PCLO Amiga/CAD command list Copyright (c)1986 SoftCircuits, Inc ALL RIGHTS RESERVED Written by Charles B. Blish -- { ars N4EJI } Last Updated: January 21st 1987 Documentation for RELEASE-VERSION 3.4r TECHNIQUE Efficient use of PCLO requires the operator to develop a group of techniques in p lacement and routing. These are best acheived by experimentation and trial-and-er ror sessions. The user is encouraged to experiment with the system, as some opera tions are very powerful and can be used in various ways. If you feel you have a n eat or handy operations sequence, send it to us... we will test and verify it, a nd include it in the manual with credit to you, if you wish. The operations that are strongest and respond best to creative use are routing and the copy/move men u operations. Library Items General purpose pcb library items are also welcomed and may be included with the release level software. A good example of this is the DRAMS-8-64K record on the r elease diskette. This is an array of 8 dynamic rams, with a0-a7 brought out to th e left, d0-d7 brought out to the right, CAS as an access line brought out to the left, and full power/ground routing and decoupling. Items like these are useful t o anyone, and we will serve as a library center for these items as a service to o ur customers. A list of current items in the library will be available from the c ompany when the service is initiated. Some of these will be included on the relea se disk, however we anticipate that there will be far too many for a complete s et to be provided with the system. Items from the library are oriented just as th ey were when they were saved; Once you have reloaded them into the workspace you can then change their orientation with "Pivot", "Flip", or "Swap" from the Operat ions menu. You could also save several copies of a library item, each oriented di fferently... this just takes more disk space, while providing a quicker operation overall for the reload into place sequence, as you would not have to re-orient e ach time. In order to perform a Pivot, you must first mark the block in question. MENUS ----> NOTE! move the cursor INTO THE MENU BAR before you press the right mouse bu tton to request a menu; Most requests for a menu are made after pressing either m ouse button in the workspace so as to TAG a location that the menu operation use s in a process. If you press the right button in the workspace in an unplan ned manner, the menu operation will then execute referenced to that point. Thi s can be highly inconvienent. Requester Editing: All text formatted input to PCLO is done from a special text r equester. Operations allowed in the requester are as follows; 1- entry of text at the cursor position 2- cursor movement via.. A- left arrow (move: 1 char left) B- right arrow (move: 1 char right) C- shifted left arrow (move: left end) D- shifted right arrow (move: right end) E- DEL key (delete under cursor) F- BACKSPACE key (cursor left, delete) 3- RETURN key (completes entry, terminates) 4- Right AMIGA/Q (Undo last editing change) Clicking the mouse's LEFT button IN the text requester is required in order to activate it. Once activated, the above operations become available. Clicking th e LEFT mouse button OUTSIDE the text requester once it has been activated is the same as pressing ENTER, and will terminate (fuah) the requester. There are four main menus; Project, Display, Items, and Operations. The Projects menu contains seven items; Load, Save, Reload, Path, Quit, New, and Info. Save: contains two sub-items; Board, and Block. THESE TWO FUNCTIONS ARE NOT AVAILABLE IN SAMPLE VERSIONS Board: This will save the entire board, all layers, and the Silkscreen as well, if there is one.Requster asks for file name info;You must 'click' in the text wi ndow for it to become active; Either the 'RETURN' key Or a click outside the requ ester will terminate input. Teleport memories are saved with board records so ret urning to the area you were working in is convenient. Block: This will save all board layers, including the the silkscreen, that are within a MARKED area. Usethe "M" keystroke cmd for marking.Requester asks for fil e name info; You must 'click' in the text window for it to become active; Either the 'RETURN' key Or a click outside the requester will terminate input. Load: Contains two sub-items; Board, and Block For either board or block operatio ns, file names of all available items in the appropriate directory will be displa yed above the requester; PCLO should be running from a directory that contains tw o sub-directories named "BoardLib" and "PartsLib" or else the "Path" operation mu st be used to tell PCLO where these directories do reside. Board: This will load the entire board, all layers, and the silkscreen as well. R equester asks for file name info; You must 'click' in the text window for it to b ecome active; Either the 'RETURN' key Or a click outside the requester will termi nate input. pcb's on the disk will be displayed on screen above the requester. Yo u choose which one to load from this list. Teleport memories are loaded with boar d records so returning to the area you were working in is convenient. You can cre ate multiple layer boards using the 512k nominal 2-layer version of PCLO via some minimalfile manipulation. Let's say you want to make a four layer board. One pos siblility for this is to create the power and ground layers, along with the initi al placement of components, first. Once this is done, save normally. At this time exit PCLO and rename BOARDLIB/myboard/.LAYER1 to