doug, It seems to me your customer is asking for a "diff" of the gerber files. I think you are right, the engineer should be able track the net list changes, this should be a function of the schematics. I would think if the engineer can provide a net list with all the changes then you would be in business. BUT, this doesn't help you in you current situation. Can you do a "diff" on the net lists ? Or write a script to do the same. Are you on UNIX or windows ? There is one other way that I know of that might help you, ADI Pro-Circuit Builder is a gerber tool with intellegence. It is able to read a net list and compair it to the gerber database. It seems a powerful tool to me. I think this could help you find the differences in the two revisions of a board. ADI reads both the gerber files and a net list. To find the differences you could provide the gerber files for the current board, along with the net list from the old one. This should produce a list of differences. You would need to call them to find out if it can do all the stuff you'll need. Contact: Robert Lowry ADI 703-742-9400x21 Automata, in Sterling Virgina, a board shop, uses this tool. let me know how it works out. joez > > We are an independent Service Bureau > > A year ago we completed a board for a customer. The board had > roughly 7200 individual nodes. Recently the customer asked > us to incorporate revisions affecting approx 500 of those nodes > (some parts deleted, several new parts + other changes.) > > Revisions are, of course, dynamic, so we received approx 4 up-dated > net lists during the process. The problem is that he had numerous > unnamed nets. The schematic capture system would assign random names > to those nets each revision. Our system doesn't care if names change > as long as the integrity of the overall net list is preserved. > > When we gave him the check plots he asked us for a printout of > just the changes, presumably so he could check just those. Since > most of the nets were renamed several times, > we didn't see how we could meet his request, but he insists that we > should be able to. > > So I'm looking for your input. > > 1. Isn't it the engineer's job to keep track of changes if he wants an > audit trail? > > 2. And isn't our job to implement them and create a design that matches > the netlist that he says is the final and correct one, but not to maintain > his audit trail of changes? (in particular, a "net-diff" list from two > net lists with randomly assigned net names?) > > 3. If a schematic capture system assigns names to the nets, isn't there > a way to fix those assignments and make them permanent? > > I'm not looking for sides, here, but a way to see this problem coming > and be able to solve it next time. > > Thanks for any input > > Doug Brooks > > > > **************************************************************************** > * The mail list is provided as a service by IPC using SmartList v3.05 * > **************************************************************************** > * To unsubscribe from this list at any time, send a message to: * > * [log in to unmask] with <subject: unsubscribe> and no text. * > **************************************************************************** > > **************************************************************************** * The mail list is provided as a service by IPC using SmartList v3.05 * **************************************************************************** * To unsubscribe from this list at any time, send a message to: * * [log in to unmask] with <subject: unsubscribe> and no text. * ****************************************************************************