At 03:27 PM 11/7/98 -0800, Scott D. Shepard wrote:
>I have a new customer that uses Protel sch (unknown version) and
>requires the layout in Pads. I just read the spec for Protel 98 and find
>they can generate a Pads netlist.
Yes, Protel 98 will generate a long list of netlist formats including PADS
ASCII.
>1) Assuming it really does, how well does it work?
I haven't tried it, but generally it is a piece of cake to write netlist
translators, so I would assume that it does a good job.
It is conceivable, however, that PADS might have some directives or such
that would not be in the Protel-generated file. Essentially, if the
information is not in the schematic, it's not going to be in the netlist.
But I would assume that the netlist would be usable and correct as far as
it goes.
>2) I don't have it, what are the commands that I can tell my customer to
>use to generate a compatible Pads netlist?
With Protel 98, with a complete schematic as the current file, under Tools,
Create Netlist opens a dialog box, the most prominent choice being Output
Format. Pick PADS ASCII from the list. There are some other options which
have to be correctly set; I think the truly important one would be to have
"current sheet only" unchecked. Net Identifier schope also has to be
correct; how to set this depends on how the schematic was created. I'm not
a Protel expert -- yet-- but Nets and Ports global might be the most common
correct setting. If it is a single sheet schematic, I don't think it matters.
>3) Did previous versions export to Pads compatible netlists?
Someone else might be able to answer, I don't have and don't know previous
schematic versions. But I think RSI has a free netlist translator program
anyway. It is a pain, sometimes, to translate PCB files and schematics, but
almost any netlist you can translate with a word processor and database (so
you can sort the data). I used to do it with Microsoft Works all the time.
I said "almost any." EDIF seems rather forbidding. But I never really tried
to understand how it is organized.
>Or, if somebody wanted to donate a valid license to me for free I can
>find out for myself. (He, He)
Easily done. I hereby grant Scott one free and valid license to use the
Protel 98 demo, available on request as a CD from Protel USA or any Protel
distributor, or by download from www.protel.com. :-)
With it, he can take the customer's schematic, print it, play with it any
way he likes, save it, create a netlist in whatever format it will write,
including PADS. The only catch is that he has only 30 days in which to do
all this.
[log in to unmask]
Abdulrahman Lomax
P.O. Box 690
El Verano, CA 95433
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