Eagle Software

Good morning, Brian,

On 03/13/2014 01:49 AM, Brian Mcclung wrote:

...

First question, is there any way to stop Eagle from carrying on point to

point connections.

Not sure of your context here.  If it has to do with the autorouter, I

can't help.  I don't use it.

I am using a XF2H-3415 surface mount connector, .5 mm spacing.

...

I have my board layout done, I have two 12 pin single row headers on

each side of the board, and the other connector on the other side.   And

I see the Ratsnest.

 

I think the pad color denotes side of board, but I'm not sure how to

check or change that.

The default colors are red for the top layer (layer 1), and blue for the

bottom layer (layer 16).  All SMD parts are designed in the library to

go on the top.  The part can then be mirrored in the board design to

place it on the bottom.

 

This is where the confusion starts.

 

I can't get the autorouter to start,and I come up with 34 DRC errors.

The Width error you're getting is because the pads are narrower than the

minimum width setting in DRC.  Go to DRC=>Sizes and change the minimum

width.  The datasheet recommends a 0.25mm minimum width.  Go ahead and

enter "0.25mm" in this field and click Apply.

In general, the DRC settings should be the greater of the limitations of

the board fabrication house, and your design requirements.  Each fab

house should publish these limitations, usually under "capabilities".

DRC also pays attention to your Class settings.  Each net can be

assigned a Class that describes further restrictions on wires of that

class.  DRC will use the greater of the values assigned in the DRC

settings and those of the net's class.  For instance, your DRC settings

may define a minimum trace width of 8 mils, and a minimum clearance of 8

mils, which is fine for signal level wires.  Our designs sometimes use

high voltages close to 3,000 V.  I assign HV nets to a "HighVoltage"

class and force a clearance of 40 mils.

You may wish to add a high current class for power supply wires and give

them a relatively large width and drill size.

Your board layout alone does not indicate a need for such classes.

As far as not being able to start the auto-router, this problem may be

related to the fact that there's a DRC error on every pad.

I'm a beginner, probably making a silly mistake, but Eagle also has a

much more complicated set of DRC rules than I'm used to.

There's one other very important point I need to make.  The hashed black

and yellow bar across the top indicates that forward and back annotation

has been severed.  This is caused by closing the schematic while working

on the board, or vice versa.  When working on a design both the

schematic and board editors should be open.  This allows changes to in

one editor to be reflected in the other.

To restore consistency, run "ERC" from .  The resulting report will

identify the differences between the board and the schematic.  If there

are any differences, these need to be fixed before consistency is restored.

More of a personal preference, I would suggest using a black background

on the board editor, and a white background on the schematic editor.

This can be changed in Options=>User Interface.

HTH,

    - Chuck

On 13/03/14 05:49, Brian Mcclung wrote:

First question, is there any way to stop Eagle from carrying on point to

point connections.   I am sure at times this is a very useful feature,

but I need it to stop after automatically after it connects 2 points. 

I'm guessing your context because you don't say, but if this is in the

schematic editor you've probably fallen into the mistake of using the

"wire" tool when you should be using the "net" tool. They seem at first

sight to behave similarly but the latter is the correct one for

connecting up pins that are electrically connected. It also has the

useful feature of automatically stopping the net when you click on a

pin, and automatically adding a junction when you start or end a new

segment on an existing net.

That was the problem.

Thank you very much.

Brian K

Hi Chuck

I'm still having the same problem, but other questions first.

How do you change the units.

How do you define the grid in such a way that your measurement steps are smaller than the area to be measured.

Back to my original problem.

I checked the parameter I think you specified, and the size is already set to 10 mils.

But this is even more important, because I tend to be very critical of software.   I'm self taught, with help obviously, but software with a steep learning curve is very distasteful.

What I want to know is if these errors are caused by a design rule, why is Eagle not self adjusting to what is a standard part.

Why is Eagle not self adjusting, and is this going to be a persistent feature when using Eagle.  Is this something that every time I do a board, I am going to have to go in adjust my design rules?

I'm really hoping I'm misunderstanding something here.

Thanks

Brian

Brian Mcclung wrote:

How do you change the units.

 

How do you define the grid in such a way that your measurement steps are smaller than the area to be measured.

Use the grid command.  (Either click on the grid icon, or just type "grid".)  You can set the grid to whatever you want.  There's even a "Finest" button if you really want to go crazy...

But this is even more important, because I tend to be very critical of software.  I'm self taught, with help obviously, but software with a steep learning curve is very distasteful.

 

Some of the best tools have the steepest learning curves, but the climb is worth it...

Why is Eagle not self adjusting, and is this going to be a persistent feature when using Eagle.  Is this something that every time I do a board, I am going to have to go in adjust my design rules?

Pardon me if I'm jumping into the middle of things and missed something, but have you set up your own directory structure yet?  In other words, if you use the EAGLE control panel and go to options->directories, is everything still pointing to something that starts with "$EAGLEDIR"?  I'd suggest changing at least the Design Rules and Projects entries to point to something in your own documents directory.  Copy the default.dru file from the $EAGLEDIR into your own Design Rules directory, and edit it to suit your needs.  Every time you start EAGLE, it will load that file.

It's also probably worth taking a look in the Scripts directory at the eagle.scr file.  A lot of settings can be changed there, and they will be loaded every time...

I appreciate all your help, but I'm putting out an alert.

Is there any experienced user of eagle that would be willing to call me

and walk me through a few basic steps.

I appreciate all your help.

My name is Brian, and my number is 213-986-7914

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Thanks for all your help so far.

How do I change the units to Metric.   Is it possible?   Is it possible to make it default?

I made the following changes:   DRC/ Sizes/ Minimum Width/5mil

I got rid of all my errors.

If I run ERC on schematic, 28 warnings, and no errors.

If I run DRC on the board with the setting at 5mils, as mentioned previously, I do not get any errors.   Things are improving.

Now I want to Autoroute, and I have what is referred to as the Freemium version.

If I try to autoroute it appears to try to start, but it flashes momentarily and finishes with 0% routed.

Can somebody identify what I'm obviously doing wrong.

Thanks

Brian

By the way, is there any keyboard shortcut for "STOP"

Is there any shortcut at all for that.

If you tell me a shortcut doesn't exist or cannot be created somehow, I will never purchase Eagle.

Nevertheless, can someone please help me complete my first autoroute.

I wouldn't think it would be this hard?

Can somebody please explain how to make the units consistent, my grid is in mils and my dimensions are expressed in mm.

I hate the crap I have to go through to learn these tools.

I may be attacking this wrong, but I need to fine position everything and get all my dimensions correct.

I need to get two connectors aligned and get them spaced exactly 700 mils apart.