BOARDLIB/myboard/.LAYER3 ... P CLO will no longer find or load this layer. Now, when you start PCLO and load "my board", only layer 1 (and the silkscreen, if there is one) will load. the bottom layer in the workspace will contain only pads, and is totally free for routing. T his series of operations could be carried as far as you like, for as many layers as you need. Block: This will load a predefined block from disk, justified so as to place th e upper left corner at the last location "tagged" by a left or right mouse button click. Requester asks for file name info; You must 'click' in the text window fo r it to become active; Either the 'RETURN' key Or a click outside the requester w ill terminate input. blocks on the disk will be displayed on screen above the req uester. You choose which one to load from this list. ReLoad: Attempts to reload the last block or PCB record you specified with the "L OAD" menu operation. If no previous LOAD operation has taken place, then this ope ration will fail. Path: This brings up a sub-menu with three selections; Global: The specification here is placed at the beginning of ALL file access. So if you set the global path to "DF1:", then all paths will start with that string. BOLD: When accessing Boards, the path specification here is Appended to the globa l path specification, and then the filename you specified is appended to it. This has a default value of "BoardLib/". Parts: When accessing parts, the path specification here is Appended to the globa l path specification, and then the filename you specified is appended to it. This has a default value of "PartLib/". Quit: Brings up a small window with a verify request in it; If you verify, the pr ogram will exit to Amigados(tm), and all data will be lost. You use the mouse and click on one of the two possible actions to terminate the requester. No further action will be taken until you make a choice. NEW: Erases ALL data on ALL planes; Sets up for a new project. Info: Brings up a window containing revision and origin data... The window is rem oved by moving the pointer up into the screen's menu bar. This window contains ei ther a serial number, or the terms "sample or "Dealer Demo". Copies of PCLO witho ut this information in this window should be destroyed, as they are obsolete. ALL Beta and above versions of PCLO have valid information in this window. Original Demo diskettes do NOT have this window at all, and are valid items. The Display menu contains the following items; Layers, Yield, NoYield, Trace, NoT race, Silk, Grid, NoOver, Magnify, NoMag, View, and Interlace. Layers: Contains a submenu with six subitems; NoLayers, PadsOnly, Layer1, Layer2 , Layer3, and Layer4. NoLayers will disable the display of ALL layers. This is us ed to view the silkscreen only. PadsOnly causes selected layers to show only pads. This option should be used for observation only -- routing in this mode is inconvienent. Layer1 adds layer 1 to the non-selected display list. This layer will then be di splayed only when you select it with the "T" key. Layer2 adds layer 2 to the non-selected display list. This layer will then be dis played only when you select it. (not active in 512k version) Layer3 adds layer 3 to the non-selected display list. This layer will then be dis played only when you select it. (not active in 512k version) Layer4 adds layer 4 to the non-selected display list. This layer will then be dis played only when you select it with the "B" key. Yield: Causes highlight of a tagged trace to be enabled; works with the "Y" key stroke. Yield must be selected for the "Y" key to have any effect. NOYield: Turns Yield off. Trace: Shows areas searched by the routing processor during trace routing. Allo ws you to place feedthroughs in an informed manner. Notrace: Turns Trace off. Silk: Enables SilkScreen display -- disables grid. Grid: Enables grid display -- disables silkscreen. NoOver: Disables either Grid or SilkScreen. Magnify: Changes display to 4:1 magnify display mode. NoMag: Changes display to 1:1 display mode. View: Changes display to show most of the work area in tiny format; temporary mode only; disabled by moving the cursor into the menu bar. No other operations a re possible with View enabled. Interlace: contains a submenu with on and off selections, allowing you to choose the mode you prefer. Interlace offers a more substantial set of graphics elements , while non- Interlaced displays are more stable. The Items menu contains 3 selections; DIP, SIP, and PinGrid. DIP contains two su bitems, DIP and w/FILTER DIP/DIP will create a dual inline package pattern only. Direction, total num ber of pins, and spacing in hundredths. Sample: S 16 3 DIP/w/FILTER will also place a filter cap near pin -1-. Direction, total number o f pins, and spacing in hundredths. Sample: S 16 3 (generates a 16 pin DIP) SIP: This will generate a single inline package pattern. Direction, total number of pins. Sample: S 8 (generates an 8 pin sip) PinGrid: This will generate a pingrid 'n' pins on a side. Direction, total number of pins on ONE SIDE. Sample s 8 (Generates a 64 pin grid) The Operations menu contains 10 selections; Open, Print, Move, Copy, DeSilk, DePl ane, Pivot, Flip, Swap, and Toss. Open: will actually 'spread' the circuit board open to allow youto insert new com ponents and routes. Brings up a requester with default specifications in it. Ente r direction n/s/e/w, and number of .050 grid locations you wish to spread out the board. Traces that are involved in the area where you specify the open center wi ll be