Include JPG image on diagram?

[Rob_J]

Hi, when working the business process and use case models I often have screen shots (JPG) of mocked up screens. I know the I can add the graphic files as "linked files" to my use cases or put a document element on the diagram, or put a hyperlink on the diagram, but what I really want is to be able to view the picture on the diagram and have it print out in the generated RTF documents. If there was a option to do this directly, or an option to automatically show / expand / include linked files on the diagrams and generated reports it would work too.

Editing the RTF documents afterward (to include the documents) is a poor option as I don't want to lose everything when regenerating the file.

Am I missing something? Is this possible? Running V7.5.845 Corporate.

Thanks, Rob

[Sunshine]

Yes there is a way  

First of all you need to add all your JPG screen shots into EA. You can do this via settings>images menu.
Click on the Add New... button and add a JPG image. Repeat until all added making sure your images have understandable names.

Second create a diagram and drag a boundary object on to it.
Right click on the boundary object in the diagram and select appearance>select alternative image. Choose the screen shot you want and click ok. Whala one screen shot. Create new diagrams and repeat for all screen shots.

You can then reference these diagrams via hyperlinks on your business process diagrams or use case diagrams.

Hope that helps  

[Eve]

Even easier.

Drag the image from your file system onto a diagram and select 'Insert'. Creating a boundary, importing the image and setting it as an alternate image are all done for you.

[skiwi]

[Rob_J]

Thanks everyone for your replies, they were very helpful.

I got it working. Here are my results with your suggestions:

1. I tried dragging a .jpg and a .png file onto the diagram from File Explorer and dropping it there. I got the circle with an slash cursor and no drag-drop-insert functionality. Maybe it's specific to version of EA.

2. In File Explorer I copied the selected the image file and copied onto the clipboard. Right-clicking on the diagram my "Paste Image from Clipboard" was greyed out. Paste from the menu and Ctrl-V didn't work either. I couldn't figure out how to get the menu active. Note that pasting from a file this way works in Word, PowerPoint, etc... so not unreasonable to figure it works here too. You can also "Insert Image from File" in many programs as a more direct approach, which was a menu i was looking for.

3. So, continuing down this path I opened the file in a graphics editor (Snagit Editor) and did a copy there of the displayed image. Now "Paste Image from Clipboard" WAS enabled and the copy worked!!

4. I followed the instructions in the help file under "Create Custom Diagram Background" topic and that worked, but it requires certain type of diagram and boundary element (incidentally it adds the images into the Image Manager same as going into Settings > Images). This has the advantage of sharing the image (I think) if you reference it multiple times in different parts of the model, but right now I don't have that need.

Method #3 seems the easiest right now so I'll stick with that.

BTW - if the diagram is is a child element of the Use Case element you have to modify the Use Case template as it does not normally include child diagrams in the report.

Funny how sometimes it's the little things that sidetrack you. Assembling the final report and subsequent revisions will be much easier now. EA is a fantastic tool.

Thanks again everyone.

[Sunshine]

Think the only problem with the cut and paste technique is that if you want to use the same image in another diagram the image name isn't very useful when you look at the image manager dialog list. i.e. "image10812" isn't too helpful. You can't change the name of the image either unless you open up the database and change it via a database tool.
Thus that was the reason I was suggesting importing the images first. When you have a large model with a large number of images its important to be able to find that image again rather than trawling through the list one by one. Even worst doing another cut and paste of the same image creating duplicates.
Well there my 2 cents worth  8-)

[cuninghamd]

Hi, This question has probably been asked before, but I can't find a satisfactory way of sharing alternate images. The sharing of the images seems to be very unsatisfactory. We share our models using SVN and the process seems to be extreamly tortuous for other to be able to see the images. (why are the images just not stored in the xml of the diagram itself? - if just a pasted in image?)
User 1
1) add image to library
2) manually export images reference data
3) check in
for each user that wishes to see the alt images
1) manually refresh images file from svn
2) check out all controlled packages where the new alt images are displayed
3) import images file reference data file
4) go through each diagram where the  alt images are displayed
5) manually select each alt image
end.

Currently using Sparx EA v 8.0.859
Thanks.

[qwerty]

There's some option somewhere in the export to advice EA exporting images with diagrams. But I have no idea how that actually works.

q.

[cuninghamd]

In Tools/options/XML specifications there is an option to Export Alternate images - this is what we are using, There is also an option that has Export Diagram Inages & then by image type - but there is no further explaination in the Help as to exactly what this actually does, or what the consequences of using this setting. Could someone please enlighten me ?
Thanks.