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Date: Thu, 23 Jul 2015 06:29:20 +0000
Message-ID: <CAM2RGhTOymLJiD76Fdjh5qbukHDMynCMT43xhA712idBTC2xKg@mail.gmail.com>
Subject: Re: [geda-user] Converting footprints from PADS to PCB
From: "Evan Foss (evanfoss AT gmail DOT com) [via geda-user AT delorie DOT com]" <geda-user AT delorie DOT com>
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On Thu, Jul 23, 2015 at 6:11 AM, Erich Heinzle (a1039181 AT gmail DOT com)
[via geda-user AT delorie DOT com] <geda-user AT delorie DOT com> wrote:
> From what I can see, altium can import ascii PADS data, but not binary.
>
> There is a "read only"-ish free PADs viewer available -
> http://www.pads.com/downloads/pads-pcb-viewer/
>
> gerbv supports svg export. dxf can be converted to kicad. kicad can be
> converted to PCB.
>
> I will experiment with the gerbers and see what is possible.
>
> The project looks interesting and gerber -> PCB layout is an itch that needs
> scratching.

I have done
gerber -> postscript -> pcb

> Regards,
>
> Erich.
>
>
> On Thu, Jul 23, 2015 at 2:46 PM, Spacefalcon the Outlaw
> <falcon AT ivan DOT harhan DOT org> wrote:
>>
>> Continuing on my quest to recapture the design of a classic GSM
>> cellphone in a FOSS EDA format...  A few months ago the founder of
>> Openmoko released the original design files, including PCB layout, for
>> their legendary Neo Freerunner:
>>
>> ftp://ftp.freecalypso.org/pub/GSM/GTA02/GTA02-MB-A6.zip
>>
>> Their PCB layout was done in PADS, and we have both the original PADS
>> file and the full set of gerbers made from it.  I would like to reuse
>> a whole bunch of footprints from Openmoko's layout, as that layout
>> contains known good footprints for all of the core components needed
>> in a Calypso phone or modem.
>>
>> The problem is that PADS' *.pcb files are in a proprietary binary
>> format. :-(  The good news is that we have the gerbers too, and one
>> can view them with gerbv, measure the dimensions of every aspect of
>> every footprint and recreate an equivalent footprint for our PCB - but
>> of course it would be a very tedious manual process.
>>
>> I wonder, would anyone here happen to know anything about PADS' format?
>> Was it perchance documented in some place accessible to mere mortals?
>> Or if I found someone with a working installation of PADS who could
>> open the layout file, does PADS perchance have some way to extract
>> elements from a complete PCB design and save them as reusable
>> footprints?  Or perhaps a way to save the whole layout as ASCII instead
>> of binary - if it were ASCII, I could probably stare at it and figure
>> out the info I'm after...
>>
>> Has anyone ever succeeded in moving footprints from PADS into the FOSS
>> EDA world, be it our PCB or KiCAD?
>>
>> TIA,
>> SF
>
>



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