stretched... FAT traces are maintained as heavy lands, and thin traces will stay thin. After the open operation takes place, these routes may have to be adj usted to make enough room for the new circuit elements you are planning to insert . Print: will generate a checkplot of the entire board area on an Epson(tm) or co mpatable printer. Move: will take a marked area and place it, justified upper lef t to the last location tagged, and then erase the source area. There are two opti ons available under move, "Active" and "All". If "All" is selected, then all laye rs are moved. If Active is selected, then only the data on the active layer is mo ved -- items on the other layers are not affected. Pads and other items like shea rlines that implicitly exist on more than one layer will not be affected. The mar ked area is removed after the move operation has taken place. Copy: works identically to move, however it does NOT delete the source area. Ther e are two options available under copy, "Active" and "All". If "All" is selected, then all layers are copied. If Active is selected, then only the data on the act ive layer is copied -- items on the other layers are not affected. Pads and other items like shearlines that implicitly exist on more than one layer will not be a ffected. The marked area is left active for possible further copy operations. DeSilk: removes all silkscreen information from a marked area. DePlane: removes pad and/or route information from a marked area. There are two o ptions available under DePlane, "Active" and "All". If "All" is selected, then al l data on all layers is deleted. If "Active" is selected instead, then only the t race data on the active layer is deleted -- items on the other layers are not aff ected. Pads and other items like shearlines that implicitly exist on more than on e layer will not be affected. The marked area is disabled after the delete operat ion. Pivot: takes a marked area and rotates it 90, 180, or 270 degrees. The amount of rotation is selected by choosing from three options in the Pivot submenu, which a ppears when the pointer is positioned over the pivot menu item. Flip: takes a marked area and flips it horizontally or vertically. Selection of flip type is done from a two entry submenu. Swap: takes a marked area and exchanges the contents of the layers so as to plac e the bottom on the top, and the top on the bottom. Toss: This function will reverse the orientation of ALL the elements in the work space; This can be done horizontally or vertically, selected by submenu options. One use for this is to help you maintain a real-world perspective on a circuit bo ard's true physical orientation when copying an already existing board into PCLO for update or integration. If there are no records (mylar, etc) of the board's la yout, then you must turn it over to enter the data into PCLO... that would mean t hat the trace information you are looking at would be backwards as compared to th e way it would appear on the screen. The toss operation can adjust the workspace to represent the board as it appears when physically "tossed" onto it's other side, thus making it very easy to copy the features into the workspace. MARKING AREAS Areas are marked using the "m" keystroke command. Place the cursor overany corner of a rectangular area you wish to mark. Click either button, andthen press the ' m' key. This places the first marker. Now move the cursorto a location diagonally opposite your first choice, and repeat theoperation. The system will then displa y the selected area with a whiteoverlay. If this is not satisfactory, press the ' m' key once more and themarkers will be cleared. Some operations (Move, Delete... ) remove the markedarea for you when they complete; others (Copy, Pivot...) do no t, as is most often needed. STATUS LINE The status line contains three X:Y number pairs. The first pair indicatesan absol ute distance of the last tagged location from the upper left hand corner of the w orkspace in inches. The second pair will display the difference between the last two tagged locations if the right mouse buttonis used to tag them. The third pair displays the distance from the last tagged location where the "L" keystroke comm and was given. This is usedto measure distances from arbitrary locations in the w orkspace. NOTE: moving the cursor out of the display window will turn off the'loc al' display co-ordinates. You must 'click' in the work area to reactivate them. In addition, any messages or errors occuring during program executionwill be disp layed here. In this case, the XY information will disappear. Itwill reappear when you tag the next location, OR if you press the HELP key.If the X:Y data is visib le and you press the HELP key, then the last message or error is displayed. The Cursor The cursor consists of a two-layer sprite. The upper layer moves on pixelboundari es, smoothly with the mouse's movements. The second layer, a smallwhite knob, is "locked" to the grid, and so 'hops' from location to locationas the cursor is mov ed over the grid. When the cursor is brought into themenu bar area, the "knob" wi ll dissapear. This prevents other screens, suchas the Intuition screen, from havi ng a non-related sprite run around in them. The DISPLAY PCLO's display can show several types of information in the work area; A: Traces, pads and associated items that are etched or drilled into the final pr oduct. B: Information associated with the silkscreen for the board, which consists of li nes delineating component areas, and text describing these areas. C: