Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect Reviews

Enterprise architecture: Capabilities and business services modeling, business processes mapping and analysis, project prioritization and planning (using ArchiMate and BPMN notations); 

Information architecture: Business information model (Information Entities modeling and Security Classification of entities (Availability, Integrity, Confidentiality)  (using UML notation and specific TAG values);

Solution architecture: Conceptual components architecture (using ArchiMate or UML notation);

Integration of all models in a central collaborative with multi-users, multi-domains, and a multileveled architecture repository structured and organized following the TOGAF 9.x Content model.

Supporting all of the important architecture modeling notations and all types and levels of architecture modeling in a secure, collaborative, and well-integrated model repository is really unifying and beneficial.

Having the possibility of integrating and sharing all architecture models inside a centralized repository for all architecture stakeholders provides immense and cohesive insight into all architecture domains and dimension interrelationships. 

The capability to analyze interdependencies between architectural elements makes for a very reliable comprehension of all architectural interactions, as opposed to trying to figure it out from a pile of Visio and PowerPoints (or any other diagramming tool) independent documents.

The product offers very good support for all mainstream modeling notations and architectural frameworks. It has a very complete and coherent environment for business, architecture, and solution modeling. If what you need is not directly available, you can extend the modelings capabilities to suit your specials needs (TAG values, metamodel extensions (MDG), scripting, API interfaces, ...).

It has a very stable and performant environment. This a necessary capability for supporting a large number and varied kinds of modelers (Business architects & Business analysts, Enterprise architects, Information architects, Domain & Solution Architects, Security Architects, ...), all working at the same time on shared and live models. 

The constant evolution of usability and integration capabilities: Nothing is perfect, but constant polishing and enhancement are reassuring. 

Even if there are web-based tools in the Enterprise Architecture tool ecosystem (like Prolaborate), the main modeling application is still a fat client application. For some organizations, it is still a concern and a significant disqualification criterion for adoption.

The capability to model and analyze while maintaining coherent traceability within different variants (variations or versions) of a future architecture has been greatly enhanced in the recent versions of Enterprise Architect. It requires a very mature, systemic, and methodic approach that is not easy to grasp for junior modelers. 

I have been using Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect for eight years.

In eight years of enterprise-wide modeling with multiple architects and business analysts working day-in-day-out with the environment, we have never had a single major problem and we never lost integrity.

The tool is very robust but assuring complete integrity over time requires competent quality control.

Enterprise Architect is a very flexible and scalable tool. It can be set-up different ways to accommodate capacity, volume, and a number of simultaneous modeling users. 

Almost never have to go through customer service/technical support but, the few times I needed it, they were very responsive and supportive. 

In different contexts and organizations, I have tried and used different modeling tools. That said, when I have the choice of tool to use for architecture modeling I always select Enterprise Architect for its usability (even though it is a complex tool), completeness, and extensibility.

It is usually very simple and straightforward. The real work is setting the standard for collaborative work between teams and projects.

For Enterprise Architect, it is usually very simple and I do it myself easily.

For efficient integration with other tools, I usually suggest going through a vendor team.

It was not measured recently, but being able to analyze traceability and architectural dependencies doing impact analysis has tremendous value. 

Avoiding multiple duplicated elements and being coherent and avoiding confusion about naming or modeling notations from different models or symbols from different modeling tool is very reassuring.

Define your immediate needs and objectives, start small and focused.

Identify some motivated champions inside your organization and find a coach to help them get to know the tools. 

Initially, get comfortable and efficient with the vanilla setup of the tool. Do not try to personalize or extend the tool unless you are confident that it will bring more benefits than confusion. 

Define templates and model examples to set the organizational standards for modeling. Evaluate your progress, adhesion to standards, and quality of models regularly. 

Identify other domains of modeling opportunities that could bring benefits to your organization. With experts and senior architects define a mid/long term vision and costs benefits for integrating all aspects of modeling that are important to you over time.

Annually, revised your mid/long term vision.

In my career, I was involved in many modeling tool selection exercises in many organizations and had the chance to compare most of the available tools on the market (Rational Rose, RSM, RSA, IBM RDA, CaseWise, Mega, Aris, ...). To date, I haven't the opportunity to try and evaluate BiZZdesign.

