Allegro Design Workbench

A collaborative environment to improve design team productivity
Part of the Cadence Allegro PCB and IC packaging design technologies, the Allegro Design Workbench provides a collaborative environment that can improve the productivity of local and/or global design teams by up to 50 percent. Ideal for library, engineering, and PCB design groups, the Workbench is comprised of two main productsa server and an application option.
Allegro Library Workbench
Allegro Library Workbench is a library development and management environment that enables PCB librarians to create, validate, manage, and distribute library parts and their associated data for use with Allegro Design Authoring (schematic symbols), Allegro PCB SI (signal integrity models), and Allegro PCB Designer (PCB footprints). As parts are created or modified, Allegro Library Workbench automatically creates revisions and distributes the updated design libraries to company or specified design sites. This keeps all design centers up to date with the latest component and library information. Allegro Library Workbench works in conjunction with Allegro PCB Librarian and incorporates all of the capabilities of Allegro Design Workbench, allowing the librarian to act as a super-user. This permits the librarian to test the library elements in the same environment that is used in production and perform all of the tasks that a designer will perform when using the libraries.
Allegro Design Workbench PDM Option

Allegro Library Server

Figure 1: One Allegro Library Server is required per site or LAN. The Allegro Design Workbench PDM option enables design data management (WiP)

Benefits

Reduces the time to create, validate, and manage large-pin-count devicesfrom days to minutes by employing an all-encompassing librarian toolbox Decreases design ECOs by verifying the accuracy of logical symbols and physical footprints using automatic library part validation
Eliminates design errors due to out-of-date or defective libraries by automatically synchronizing logical and physical reference libraries across the enterprise Increases librarian productivity and company purchasing power by eliminating redundant components and suppliers
layout footprints). Selecting a step in the flow displays the tools appropriate for that step. This acts as a checklist, creating a shorter learning curve, improving productivity, and ensuring consistency in part creation. Library verification steps, with their appropriate tools, are built in to the flow to facilitate rapid verification of components.
Multi-Site Library Distribution
Allegro Design Workbench maintains a central master library of preferred parts and associated known-good library data that is automatically distributed to various design sites as new parts and updates appear in the library. This keeps all design sites up to date with the latest library additions and changes, ensuring that all designers have access to the most current library and component information.

Regulatory Compliance

Regulatory compliance directives (such as RoHS) are a top concern for electronics designers. Allegro Design Workbench captures RoHS and other regulatory compliance component information, making it searchable in the component browser. Designers can search for compliant parts in the library or specify a preferred parts list that contains only compliant parts. Where-used functionality can be employed to find non-compliant parts in previously completed designs. Regulatory compliance information can be automatically sourced or synchronized with a corporate PLM system through the PLM vendors gateway (which integrates directly with the Allegro Library Workbench).

Figure 2: Configurable design flow guides users through the design process and brings appropriate design tools to their desktop at each step
When connected to an enterprise product lifecycle management (PLM) system through the PLM vendors supplied gateway, enables holistic part creation, management, and synchronization across the ECAD and PLM business data management worlds Supports joint development model (JDM) methodologies commonly used between OEMs and ODMs/EMSs through partial library distribution, synchronization and management
makes casual users more productive, ensuring that important steps and checkpoints are not overlooked.

Component Browsing

Parametric component search ties into your companys preferred components database, providing access to approved and preferred parts. This helps lower costs and reduce inventory. Users can search and select parts based on parametric and business data and view schematic symbols, PCB footprints, and component data sheets during the selection process. The selected parts are used to build a preliminary bill of materials (BoM). Parts from this BoM can then be added directly into the schematic.

Features

Configurable Work Environment
Enables common cross-organization, cross-company methodologies by defining standard design flows across a variety of design types, such as standard, highspeed, analog, and prototype. Each flow is defined to enable access to appropriate design tools and aids for each step in the flow. These flows can act as a checklist that helps shorten learning curves and
Provides a central server capability for librarians using Allegro Library Workbench, one server is required for each design site or LAN. The library server connects to a PLM server for the synchronization of business-metric data that provides the design engineer with realtime decision data.

Library Development Flow

The ability to set up standard partcreation methodologies through a graphical user interface streamlines the library development process. Users can define standard flows for multiple types of parts, each with a different flow and access to different tools (e.g., schematic symbols vs.

