Here are some questions (and answers) of the past. Some are obsolete now, but it might be due to changes in the code, that some could reappear.
Spice 1 -> cad -c called freehist -1000 calling cad sorry, you are not allowed to run spicecad contact martin.maschmann@t-online.de
This is due to a little license function which has been left in the code. Please set an environment variable SPICECAD_VALIDATE to 'unddassollallessein'
internal error - segmentation violation
exitspice: CTRL e works no problem
This error seems to be hard to reproduce: on some schematics and machines, crashes can be produced hitting these keys, on other machines and operating systems, crashes never happen. So, if you have a schematic which causes crashes, please send it to me for debugging.
You can use the 'save spice3 data' function in the simulation menu to store the last simulation. If you want to store earlier simulations, you can type in SPICE3 commands directly from within the mouse window (the lengthy window which appears first).
This problem is solved now.
This is changed , now. After a paramsweep simulation, the variable names and values will appear in the plot window.
This is implemented now.
Definitely not. This requires major changes in SPICECAD. What is more, plotting more than one variable makes is difficult to see what is what. I am thinking of multiple plot widows. What do you think about this?
This is a feature of XVIEW: you have to hit a pre-defined key to confirm that the menu field you filled in is correct now and can be sent to the application program. In this case, ESCAPE and RETURN are the keys used for confirmation.
Analog and digital MOS symbols are available now.
This is always true. Thanks to everyone sending suggestions, bug reports and error messages which helps us improving the program and the manual and fixing the errors which are still undetected.
This bug is fixed now.
Error circles can be removed by netlisting the circuit successfully.
Sorry, no way to re-activate SPICECAD. Yes, don't kill SPICECAD hitting CTRL c. Use CTRL z and kill -9 PID instead.
Undetecable key errors reside from mapped keyboards.
To circumvent this, you can re-define the key codes in file 'keys.spi'. Plase read chapter 'Hotkeys'.
It could be made customizable due to a setting in the 'setup.spi'-file. Any more requests?
Dead menus only appear under linux, not under SUN SOLARIS. A way to remove them is first removing the last menu (F5). Klick with the right mouse button outside the menu to make it disappear. Then, press the function key to redraw the dead menu (F4). Klick with the right mouse button outside the menu to make it disappear, and everything will be fine again.
This depends on the window manager used. OLWM,OLVWM and TWM can be used, FVWM not.
This depends on whether you have the 'sharedlists' entry in the file 'setup.spi' set to 'yes'. 'yes' means that all symbols with the name in your schematic share the same physical list of objects (trasistors, sources). 'no' means that each time a symbol is created during loading or after a symbol placement, a new list of objects is created and loaded from the apropriate symbol files. This means that , if sharedlists is set to 'yes', editing an object in a symbol affects all symbols, because the object you have edited only exists once. If sharedlists is set to 'no', editing an object in a symbol affects no other object in any other symbol, because the object you have edited is unique and is not related to any other objects in any other symbols. This is why you should use properties is symbols, it reduces the necessarity to leave and re-enter SPICECAD due to changed symbol object properties.
Setting 'sharedlists' to 'yes' also means the simulation result backannotation only works on the top hierarchy level or if you use symbols only once. Using symbols several times means that node number and device names are incorrect: node numbers and device names are those of the last symbol in the netlisting sequence. As an example, is you create a FLIPFLOP and use it 20 times, an internal node might have the node numbers 4, 23, 45 , 78 ... 121 during netlisting. If you want to look at this internal node after simulation, you can only look at node 121. The other nodes are invisible. So, if you develop cells, you should always set 'sharedlists' to 'no'.
The file 'setup.spi' has two rows (columns?). Each line of this file is read by reading two strings at a time , where the first string is the name and the second the value of a variable to be set. If a value string is missing (because it has been set to an empty string, perhaps), the next variable name is read and interpreted as the value. After the next readed line, a variable value is read and interpreted as a variable name. This results in the mentioned error message. So, please check you file 'setup.spi' whether all lines contain exactly two strings. Please add the appropriate variable value if one is missing, or delete the whole line if the variable name is missing.
It has to be taken care that the mouse is near to the desired position inside a net or a contact you want to snap to. If not, it might happen that it will be snapped to the same position two or more times after another. Then, nets of length zero are created and removed immediately, which results in the described error message. Nets with only one connection which require leaving an re-entering SPICECAD : this is still a bug which has to be solved.
What is described there is recursive placement: a symbol, which contains itself in its own description.
Please do not place symbols into their own schematic.
If there is anyone outside there who has written a LVS program, please contact us. I could rewrite the netlisting procedures of SPICECAD to provide the LVS with additional information.
Netlist to schematic converters are only useful in digital design. In analog design, too many information is lost when making a netlist from a schematic: the reverse way is very difficult to go.
Did you run a simulation before ? Please check whether you have at least a DCOP box inside the schematic.
There is a button called 'terminate' which terminates SPICECAD immediately. But, the described behaviour above could not be reproduced by me. Rename works fine on my machine.
Copying symbols is allowed. Again, the described behaviour could not be reproduced by me.
Sounds interesting. Detailed suggestions welcome.
Is implemented now.
No comments.