Cadence Allegro Expansion

PollEx PCB supports Cadence Allegro Expansion files such as binary and ASCII files.

1. From the menu bar, click File > Import ECAD > Cadence Allegro Expansion.
   The Import from Cadence Allegro dialog opens.

   • Allegro Binary File: Select the target binary file *.brd or *.mcm to import. To import binary files, you need to set the Binary Reading Option in the User Defined Setting dialog.
     • Panel: To import as a panel data, select a *.geom file of the panel data.
   • Allegro ASCII Files: Select the target ASCII file *Geom.txt to import.
     • Panel: To import as a panel data, select a *.geom file of the panel data.
   • Allegro Fabmaster File: Select the target fabmaster file *.txt or *.cad to import.
   • User Defined Setting: Specify parameters for data importing options.
2. The User Defined Setting for Cadence Allegro dialog opens.
   • Import Type
     • Read from Binary File: Support default as Allegro binary file reading.
     • Read from ASCII File: Support default as Allegro ASCII file reading.
     • Read form Fabmaster File: Support default as Allegro Fabmaster file reading.
   • Binary Reading Option: Import with an Allegro binary file (*.brd).
     Note: The Binary Reading Option only works on a machine which Cadence Allegro installed. Otherwise, this feature will not work.
     • Path to the extracta.exe: If you want to use the way of reading binary file, set executable command file, extracta.exe path. Example: %ALLEGRO_INSTALL_DIR%\tools\pcb\bin
     • If the extracta.exe file is not found in the user-specified path, it will refer to the Allegro default path. (%CDSROOT%\tools\pcb\bin or %CDSROOT%\tools\pcb\bin)
       Note: Extracta.exe is provided by Cadence Allegro. It extracts the desired format from the design data and exports it as a text file.
     • Path to the Control File: To use Allegro ASCII extraction command, extracta.exe, you need to use control file for extract ASCII file. Set the path for control file. In general case, this file is in C:\ProgramData\altair\PollEx\<Version>\Share\AllegroExpansion_ExtractCommandFile163
       Note: The control file is provided by Altair PollEx. It contains the information necessary for extracting ASCII files through the extracta.exe command.
   • Options
     • Allow Break Component: Check when user wants to import Break Component.
       Note: The edited Footprint Library on the PCB Layout is recognized as a Break Component.
     • Higher than Version 16.3: Check this option while reading upper Allegro version than 16.3.
     • Add suffix “Manufacturing” for the manufacturing related layers.
     • Define Part Name: Set the ECAD Part name with a Property or Parameters value.
   • Layer Set-Up: Set Allegro layers’ name which will be used as PDB’s component related layers for silkscreen, component outline layer.
   • Apply to Environment Setting: Apply settings to the environment setting.
     Note: In order to use the cross-probe with Allegro(Link to ECAD) in PollEx PCB, you need to copy the 'allegro.ilinit' file to Cadence installed directory.'allegro.ilinit' file in the "C:\ProgramData\altair\PollEx\<version>\Share" directory to "%CDSROOT%\share\local\pcb\skill"