Hang around in the user's community to gain a perspective of what others do and don't do.

There are several ‘primary’ use case:

1: Designing a solution

2: Reverse-engineering the solution from a poorly documented code base - all too common in my 25 years of coding.

3: Communication of concepts, rules, ideas to devs, testers, dev team management

4: Importantly keeping the evolving codebase and the design ‘close-coupled’, with EA that is easy. Code evolves and sometimes the design often changes a lot - how often do devs avoid the design because it’s just way outdated?? It should be the first port of call in a bug fix - not the last.

High/Low-level Design, Test case identification. Mindmapping, functional requirements elicitation, use case elicitation, test cases, activity diagrams. I am a contract developer/designer, for me, it’s vital to get up to speed quickly with new and complex systems. I have often used my own EA license to get a handle on the real model - for me, that's been vital.

Sparx has mainly improved my organization through the communication of ideas through the sharing of models and a variety of diagramming techniques. Consistency is a key attribute of a good codebase. This tool helps a lot in the maintenance and organization of a lot of complexity.

It has led some teams to do better code reviews - to be less focussed on coding conventions (syntax) and more focussed on the semantics because of the abstraction level clear design affords.

We all know understanding is ALL - so Communication is vital, this tool makes it easy.

• Mind mapping as a top-level tool for conceptual brainstorming and identification of key concepts in the conceptual model.
• Use cases / scenarios / activity diagram generation
• The fact that it’s very easy to create child diagrams in diagrams and so keep each diagram clear, focussed, and not bloated. This is very important and a powerful aid in clarifying the model
• Easy forward and reverse engineering - to code and DB design/implementation is an iterative process so there is a real use case for a tool like EA to make the update process very easy
• It's possible to write stored procedures in the EA SQL database to extract steps that can be used as code comments to structure the code directly from activity diagrams. This is something I find really useful to speed up the coding and keep it aligned with the low-level design.
• There are some powerful ideas code generation templates and transforms. Sparx has made the EA object model available so you can add your own popup menu items etc. It is very customizable for the power user.

It is a good affordable that is actively evolving, I think the modeling of activity diagrams could be optimized - currently, they insist on you specifying whether a connector is a control flow or an object flow for instance. It is a minor point, but since this sort of diagram is popular in that it affords both the chance to effectively constrain the model whilst leaving freedom for the next stage in the dev process - which key in good design then it should a high priority to optimize this rather than waste resources unnecessary 'bells and whistles'?

There are several little things they could and should optimize. But the platform is good and could be the base a whole tranch or really useful features. for example: to be able to easily run code set up in unit tests to reverse engineer specific code blocks to yield sequence/activity diagrams, would be really useful when as a contractor you have to 'firefight' the design from the code. 

Personally I would like to see the database normalized better. It's really just a data dump whose business rules are contained in the front end client code - it is way way way off 3nf.

Because its easy to create diagrams one needs to be vigilant on the housekeeping of orphaned fragments - I have written my own scripts to do this, may they are available now.

I don't make much use of the traceability Matrix, yet that should be a feature that I should use if I could see it made it easy to ensure the traceability of ALL the design to the code (completeness)

However, it works. It’s good to use and it’s affordable for a single contractor. It has REALLY helped me. It is a good product and I am sure it will only continue to improve.

I have been using Sparx for ten years. 

IBM Rational, but not many companies could afford it.

Pricing is an obvious selling point and so are the flexibility and feature set.

At the time I first used it it was a no brainer, there was only Sparx out there as affordable and serious software - there was Visio. Now there are real alternatives.

It supports a variety of databases - if you have more than say 5 do not use access. Maybe it is better now but it did cause us problems when 30 devs were using it.

Access DB is ideal for the single user or very small team because its a file-based repo which is easy to back up as part of the project back up at my home-based office I use both Access and MSSQL repos - you can migrate - but its not a simple exercise. I guess if you did it a lot you would have a well-documeted process - i.e picking the wrong driver is/was possible and it will give you an incomplete/corrupt migration. That being said I do do it because I like to get at the SQL repo directly. 

