On Fri, Mar 14, 2008 at 7:16 AM, John Griessen <
john@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
I came across this in a trade magazine, Chip Design, and copy excerpts
that suggest what the "best of breed" tools can do. The author sees the collection of abilities
as most valuable, and it seems not to be a copyright conflict to use a similar collection of features,
just common sense.
The parts in quotes are from Clive (Max) Maxfield's article about Agilent's
Advanced Design System 2008 software release:
http://www.chipdesignmag.com/display.php?articleId=2011&issueId=26
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Does this sound familiar?, "However, the part that really grabbed my attention was the fact that
they've completely revamped the ADS graphical user interface (GUI). The reason I'm so interested
in this area is that I spend so much of my time fighting with interfaces for other tools that appear
to have been created by someone from another planet (or at least, someone who has never actually
used the tool themselves)."
He likes "integration" and "the new three-dimensional (3D) representation", both of which we see
GPL methods for on the horizon. By integration, I'm pretty sure he means interprocess communication, (IPC).
He says, "you control it using the same highly-intuitive usage model as for Google Earth",
which confuses me -- I thought it was flat only...but I'm thinking the blender 3D mouse
GUI is what he is talking about. He says, "Designs can be "stretched" in the vertical dimension as an aid to seeing what's going
on inside the various planes". I like the stretch idea for PCB stackup viewing.
He notes, "visualization engine also supports the ability to define and manipulate "cut-planes".
That's a thing that might be tough to code, but if any of the 3D code/toolkits used to make
the view supported that, it would be valuable for quickly getting inputs for use by a two-D
field solver.
I've often wanted the ability to unstack and cut through a PCB design
like this. As the article points out, it is only in the last few years
that graphics horsepower has allowed the 3D manipulation that this kind
of display requires. If PCB could do this (some day) it would be great.
So, that's all it takes today to be "5th ranked in EDA".
Lest we loose sight of the larger picture... I think it takes a bit more than this. The main strength of ADS has (in my opinion) been its ability to accurately model complex RF an u-wave circuits. It's biggest drawback has been the UI and to some extent the documentation. I'm pleased to see they finally addressed this shortcoming. So, it's not as if making a fancy UI allows you to be "5th ranked" but rather that when you make the UI as good as the rest of the tool you can have a "5th ranked" solution.
(Full disclosure - I've used this program quite a bit in the past as a former HP and Agilent employee.)
Joe T
John Griessen