Information associated with operations on the workspace area, including loca tion grid, trace routing expansion displays, and highlighting effects that indica te areas marked with the "M" key cmd. D: Windows and requesters used to pass detailed information to the program such a s file names, detailed component specifications, etc. Use of color within the work area When a layer is selected as current, it will be displayed in GREEN. When it is no t selected as current, it is displayed in a color that allows you to determine at a glance which layer the element you are looking at is located upon. The layer c olors are as follows; TOP: Blue UPPER: Orange LOWER: Magenta BOTTOM: Red Navigating the workspace PCLO provides Intuition(tm) standard proportional gadgets on the right andbottom of it's Screen. The gadget on the right allows you to move through the workspace vertically, and the gadget on the bottom allows you to move through the workspace horizontally. In addition, at the extreme end of each of these gadgets, there ar e small gadgets that are represented by arrows pointing in different directions. These will also move you through the workspace, but in very small increments. Cli cking in the container of a proportional gadget will move approximately one full screen in that direction; and clicking on and dragging a knob will allow you to m ove arbitrary amounts through the workspace. Pressing the ESC key followed by one of the function keys F1 thru F10 will 'memorize' your current display window. Af ter this is done, pressing the same function key will move the display window to this memorized area. All ten function keys are available, providing ten individua l position memories in addition to the above described arbitrary navigation syste m. KEYSTROKE Commands A -- ATTACH (marked area) to silkscreen record (requester asks for opt text) B -- BOTTOM of board selected as current (bottom layer displays in green) C -- CLEAR current cell (last spot tagged by click of mouse button) D -- DRILL hole marker to current cell E -- ELIMINATE tagged trace F -- FATCELL to current cell G -- H -- I -- J -- JOG route -- repeat target offset (try this in array routes like ram) K -- L -- LOCAL co-ordinates become relative to last tagged cell M -- MARKER set at current tagged cell N -- NODE to current cell O -- OPPOSITE route direction -- use after routing with spacebar P -- PAD (normal) to current cell location Q -- QRUNCH tagged trace (thin it) R -- S -- SHEAR line - convert tagged trace T -- TOP of board selected as current (top layer displays in green) U -- UP/down silkscreen text entry to the text layer. V -- VIA (feedthru) to current cell W -- WRITE a text string to the silkscreen layer X -- X-PAND selected trace (fatten it) Y -- YIELD the selected trace (highlight it) Z -- ( ... no mnemonic here ) continue routing trace from last node ESC - Memory enter key for function keys F1-F10 - Memory select keys (see navigating the display, above) SPACEBAR set current cell as next node in route (start/end trace) CURSOR keys - navigate the on-screen grid in .050 and .500 steps (shifted)NUMERIC PAD; All keys, -, ENTER, and 0 - 9 will place different pieces of tracesegment in the current cell; This allows you to create any arbitrary trace by hand, if the router will not co-operate with your needs. Routing example A: Place the cursor over the location you wish the route to start or end on B: Click either mouse button C: Press the space bar (observe the message in the status line) D: Move the cursor over the location where the other end of the route goes E: Click either mouse button F: Press the spacebar again. This completes the route. Optional route continue: (Used when the second point does NOT terminate on any other item such as a pad or another trace) G: Move the cursor over the next location in the route H: Click either mouse button J: Press the "Z" key to continue from the last end of the trace HoleCount This program is provided as a simple example of a "layer post-processor". It coun ts the number of holes to be drilled in a board, asks you for a "cost per hole" v alue, and calculates a cost for the board. The entire source for this program is included on the release disk, for use as anexample in generating your own layer post-processor routines. The source is NOT included on the sample diskette. This s ource is in the 'c'language, is well commented, and written in anuncomplicated st yle. PLOT DMP-52 and compatible plotter driver. This can be run from either the workbench o r CLI. Operation is generally self-explanatory, as each option is selected by a c hoice from a multiple choice list.Also included on the release disk is the source for the plotter driver in the 'c' language. This may be used by registered users to create drivers for other types of plotters. If you do create such a driver, t henplease contact us; Such drivers may be useful to otherusers of PCLO, and it is to your benefit that others use PCLO, as this furthers development here at SoftC ircuits, Inc. For correct plot generation, we suggest strongly that a .7mm pen be used. All tolerances are plotted assuming this pen diameter.The plotter runs at 9600 baud. This Software is provided as a tool for the user...No warrantees or guarantees of usefulness for any purpose is provided; We welcome your suggestions -- please feel free to call or write with specifics. Also, please: as a kindness to us; report ANY "bugs" or errors to us at; SoftCircuits, Inc; 401 Sw 75th Terrace North Lauderdale, FL 33068 or call 305-721-2707 Route on! C.B.B.