. "Scale Saved Bitmaps to" allows you to set a higher resolution for the images.

I haven't checked whether these also affect the copy-to-clipboard function (in the Diagram menu or CTRL+B), which is the way I usually copy diagrams into documents.

edited Feb 17 '16 at 08:25

answered Jun 07 '12 at 19:59

Uffe

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Ah great, this actually helps a lot - I scaled the Bitmap export to 400% and defined 512MB of memory for hte image conversion. Now I can save the diagrams in a png file with quite a decent quality. Problem is that my word now fails at the pdf export ( loses quality ) but okay thats not part of this particular problem. Thank you!! – Toby Jun 08 '12 at 08:30
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Ctrl + T is the short-cut for saving a diagram as an image file – Adrian K Sep 02 '14 at 22:28
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EA 13: Start -> Preferences -> Diagram – Eric Eskildsen Apr 25 '19 at 14:41

score 28 · Answer 2 · edited Sep 25 '12 at 12:38

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To have diagrams in word there is very easy way.

Simply, open diagram in ea then select all with CTRL+A, then copy CTRL+C, go in word and just do paste CTRL+V. Easy and perfect quality.

edited Sep 25 '12 at 12:38

Mihai Iorga

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answered Sep 07 '12 at 08:33

Vladan

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sometimes large class diagrams are cutoff using this approach. – O.O Jul 28 '14 at 15:15
I already had finished my question here on SO before finding this. Well, I was searching for use case export, not uml. This works nicely, many thanks! BTW, you can also select parts of the diagram, this works just as well! – Andreas Reiff Sep 02 '15 at 07:41
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As of EA 12.1, this puts a "fake" metafile on the clipboard. It's actually a bad-quality JPG wrapped in a metafile. This is also what happens if you save as EMF or WMF. Also, the image has cleartype baked into it, so it is no good for printing. – Moby Disk Jun 15 '16 at 16:51

score 12 · Answer 3 · edited Aug 14 '15 at 09:16

For some reason, when you use Ctrl-B to export a Sparx EA model to MS Word, you get a bitmap copied to the clipboard, but when you paste into Powerpoint, you get an Enhanced Metafile. This is vector graphics which can be zoomed into etc. with no loss of detail.

Prep

Before you start, go into EA and Tools->Options (or hit Ctrl-F9).
Ensure that the General properties page is selected.
Check 'Clipboard' is set to 'Metafile' (if it is set to Bitmap, you will only ever get a bitmap produced, even in Powerpoint).

Steps

Open your EA model to be exported.
Open Powerpoint and clear the default bounding boxes leaving a blank slide.
Open Word and locate the point in your document where you want to paste the model.
Back to EA, open your model window and hit Ctrl-B (Diagram->Paste Image to Clipboard)
Go into Powerpoint and hit Ctrl-V to paste.
Resize the model to fit the slide.
Hit Ctrl A then Ctrl C to ensure everything is copied to the clipboard.
Go into Word and hit Ctrl-V to paste - you should now have an EA model in EMF metafile format, not a bitmap. Document reviewers can now zoom in and see the full detail in the model.

As of EA 21.1, this puts a "fake" metafile on the clipboard. It's actually a bad-quality JPG wrapped in a metafile. This is also what happens if you save as EMF or WMF. — Moby Disk, Jun 15 '16 at 16:51
I'm using EA 14. I just tested to paste it directly into word and I can zoom it without loosing quality, so I guess now the metafile gets pasted into word as well instead of the bmp. — AdriRomas, Apr 16 '20 at 13:15

score 2 · Answer 4 · answered Aug 09 '16 at 15:42

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Do the following:

PACKAGE->Documetation->Publish as HTML

Create new folder for output and set the path in"Output" field.

-> Press Generate

Goto ..[your folder]\EARoot, the files named EA*.[png|gif] are your diagram

images in original resolution.

answered Aug 09 '16 at 15:42

Yan

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score 1 · Answer 5 · answered Mar 14 '14 at 23:22

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Myself, I used ctrl+P and used my pdf converter for printing. - Before this, I setup the page size in the Diagram properties -> Diagram -> Page Setup -> Advanced. - I set "Scale to one page" then i click "Page Setup", choose the appropriate page size and orientation. - My PDF converter is PDFCreator: http://download.cnet.com/PDFCreator/3000-2064_4-10558866.html

answered Mar 14 '14 at 23:22

Sinisha Mihajlovski

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There is no "Advanced" in my "Page Setup" dialog. Otherwise this sounds like a reasonably nice workflow. – Tuure Laurinolli Jan 29 '16 at 12:49
This is a print option that depends on the operating system/printing software. In Any case you get the idea. – Sinisha Mihajlovski Jan 29 '16 at 14:20

score 1 · Answer 6 · answered Dec 01 '15 at 15:18

While I see that you seem to have this resolved (happy to hear), I'll post this in case others don't have any luck with the above.

I've always just selected (ctrl+A for the whole diagram) and pasted in to Word/PPT/Outlook and the diagrams were converted automatically to nice PNG scalable images (without ever changing the memory/quality settings).

But on a recent project it seems that when I tried to do the same the quality was very poor/fuzzy and the text was sort of squashed.

Are you by chance using Remote Desktop to connect to a machine that is Running Sparx EA? There is another thread floating around somewhere (sorry don't have the link) where others were having this similar trouble when connected via RDP in Full screen display mode. I was able to export good quality from a non-RDP session, or I think if I connected via RDP but not in Full-Screen mode it owuld export in the quality I'm used to.

Hope this helps anyone else with a similar issue

score 1 · Answer 7 · edited Jun 24 '21 at 10:05

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Change your diagram themes, go to tools->diagram->Themes and change diagram themes to "blueprint" and go to file->Print to PDF

edited Jun 24 '21 at 10:05

cbuchart

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answered May 30 '16 at 13:53

Latief Anwar

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score 0 · Answer 8 · answered May 29 '18 at 06:55

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With Version 13 (probably older versions as well) you can press Ctrl-T to open the dialog "Save as Image". There you can choose between .png, .bmp, .jpeg, .tga, .gif, .wmf and .emf.

answered May 29 '18 at 06:55

QBrute

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score -1 · Answer 9 · edited Nov 26 '18 at 10:20

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Copy the diagram Ctrl + A, Ctrl + C and paste it into Microsoft Paint and then save it as jpg/png file.

edited Nov 26 '18 at 10:20

Agilanbu

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answered Nov 26 '18 at 07:06

Amit Kumar

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Enterprise Architect: Export UML Diagrams in high quality

9 Answers9