EA and SA Diagramming

Allowed us to validate design changes and give an indication of the code before even speaking with developers. It also allowed the architects to reuse work done by other projects or by other architecture specialities. It is more structured than tools like Visio making it easier to build accurate diagrams.

• Ability to manage a meta-model that support a single source of truth for models
• Ability to capture concept thinking diagrams (referred to as white boarding)
• Reverse engineering capabilities
• Collaborative functionality
• Ability to trace through from a requirement statement to impacted logic was extremely powerful to us

Collaborating on a medium to large model resulted in significant performance problems, in some cases critical issues. It did not include sufficient flexibility for architecture work targeting business stakeholders. Very much a tool focused at application architecture despite having functions covering higher architecture domains.

I've been using it for eight years in total, and five on a daily basis.

We have had some stability issues but these varied version by version.

The scalability issues limit us from expanding the use of the tool.

Initially this was excellent in early versions. The growth of the product has changed as the company has grown. We were not able to get resolution to scalability issues in reasonable timeframes for versions nine or 10.

IBM's tools and a number of other tools primarily UML focused. In v7 Sparx was miles ahead of the competition, fast, flexible, priced affordable.

It was straightforward for single use, but for collaborative use it is slightly more complicated.

In house team. If you're thinking of scaling it up I would recommend linking the commitment to pay for the product to demonstration of the tools ability to support the team size and use you are proposing and ensure contracts are in place with tight SLAs if issues occur.

It's impossible to tell, as the tool has helped to swing decision making in a few high level business meetings but mostly considered a tool to improve the efficiency of architecture.

The current market landscape is changing. The recent work I've done with Orbus IServer to be a serious contender. Other tools now exist like LeanIX as cheaper solutions but SaaS based.

Be realistic about what you team can achieve. In a single use situation there is little advise needed but if you are intending to deliver it into an organisation, ensure that

• The way it will change how you work is possible (considering people and processes)
• The cost is reasonable
• The competition has been assessed using a POC not marketing ware (e.g. Orbus)
• The training impact is understood (The tool is not trival to use)
• The business view is not ignored. In my experience this tool does not remove the need to render information for a business audience separately and neither does tools like Orbus.

We use the product to design and develop databases, leveraging its features to create robust database models.

The product's most valuable features are the database design and development capabilities. These features are adequate for my needs, allowing me to create detailed and efficient database models.

The product could be improved in terms of its ease of use and documentation. While it offers a lot of functionality, it can be difficult to grasp how to utilize these features effectively.

I have been using Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect for over five years. 

The platform is stable and reliable.

My experience with customer service and support has been positive. They generally respond within a reasonable time when I have questions or issues.

Positive

The initial setup was straightforward.

The pricing is reasonable, with the ultimate version costing around 290 Euros for renewal and the initial purchase around 600 Euros. There are no additional costs for maintenance or support, as these are included.

I would recommend this solution for those who work in diverse environments and need a versatile tool.

I rate it a seven. 

We use it mainly for enterprise and business architecture including application landscape and interface landscape. In some instances, we use it for business processes and roadmapping. 

I am not a big fan of using Sparx. The interface is not user-friendly and is outdated. For example, it is not possible to only open a view you've created or to open one project at a time instead of the entire package.

I'm not looking into expanding the use of Enterprise Architect, but I'm looking into replacing it.

It has been a useful tool for modeling and testing automated processes. 

It would be beneficial to incorporate features like document management usage of video models or PowerPoint visuals that you can import and easily use, instead of having to buy extended modules. When collaborating with other people, it needs to be more user-friendly. I cannot get businesses to use enterprise architect as it is too complicated for them. 

Our organization has used this solution for three years. 

The stability of this solution depends on the availability of the license server. If this connection is set up properly, the stability is okay. It does take a long time to load model projects.

It was straightforward. It involved connecting to the license server and deploying the solution. 

It was deployed within two weeks.

We purchased it once off for 1200 euros. If we want to build integrations with other systems such as Word or SharePoint, we would need to pay approximately 300 euros for this. 

Sparx is a good tool for extended usage such as modeling or automated testing. It allows you to do good testing upfront. If the only intention is to use it for architecture modeling and visuals, it may not be the best solution. 

I would rate this solution a seven out of ten. 

