Enterprise Architect: Generate display text for links to packages in RTF reports

Question

In Sparx Enterprise Architect it is possible to insert hyperlinks to other model elements, particularly to other packages, in notes and linked documents. These hyperlinks appear as well in generated RTF reports. No surprise, they are displayed with the same label as defined in the tool. However, for links to packages (which become sections in the document) I'd like the hyperlink to be displayed with the section number that the package is associated with in the document.

E.g., instead of "see ThatOtherPackage" I want to have "see section 4.2" in the document.

Is that possible, and if it is: how can I achieve it?

Answer 1

This is not possible, at least not in the current version (9.3.935) of EA.

The reason is that in an RTF template, element notes are indivisible. In other words, you can't "get at" the contents of a note (such as a hyperlink) to perform any preprocessing (such as a substitution).

In addition, it would be very hard to determine at "compile-time" what section number a package would get. The EA API, while richly featured, does not provide any way to insert code into the RTF generation process.

Hyperlinks are pretty weak things in EA and you'd have more options if you used connectors instead. But I still don't see a way to find the section number during generation.