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Master Project GPS USB VIDEO Audio GPS USB VIDEO Audio GPS USB VIDEO Audio GPS USB VIDEO Audio GPS USB VIDEO Audio Sub Project Sub Project Sub Project Sub Project
Software serviceability capability enables efficient management, tracking and debugging of software infrastructures
Allegro Design Workbench Integration PDM Option

Enables direct integration with a corporate PLM system (PLM vendorsupplied gateway required), providing work-in-progress (WIP) data management. Facilitates team collaboration by letting users control change adoption and maintain design revision history. In addition, Allegro Design Workbench PDM Option provides access to the most current design data; where-used visibility allows all team members to see where components are used in both production and archived designs. Because it manages schematic and board files separately, Allegro Design Workbench PDM Option facilitates concurrent design and collaboration including secure shared workspaces for both local and globally dispersed design teams.
Figure 3: The initial master project is automatically replicated in each team members own area. This allows team members to develop and validate asynchronously without disrupting other team members, or the master project, until requested or required.
Tightly integrated with Allegro Design Authoring, Allegro PCB SI, and Allegro PCB Designer, Allegro Design Workbench provides a configurable team design work environment that allows companies to define and implement standard design methodologies across multiple design disciplines. Use of common design tools and best practices maximizes individual productivity and reduces design throughput time. Allegro Design Workbench allows parametric component searches that tie into your companys preferred components database, promoting the use of approved and preferred parts and reducing component research time by as much as 75 percent. Team design authoring enables multiple design engineers to collaborate asynchronously in the hierarchical development of a logical designs definition. A design can be partitioned into user defined levels of hierarchy and distributed to the defined members of the engineering team provid-
ing them with an isolated sandbox for the development and verification of their partition(s).

Specifications

System Requirements
Software requirements SPB 16.5 Java 1.6.14 or above IE 6.x or Firefox 1.5 Hardware requirements Client configurations 2.0GHz Pentium processor 1GB RAM memory 30GB hard disk Server configurations Windows 2008 3.0GHz Pentium processor - 4GB RAM memory - 100GB hard disk (IDE or SCSI) Solaris 10 Sun Ultra 45 UtraSPARC IIIi CPU 8GB RAM memory 250GB SATA hard disk Linux
Cuts training and support costs by providing a common user interface and design methodology across the enterprise Improves productivity of engineers, designers, component engineers, procurement, and others by expanding access to component information and design data Improves quality and reduces board spins by providing common access to known-good library data Eliminates design errors due to out-of-date or defective libraries by interactively synchronizing logical and physical reference libraries with logical and physical design projects Enables asynchronous concurrent design and reduces development time by managing schematic and layout data separately during the design process

Platform/OS

Windows XP Pro SP3, Vista enterprise/ premium 32 bit, Win 2008 Server 32 Bit, Win 7 32/64 bit Windows 2003 Server only for GXL Server Installation Solaris 10 Linux RHEL 4
Cadence Services and Support
Cadence application engineers can answer your technical questions by telephone, email, or Internetthey can also provide technical assistance and custom training Cadence certified instructors teach more than 70 courses and bring their real-world experience into the classroom More than 25 Internet Learning Series (iLS) online courses allow you the flexibility of training at your own computer via the Internet Cadence Online Support gives you 24x7 online access to a knowledgebase of the latest solutions, technical documentation, software downloads, and more

For More Information

Contact Cadence sales at 1.800.746.6223 or visit www.cadence.com for additional information. To locate a Cadence sales office or channel partner in your area, visit www.cadence.com/contact_us.
Cadence is transforming the global electronics industry through a vision called EDA360. With an application-driven approach to design, our software, hardware, IP, and services help customers realize silicon, SoCs, and complete systems efficiently and profitably. www.cadence.com
2011 Cadence Design Systems, Inc. All rights reserved. Cadence, the Cadence logo, and Allegro are registered trademarks a of Cadence Design Systems, Inc. All others are properties of their respective holders. 22097 05/11 MP/DM/PDF

Allegro PCB Librarian

Maximizing productivity in a powerful library development environment
Cadence Allegro PCB Librarian comprises an advanced library development environment for board-level design components. A comprehensive library toolset makes part creation fast and easy by reducing development time associated with large-pin-count parts from days to just minutes. Allegro PCB Librarian automates part creation tasks, eliminates manual validation, and captures revision history for schematic symbols. When used with Allegro Design Workbench, it becomes part of a scalable, comprehensive library creation, management, and component information system.
Allegro PCB Librarian maximizes the productivity of librarians who create schematic symbols, PCB footprints, and digital simulation map files for use in the Allegro PCB design flow. An easy-to-use interface, a configurable work environment, and an array of advanced verification utilities make it a powerful library development environment.
Allegro Design Workbench PDM Option

Allegro Design Workbench

Allegro Library Workbench
Allegro Library Management Server Library and Team Design Management
Allegro Library Management Server Library, Team, and Design Data Management and Collaboration

