Attributes Dialog

What is the Attributes Dialog?

The Attributes dialog (accessed from Configure, Attributes) enables you to change the values of the control attributes.

The Attributes dialog is modeless (which means you can keep the dialog box visible at all times while you are working on the design) and you can edit attributes at any time.

Any "Alert" messages must be dismissed by clicking OK. Other buttons cannot be selected while an alert is displayed.

Attribute Levels

A level is selected using the tab list at the top of the window:

The levels available are:

Board, Net Class, Net, Area, Spacing Class, Pin, Pin Class, Component, Material, Pad_Code, Part Pin, Teardrop and Template.

The attribute level displayed by default will be the board level. If anything is selected in the design when the dialog is displayed then the dialog will select the most suitable level for the selection (for example selecting a track will display Net level).

Attribute Groups

A Group is selected at the bottom right of the Attributes dialog. The predefined groups available are:

All	Selects all attributes relevant to the Level selected.
Diff Pair	Selects attributes that specify the requirements of Differential Pair nets. For example: diffpr_trk_smd; diffpr_any_any; net_diff_pair.
High Speed	Selects attributes that satisfy the requirements of High Speed nets. For example: ref_voltage.
Other	Selects attributes that do not fit into the other Groups. For example: min_len_fat; net_width; stacked_vias.
Same Net	Selects attributes that specify the maximum allowable spacings between design items on the same net. For example: self_trk_pin; self_any_any.
Spacing	Selects attributes that specify the maximum allowable spacings between design items. For example: space_trk_via; opt_trk_pin.
Template	Selects attributes that specify the parameters for copper pouring templates. For example: ppp_box_pins; ppp_pad_relief.
Thermal	Selects attributes related to component thermal properties. For example, thm_power_diss.

Different levels may only show a subset of these groups, for example at Net level there is no Template group. Note that if the Hide Spacings option is ticked, then nothing will be displayed if Spacing or Same Net groups are selected.

You can create your own groupings of attributes for different levels, either for the current session, or to save and reload between different session:

In the Attributes dialog, select the Level that is appropriate to the group of attributes being created (e.g. Component level).
In the Attributes dialog, select the [...] button to the right of the list of available groups. from the Attribute Group list. The following dialog box is displayed:
Change the attributes to be included in the group in the right hand column. The order can be changed by using the up/down arrow buttons.
If you wish to save the group so for future use, type in a Group Name and press the Save As... button, and a small .ugp file will be created in the same directory as the design. These files are automatically loaded with the design, so they will appear whenever the design is re-opened in future. Note that you cannot modify the pre-defined groups.
Press OK to dismiss the dialog and return to the attribute editor. If you saved your Group, then the Group Name will appear in the drop-down list of available groups.
If the modified group was not saved, then when OK is pressed then a 'User Defined' group will appear in the Group Name drop-down list. This group will only exist until the Attribute Editor is closed. Only one 'User Defined' group can exist, creating a second group without saving it to a file will overwrite the first group.

Loading attribute groups

Although .ugp files in the router directory are automatically loaded, this option allows you to load a group setting from another location and apply it to the current design.

Checking Attribute Values

An attribute can be set at one level, and will apply to all subsidiary items unless another specification is made at a lower level. If the level at which an attribute is set is different to the level

For example, you can set the net_width attribute at the Board level and it will apply to all net-classes, unless otherwise specified at the net-class level. Similarly, the attribute can be set at a Class level and it will apply to all nets of that net-class, unless otherwise specified at the Net level.

This means that you need a quick way of checking which value applies to a particular attribute. The attribute editor automatically colors any attribute values which are inherited. The color indicates the level at which an attribute has been set, which can been seen in the levels tabs at the top of the dialog.

For example, all the nets below have a Board level (blue flash) value of 0.5mm as the routing width. However, the dialog box shows that net44 has a Net level setting of 0.75mm, as there is no colour beside it.

In this example, if the Net level attribute were to be deleted, then net44 would default to the Board level value (assuming no Class level value was applicable).

If you need to set an attribute, then you should set the most common value at the highest level, and modify the exceptions, since this will minimize the amount of work you have to do later.

Attribute Selections

If you have item(s) selected, and in the Attribute Editor the Display Options has "Selected" ticked, then the dialog will restrict the list of displayed items to match the selection set in the main window. This is useful to quickly find attributes for particular pins or nets, and is faster than updating the entire list of items which exist on the board. However, the attributes displayed (and their values) will depend on the current level which is selected.

Level		Items loaded
Board	-	The design name
Net Class	-	Classes corresponding to selected nets.
Net	-	Selected nets
Area	-	Spacing attributes
Pin Class	-	Classes corresponding to selected pins.
Pin	-	Selected pins
Spacing	-	Spacing class pairs involving the selected nets.
Template	-	Selected templates
Pad Code	-	Pad codes of selected pins and vias.
Teardrop	-	Names of selected teardrops (specified by values of the teargenrule attribute).

If there is a mismatch between the items selected and the current level of attributes in the attribute editor, then no items would be displayed. For example the attribute editor is displayed Pin Level, but a piece of track is selected, nothing would be listed. However changing the level to Net level would show the net of the selected track and its attributes.

For the Board level, there is always only one item - the design name.

Hide Spacings Check Box

This is by default checked on. When this option is ticked all spacing values will not be displayed in the attributes dialog. Spacings can be edited using the Spacings Dialog.

Report...

This option when selected will write a report of the current contents to a file or the screen. The location of this file can be configured using the Configure, Utilities, Reports dialog.

Log Changes Check Box

For details on this option please refer to the section on Changing Attributes in the P.R.Editor user manual.