Our primary use case is related to the architecture around tying the business objectives and values to their maintenance management and asset management system. I'm a digital asset intelligence lead and we are customers of Sparx.  

The company wants to reduce its maintenance budget so the aim is to get more for less. The solution has achieved this and improved efficiency.

Sparx has good functionality to tie back the requirements coming all the way up to the balance score card. The connection is good as well being reusable so you can tweak the system and change different elements in it, which actually cascade down and see the connections with the other elements.

I think the UI could be improved and made a little bit more presentable. I've also found that sometimes finding the track of the information inside can be difficult. All their topics and help are related to each other with one link over the other and it's a bit like going down a rabbit hole and not being able to find your way back. It would be helpful to have some form of infographic showing how these concepts are related to each other. But I also understand that there is a huge amount of information available and sometimes finding the proper tool is not easy.

I've been using the solution for almost a year. 

I rate the solution seven out of 10. 

We use it for data modeling, business process modeling, and all kinds of enterprise architecture tasks such as DoDAF, ArchiMate, SysML, and UML. We do a lot of data modeling, model transformation, and GIS modeling with it. 

We are using its latest version.

There are a couple of things. Price is one thing, but we also like the scriptability of it. We got into scripting it and automating tasks with it, and it is super duper easy to do and helpful. The API has improved over the years. We automate everything, and I love the automation aspects of it.

Its documentation is not 100% perfect, but it is good enough. It is powerful, but because it is so powerful, it is sort of arcane.

It took me a while to figure out how to use the report generation features effectively. So, it would be really nice if they had a way to make that a little bit more interactive and a little bit more straightforward.

Something that is a little bit annoying is that the changes that you make to models are instant and permanent. So, you have to be careful with what you do, and you should do a backup or have some kind of a version control scheme in there. I'm used to Word where you can hit Control+Z and undo what you just did. It is not quite that way in Enterprise Architect. There are cases where the model changes, so you got to be careful with what you do before you change the model.

I set up our Pro Cloud Server literally last week. I've used EA for 10 years or more.

I don't think I've ever had it crash before.

They're amazing. They're a great company. All my interactions with them have been outstanding. So, they're good.

I've used a few other tools such as public domain RG and System Architect. EA is a good, cheap, flexible, and capable tool.

EA is extremely easy to set up and use once you know what you're doing. You really do need to have some kind of an overview from someone to get it started. They have good online tutorials, so you can get going. It is pretty easy to get going.

It is cheap.

I am about to do testing of interoperability between EA, System Architect, and a few other things. I'll be really interested to see how the ins and outs of sharing artifacts between those two capabilities work.

I would advise others who are looking into implementing EA to get training. I learned it the hard way. I'm hardheaded, and I just went at it myself, but getting training is going to be a helpful thing on what to do and how to do it correctly. I would learn how to do what you're trying to do before buying a tool to do it. Data modeling is not just about the tool, it is about the actual data modeling itself. So, if you're going to do enterprise architecture, you have to take enterprise architecture training from The FEAC Institute or another institute. Instead of just going right in and using the tool, it is better to be trained. I train my people in what they're doing and not just the tool. They do it way better when I give them the tool.

I would rate Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect an eight out of 10. We do a lot of things with it, and it is a great tool, but no one is a 10.

I want a solution that can interface with Jira and Confluence, both of which my customers have, as well as with that of Bizagi.

A feature I like most about Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect is its ease of use. 

My customers use Bizagi, although I do not. I don't want to change this. What should be improved, however, are the integration capabilities of the solution with Bizagi. 

I work with IBM in enterprise architecture as the project manager. I used to use IBM Rational System Architect. I can now see as a consultant what I am able to offer the customer, not only that of IBM, of course. I am currently seeking solutions other than IBM. 

I previously used other tools, such as IBM's enterprise architect, although the tool has since been sold and the company changed. The IBM tool offers certain customization features which are not found in Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect, although I can live with what it has at the moment. 

Since all the staff is already trained in Bizagi and find it easy to use, I do not wish to change this, but only to load all the processes from it to Sparx. This is my approach. 

The Bizagi model is only for process. It is not an enterprise architect tool. Only Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect, but not Bizagi, allows one to make diagrams and metrics, to examine the relationship between all the elements.