Poseidon for UML: User Guide
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# Exporting Graphics and Printing

Another option that you will find useful is the export of diagrams as graphics. Whether you want to use your diagrams in other documents, in a report, a web site, or a slide show, you can export them in a range of different formats depending on your needs.

Formats

The currently available formats are Joint Photographic Experts Group (JPG), CompuServe Graphics Interchange (GIF), Portable Networks Graphics (PNG), Portable Document Format (PDF), Postscript (PS), Encapsulated Postscript (EPS), Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG), and Windows Meta File (WMF).

The first six are well known for their respective areas of usage, but for our purposes the most promising format is SVG. There are not many applications that support it yet, but in the near future this is likely to change to be the standard format of choice for web content as well as for text documents. If you want to try to exporting and viewing diagrams in SVG, there is a browser plug-in (for the Internet Explorer) available from Adobe. There also is an appropriate graphics tool called Batik, available from the Apache project.

Export a Diagram to a Graphic File

- Main Menu - Select 'Save Graphics...' from the File menu.

In the Community Edition of Poseidon for UML version 2.x, graphics generated contain a watermark that appears in the background of the exported graphic file but does not affect any of the diagram information. This watermark has been removed for version 3.0 and is replaced by a default footer that states, "Created with Poseidon for UML Community Edition".

Figure 9-2. Watermarked Community Edition diagram graphic

Figure 9-3. Premium Edition diagram graphic without watermark

Printing

You can also directly print diagrams to a printer. The Print function (Ctrl-P) prints the current diagram; be aware that the diagram must be the currently selected element or the print function will not be available. Many new printing features like model-wide scaling and custom headers and footers are available in versions 2.6 and later. See the Section called Printing in Chapter 7 for details about how to set these options.

The Print Diagrams function calls up a window for you to select which diagrams to print. You can navigate through the diagram tree and select any number of diagrams by pressing the Ctrl key and clicking the relevant entries.

Anti Aliasing

Anti-aliasing smooths out the lines and text in a diagram, making them appear less pixilated. At times this may cause the graphics and text to appear fuzzy, particularly when printed. From the Settings dialog, you can set anti-aliasing for text and diagrams separately for printing and screen viewing. More information is available from the Section called Appearance in Chapter 7.

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