Benefits

Accelerates part creation with the help of advanced part creation and verification utilities Offers integrated online verification and flow verification using interactive and batch tools to provide known-good library data for design tools Enables easy import of part information from tables, grids, text files, and several other commonly used formats omplete for new parts C ncremental for changed parts to I expedite updates

Library Development

Figure 1: Allegro library development and management solution
Delivers powerful graphics-editing capabilities to create schematic symbols and reusable shapes Provides a common library development environment for multivendor schematic design tools Integrates with Allegro Design Authoring and Allegro Design Workbench

Features

Imports from more than 15 common file formats in full and incremental modes Exports to 5 common file formats Capture EDA XML CSV Mentor DxDesigner Design Architect Provides integrated spreadsheet and graphical editors for schematic symbols
In Allegro PCB Librarian, all changes made to a part are tracked and the differences between part versions are captured and saved automatically. This removes the burden on librarians to record all changes made to a part. Check-sum verification is integrated into the system and tracks any modification to parts made outside the library system. This protects the data against unauthorized modifications and notifies librarians when a modified part is opened in the system.

Multi-Vendor Support

Allegro PCB Librarian allows users to create symbols for Allegro Design Entry HDL, Cadence OrCAD Capture, Mentor Graphics Viewdraw/DxDesigner, and Mentor Graphics Design Architect. Part information can also be exported in comma-separated values (CSV) and XML formats. This allows single sourcing of part data in companies where librarians need to support designs teams who use multiple schematic editors with Allegro PCB Designer. Direct export to multiple schematic editor formats makes it easy to develop parts in a single toolset for use with multiple schematic editors. Export in XML can be used to publish part data for external access or verification. Exporting text files allows users to store electronic datasheets. The ability to convert from CSV to PDF helps in the migration of parts from other vendors. Allegro PCB Librarian also allows users to save parts in formats compatible with older releases of Allegro PCB Designer and Allegro Design Entry HDL. This enables users to adopt the latest librarian releases and features while still supporting previous releases of Allegro solutions.

Figure 2: Integrated spreadsheet and graphics editor
Supports the creation of reusable shape libraries Enables real-time, online verification Provides batch verification scripts Supports symbol property templates Includes configurable rule checkers for both schematic symbols and footprints Provides strong metadata support to enable built-in version management
A powerful graphics editor makes symbol creation easy and quick. Users can not only create complex IEC and IEEE shapes to represent pins and functions, but also save them as reusable library elements. The Allegro PCB footprint wizard makes it easy to create footprints by providing templates for most commonly used parts. Using the footprint wizard, users can accurately create complex footprints with thousands of pins in minutes. Allegro PCB Librarian also provides the ability to quickly associate Hardware Description Language (HDL) models with schematic parts for both Verilog and Verilog Hardware Descripton Language (VHDL) models for use in system-level digital simulation.

Part Creation

Largepin-count devices are becoming common for off-the-shelf components. Creating these largepin-count parts for schematic and PCB layout can take hours or even days without special tools to accelerate part creation. The powerful import and spreadsheet editing features of Allegro PCB Librarian aid in manipulating largepin-count part data. Users can quickly split pins across multiple symbols, map pin names to pin numbers, and specify the visibility of power and ground pins.
Figure 3: Symbols with reusable shapes

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Data Import
Allegro PCB Librarian provides a variety of import options and utilities to accelerate part creation. Users can create schematic parts by importing part data in formats such as: EDA XML Si2 PinPak XML VHDL Verilog Synopsys PTM models CSV and text files Die text Pin grids Pin tables Cadence OrCAD Capture Mentor Graphics DxDesigner Mentor Graphics Design Architect Allegro Package Designer FPGA (Xilinx, Actel, Altera) IBIS DML Die file import enables co-design while FPGA import helps in implementing FPGA flows in front-end design. With IBIS and DML model import, front-end models can be easily created from third-party highspeed models. User-configurable data translation rules make it easy to customize data import. These rules manipulate part, pin, and property names as well as other part details. Allegro PCB Librarian checks the data being imported for consistency and validity, flagging errors upfront. A preview window allows users to review the part data before the part is created. These reduce the chance of errors in the source data being propagated into the part.

