[time-nuts] Schematic capture, anyone?

[Chris Albertson]

On Fri, Feb 24, 2012 at 9:52 AM, Brooke Clarke <brooke at pacific.net> wrote:

> Now when you're doing the layout you can turn on checking and all the pads
> for the currently active note light up in a different color.  By stepping
> through all the nodes you can confirm that they are all connected to each
> other.

A good feature to look for is autorouting.  and design rule checking.
 Of course every engineer thinks he is smarter than this kind of
software.  Mostly he is but it is good to use software that simply
will not allow some kinds of errors.  Design rules generally are
things like following the schematic and the geometry of traces and
limits of the PCB fab like line widths.

I've used "rat's nest" routing too.  This allows you to place the
parts on the PCB and then does the interconnects with "as the crow
flies"  traces that cross and can't possibly work but they are drawn
in red.  you click them one at a time and  rout them.   As you place
components you can see the rats net and you move them around to
minimize the crossings.
-- 

Chris Albertson
Redondo Beach, California