xref leabels: question and suggestion

[Anonymous]

Hello,

I have been searching for a solution to a net labeling issue I have. When you have a lot of high pin count ICs (i.e. a micro <-> SRAM, flash, eMMC) sometimes using complete nets everywhere makes a schematic unreadable. We prefer to use the Xref labels because it conveys the same information (i.e. what are the actual connection points) without the messy wires. The problem is that the options for it are very rigid. We also prefer to use ledger size (11" x 17") paper for our schematic sheets, so we can fit a lot of information onto a single page.

The first issue is not displaying connection locations on the same sheet. If your schematic has some connections that look something like below (please note, I am not willing to share more of the schematic. It is for a work project.):

This is taken from sheet one of a two sheet schematic. Both UART1 signals are connected on a separate sheet (sheet 2, column 8, row D). Both SPI0 signals are connected on the same sheet (sheet 1). How do I make it show the same information for connections made on this sheet?

When you look at the properties menus (below) for each type of net label, it's clear that the Allocation settings are what are causing this issue. However, short of creating a custom script/ULP I see no easy way to modify this, and I would rather not have to mess with writing my own scripts/ULPs. It's not that I couldn't figure it out; it's that I feel there really is not a great reason for it being as difficult as it is.

  

My feature suggestion/request:

I guess ultimately, I just have to wonder why these rules are (and always have been) so rigid. If I have a net connected in eight different locations, and I want to show all seven other locations on the each points' label then I should be able to. If I want to display these connections on the same page, I should be able to. I understand that there are a lot of potential problems that could be caused by this. My response to that is have the "advanced modification of net label allocation" not enabled by default.

[Anonymous]

I'm not sure what to do with this, but I was unable to edit my post from above. I would like to correct the spelling error in the title and a few other grammatical errors.

[jorge_garcia]

Hi @Anonymous,

I hope you're doing well. I have added your comments to the existing enhancement request for the XREF labels. Thank you for your comments.

It's odd, that you can't edit your post. Go ahead and click on the Report flag and our moderator will be happy to help you get that corrected.

Please let me know if there's anything else I can do for you.

Best Regards,

[Anonymous]

To disable this feature, go to Options->Set->Misc->Xref label format, and change it from this format %F%N/%S.%C%R to this one %F%N.

credits to: https://www.allaboutcircuits.com/technical-articles/easier-pcb-design-eagle-cad-tips-and-tricks-part...

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@Anonymous wrote:

Hello,

I have been searching for a solution to a net labeling issue I have. When you have a lot of high pin count ICs (i.e. a micro <-> SRAM, flash, eMMC) sometimes using complete nets everywhere makes a schematic unreadable. We prefer to use the Xref labels because it conveys the same information (i.e. what are the actual connection points) without the messy wires. The problem is that the options for it are very rigid. We also prefer to use ledger size (11" x 17") paper for our schematic sheets, so we can fit a lot of information onto a single page.

The first issue is not displaying connection locations on the same sheet. If your schematic has some connections that look something like below (please note, I am not willing to share more of the schematic. It is for a work project.):

This is taken from sheet one of a two sheet schematic. Both UART1 signals are connected on a separate sheet (sheet 2, column 8, row D). Both SPI0 signals are connected on the same sheet (sheet 1). How do I make it show the same information for connections made on this sheet?

When you look at the properties menus (below) for each type of net label, it's clear that the Allocation settings are what are causing this issue. However, short of creating a custom script/ULP I see no easy way to modify this, and I would rather not have to mess with writing my own scripts/ULPs. It's not that I couldn't figure it out; it's that I feel there really is not a great reason for it being as difficult as it is.

  

My feature suggestion/request:

I guess ultimately, I just have to wonder why these rules are (and always have been) so rigid. If I have a net connected in eight different locations, and I want to show all seven other locations on the each points' label then I should be able to. If I want to display these connections on the same page, I should be able to. I understand that there are a lot of potential problems that could be caused by this. My response to that is have the "advanced modification of net label allocation" not enabled by default.

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[Anonymous]

Hi @jorge_garcia,

I was wondering if this feature request was still on your radar. I would really like to see the ability to show all connections rather than just the first if the net spans multiple sheets. This issue has caused wasted time since its assumed that the xref shows all connections when in fact it only shows the first one. When working in eagle its easy enough to show all net connections, but when debugging with a printed out schematic it becomes impossible to figure out all connections without lookup tools. 

Please put this issue on the top of your priorities.

Thanks, 

Nick

[jorge_garcia]

Hello @Anonymous,

I hope you're doing well. It still on the radar, but it isn't a top priority right now. Other projects are taking priority at the moment.

Thanks for following up, I'll post if anything changes.

Best Regards,

[charlie_didear]

I agree.  This is a feature that a lot of professional ECAD programs have and it's disappointing that EAGLE does not have this feature.

Honestly, having the option of the XREF showing multiple page numbers with a given net is not a fancy extensive feature like multiple trace routing or differential pair routing, and sounds like a rather simple thing to get around to.

Could you please consider making this a slightly higher priority?  It's already been two years since the original user suggested this and it would be great to see this on 9.5 or even version 10.

[jorge_garcia]

Hi @charlie_didear,

I hope you're doing well. The priority isn't my call but I can bring it up to the developers and our leadership team for review.

That's the best I can do. Thank you for posting, we appreciate the feedback and do our best to implement it. I feel like with this feature it may not be the best idea to just print it on the schematic, if you have nets that show up in a large number of places the list could become unwieldy and clutter up the schematic so the implementation requires some thought. If you have any suggestions on this please feel free to post them.

Best Regards,

[charlie_didear]

Thanks for getting back to me.  I don't believe it would clutter your schematic much, unless your schematic were quite close to being cluttered anyways, which suggests a visual re-arrangement of your schematic is already necessary.  Sure, some may consider adding every page number to be excessive, but that is what the XREF formatter options are for, so that users may chose what information to show on XREFs as they see fit.