Figure 4: Preview window for viewing and editing part data before importing
users the flexibility to do bulk operations and intricate graphics work according to their needs. Automatic symbol generation based on user preferences makes it easy to create large-pin-count devicesdevices that might have thousands of pins distributed among dozens of symbols. A simple pin distribution interface makes it easy to move pins between symbols to meet engineering requirements. The spreadsheet editor for part information speeds many part development operations, including: Converting scalar pins to vector pins and vice-versa Expanding and collapsing vector pins Switching between visible and invisible power pins Filtering and hiding operations Finding and replacing A comparison UI makes it easy to compare interfaces of various part entities including footprints, schematic symbols, and SI models. The ECO import mode makes implementing incremental changes remarkably easy. This mode retains original data, while allowing new, possibly conflicting data to be imported. The data can then be compared and resolved to produce parts. The ECO mode greatly reduces rework in cases where input data changes frequently. The ECO preview window allows users to view and evaluate newly imported data before committing to the change.
copy pin-out/ball-map diagrams from datasheets into Allegro PCB Librarian. The data is automatically interpreted and can be fine-tuned to meet company naming standards. Additionally, users can copy complete tables of information from datasheets with configurable translation of pin types and bus notations.

Schematic Symbol Editing

Allegro PCB Librarian comes with a powerful graphics editor for creating reusable shapes and schematic symbols. An editable spreadsheet with symbol information and a symbol editing canvas with expert features, such as separate grid controls for pins and non-pin objects, give
Pinout description in PDF

Datasheet Mining

The ability to read pin tables and pin grids makes it easy to create parts from descriptions in PDF datasheets. Users can
Imported data after mining
Created and validated part Figure 5: Import of part data in pin-grid format from PDF

PCB Footprint Editing

The PCB footprint creation process is designed to simplify the ever-increasing complexity of todays package models. A powerful wizard enables users to quickly create footprints using templates that handle most package typesincluding DIP, SOIC, PLCC/QFP, PGA/BGA throughhole discrete, SMD discrete, SIP, and ZIP. The pad designer facilitates the creation of any shape pad and padstack. It allows users to define the pads for each layer in the stack-up as well as various mask layers, hole types, and slots.

Comprehensive rule development and checking guidelines are provided both for schematic symbols and PCB footprints. Consistency checks are done whenever a part is saved or loaded for editing. Part error status is stored with the part and displayed whenever the part is opened or closed. Allegro PCB Librarian provides a standard rule set and a developers toolkit for building user-defined rules. Using these rule sets and the built-in part validation system, librarians can push parts through the advanced rule checking and advisement system. This reduces costly design iterations by ensuring that a part is correct from the start.
Cadence Services and Support
Cadence application engineers can answer your technical questions by telephone, email, or Internetthey can also provide technical assistance and custom training Cadence certified instructors teach more than 70 courses and bring their real-world experience into the classroom More than 25 Internet Learning Series (iLS) online courses allow you the flexibility of training at your own computer via the Internet Cadence Online Support gives you 24x7 online access to a knowledgebase of the latest solutions, technical documentation, software downloads, and more

Validation

Allegro PCB Librarian provides extensive part validation capabilities with built-in checks at every stage of the part creation process. For imported data, validation occurs at the time of import. When data is entered in the part editor, it is checked in real time for valid characters, lengths, permitted values, and syntax. Symbolpackage checks guarantee that parts will work in the complete PCB design flow. Footprint validation routines allow users to compare pin numbers specified at the time of schematic symbol development with PCB footprints. This online check ensures that schematic components and footprints are in sync. Most verification is done in real time without leaving the editor. Additionally, batch validation provides automated design flow verification that significantly reduces the burden on librarians. Users can run detailed packaging checks that instantiate the schematic symbol in a schematic sheet, create a netlist, and place the footprint into a layout file or quick checks that help them determine, in considerably less time, if a part can be packaged. User-defined symbol and footprint checks can be built for schematic parts and footprints. These can operate on one part at a time or on complete libraries.
Allegro Design Workbench Integration
Allegro PCB Librarian is an integral part of Allegro Design Workbench. When combined, these technologies comprise the most powerful board-level library and design data management system available today. It allows users to manage and distribute their Allegro schematic and PCB libraries. Component information can be included from datasheets, ERP, MRP, or other sources. By setting up a standardized part development flow across their organization, users can reduce errors and accelerate library development. This approach significantly increases productivity and improves the quality of their library. Configurable flow management capabilities allow users to manage their library development process and tailor it to their specific needs.

For More Information

Contact Cadence sales at 1.800.746.6223 or visit www.cadence.com for additional information. To locate a Cadence sales office or channel partner in your area, visit www.cadence.com/contact_us.

Operating System Support

Sun Solaris Linux IBM AIX Windows
Cadence is transforming the global electronics industry through a vision called EDA360. With an application-driven approach to design, our software, hardware, IP, and services help customers realize silicon, SoCs, and complete systems efficiently and profitably. www.cadence.com
2011 Cadence Design Systems, Inc. All rights reserved. Cadence, the Cadence logo, Allegro, OrCAD, and Verilog are registered trademarks a of Cadence Design Systems, Inc. All others are properties of their respective holders. 22114 05/11 MP/DM/PDF