At 12:49 PM 2/7/2002 -0500, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: >Protel is an EDA package, don't expect >it to do your mechanical work.
Certainly it is not necessary for Protel to do what a true 3-D drafting package would do. However, meeting the problems of fitting parts on a PCB, which is a very limited subset of the field of 3-D drafting, is mission critical for PCB designers. Many users will not want to have to convert all their libraries to include 3-D information; but gradually available libraries would come to include such information. For the program to be able to accept it is, in my view, fundamental. Basically a 3-D model can be associated with any footprint. Protel is doing that right now, with automatic assignment of models, just as a demonstration. So users who don't need 3-D information could simply not make those libraries available, and they would not need to set 3-D rules. And once those models are available, and once users can make their own models, a user could make an environment model or, ideally, import one from a 3-D CAD package, and then detect rule violations in 3-D. This is not very far from where we are already, and it is a logical step in the development of the program. And it would be quite useful for many designers. What is needed: (1) User ability to make and/or import 3-D models. (2) Rule checking (similar to present placement rule checking). This is pretty elementary, compared what is needed for "mechanical work."" [EMAIL PROTECTED] Abdulrahman Lomax Easthampton, Massachusetts USA * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * To post a message: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] * * To leave this list visit: * http://www.techservinc.com/protelusers/leave.html * * Contact the list manager: * mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] * * Forum Guidelines Rules: * http://www.techservinc.com/protelusers/forumrules.html * * Browse or Search previous postings: * http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected] * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
