'As shown when printed' vs 'As shown on screen' mode

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Written by Romain | Updated

UpSlide supports two modes for copying data in Excel when exporting to PowerPoint and Word, 'as shown on screen' and 'as shown when printed'. 

To avoid any issues when co-working on a document, we recommend all team members use the same export settings. When using 'as shown when printed', we also recommend making sure the same default printer is selected in Office's File > Print.

The 'as shown when printed' mode has been introduced in UpSlide v6.1, released in June 2018. Before that, UpSlide used 'as shown on screen'. These modes are available in the Settings menu:

Export_-_Options.png

They correspond to Excel's native feature Copy as Picture... modes in Excel:

asprintedExcel.jpg

 

Comparison of the two modes

As shown on screen

Using 'as shown on screen' mode will - as its name suggests - export the image as it is currently shown on the screen. Note that:

  • The zoom level is not taken into account when exporting. (i.e. Always exported on 100% zoom level.)
  • This mode is strongly dependent on the computer's display settings.

Aspect issues can appear when working with different workstations that have different display settings. You can read this article to know more.

 

As shown when printed (UpSlide's default mode)

Using 'as shown when printed' mode will export the image as it would appear on a printed document, using the default printer's driver. This is why, when co-working on a document, we recommend all contributors select the same default printer.
This mode will ensure that the whole export is visible, therefore printable, contrary to the 'as shown on screen' mode.

mceclip0.png
Here, the selected printer is "OneNote"

This mode is useful for working consistently in a team since - provided all computers have the same printer - using 'as shown when printed' will always yield very close results in PowerPoint, minimizing the impact of screen resolution, DPI scaling, etc.

This mode is not perfect and comes with its own issues:

  • If you use different printers, you will most likely get slightly different results.
  • If the users' default printer supports only black & white, all colours of an element exported 'as shown when printed' will be lost.
  • The quality of the exported element can vary according to the printer’s quality. Images generated with an old fax printer are likely to be of poor quality.
  • UpSlide won't be able to export large quantities of Sparklines due to a Microsoft Excel limitation. The workaround would be to use the 'as shown on screen' mode.
  • Exporting using this mode can sometimes crop content or overall look wrong, which can also be visible when you physically print your document.

 

Which one should I use?

As mentioned above, both modes have their pros and cons. If you don't know which one to choose for your team, we recommend you use 'as shown when printed' with Microsoft Print to PDF as the default mode and printer, which is best suited for teamwork with UpSlide.

 

Migrating from one mode to the other

Exporting the same element from Excel to PPT/Word with both modes will not yield the same result. Therefore, if a table has been exported with the 'as shown on screen' option and is later updated with the 'as shown when printed' option, its appearance will change (height, fonts, lines, etc.).

As you can see the updated result is slightly bigger in height and has thicker lines.

 

To prevent the exported element from changing, the solution would be to manually change back the option used when exporting before updating.

Since version 6.4.0.5, UpSlide will automatically remember the export options used. That way, you will automatically avoid the migration problem described in the previous section.