adding reference on assembly in cadstar

cadstar rgf

Hi,
can anyone let me know how to add reference designators on assembly layer because cadstar-10 only exports one referance designator which is useful on silkscreen layer

thanks

I am not very sure about Cadstar10,But i have done it for Cadstar 9..If you need,i can send you the procedure..

It might help me in doing it in cadstar-10 so kindly let me know the procedure

There is an additional program called "addatrib" that duplicates the attribute onto whatever layers you wish.

This is available at the Cadstar user email group on Yahoo groups.
I will try & add it to this post for you as I have a copy.

Further information on what & how is in the PDF file within the zip.

Hi V_kumar,

please follow the below procedure ;

1- Add assembly_name origin at the time of creation of footprint.(It should place at centre of component)
2- from PCB design,generate report by using add assembly name.rgf

Tools->Report Generator->manage reports->add assembly name.rgf

Save the report in ur system.

3- Now Import that report into the design

File->Import->Rinf(format select)->Report file

with this it will add reference designator in assembly layer and the position of reference designator will the place where you kept assembly_name origin.

feel free to contact ,if any clarification needed!!

abhishek

I tried with the way abhi002 has explained and it is working.

Yes, I too have tried this.

And Zuken must have known about it too, the dogs - keeping quiete about this jem.

Cheers Abhi, most useful.

So the basis is that you need to have the origin setup on the layer you want it to be on, for each component footprint that you want it to work on.
(this does not work on testpoints so they need removing from the .rep file).

This can be a quicker way than using the method I put above, I'll tel the guy I got it off too.

In essense, for each refdes on each different layer it needs an attribute on that layer named appropriatly. Then you can find & replace in the generated report file to be the same as that name & then import it in.

By the way, when searching for the report file after selecting "rinf" format, type *.* in the filename field to show all.

Also you can set the assembly_name origin alignments as centre and put the origin at the centre of components.so when u import the report file ,it will automatically place reference designator at centre of the components..it just saves our time .

I have all my reference names set to centre so a pick & place program creation Gerber will pick them up & not confuse them with something else.

Now I'll use your method with some appropriately modified report files to put reference names on the legend layer when needed.
In fact making a longer (repeated report) will enable me to do all in one go, legend, placement drawing, assembly drawing names.