DbLibs Viewer app under development

[ddavidebor]

Hi guys,

We're currently developing a new web-app (on premises! no cloud expected for now) to manage Altium Libraries.

Currently, these feature are already developed or being developed:

- Easy management of Component Links (from web, local server, etc etc)
- fetch and store documentation: added links are automatically downloaded and stored to avoid broken links
- Automatic parsing of PcbLib and SchLibs to retrieve the list of components
- Automatic Symbol and Footprint path verification
- Custom "comment" (AKA component values + part number + tolerance etc etc) string generation with easy syntax
- Full electronic units of measurement (example: enter 10nF > converted to 10*10^-9 farads)
- pretty units of measurements generation (always readable and autoscaled regardless of how you enter them)
- Support external OBDC databases integration (for example ERP)
- history of modifications
- User management
- basic octopart integration (MPN verification, datasheet retrieval)

[aandrew]

Very interested, keep us posted!

[EE-digger]

Sounds interesting and good luck with your effort 

Just curious though as to how you avoid obsolescence when Altium change things radically?  Or, does the internal design remain somewhat stable?

[julianhigginson]

sounds cool!
Hopefully it can still be deployed in a cloud hosted VM, though. Plenty of people work in teams that aren't all located in the same building.

Is it open or closed source?
is it going to be a paid product?
where are you in the development, and what's your expected availability date?

[radar_macgyver]

 

If possible, could the app also support SVNDbLibs? I use those, and find they help sync up library management across multiple machines.

[Philfreeze]

What do you mean by "Automatic parsing of PcbLib and SchLibs to retrieve the list of components"
Are you takling about the PcbLib and SchLib used in the DbLib structure of are you talking about old libraries (like IntLibs etc.)?

Otherwise it sounds like a great idea!
Keep us updated!

[ddavidebor]

Very interested, keep us posted!

I will!

Sounds interesting and good luck with your effort 

Just curious though as to how you avoid obsolescence when Altium change things radically?  Or, does the internal design remain somewhat stable?

Many possible answers:
* I don't expect Altium to change how the DBLibs works radically, if not at all. It has been supported for years, and it's widely used by almost all big corporation buying from them.
* If they move to a different dblib structure, porting is not hard. The data structure is complex within the app, but everything is joined dynamically and compiled into a flat table for Altium stupidity's sake. This latter part can be easily changed if required.
* dblibs can be converted to IntLibs in the worst case scenario

sounds cool!
Hopefully it can still be deployed in a cloud hosted VM, though. Plenty of people work in teams that aren't all located in the same building.

Is it open or closed source?
is it going to be a paid product?
where are you in the development, and what's your expected availability date?

Cloud VM would be the preferred way of deploying it. Alternatively, a local Linux VM using hyper-v on windows for companies that are Windows-only. The app runs on Linux exclusively nonetheless.

Cannot comment on open or closed source nature for now. Currently awaiting some feedback from enterprise customers. Personally, I prefer open source, and would gladly like to find a way for the software to be free for entusiast. Main issue, for now, is that we're based in Europe, and most of the market is US/Asia, with no judicial continuity, so we need a licensing model that is solid in practice more than on legal terms.

It's going to be paid for business customers. Not planning to make money off individuals.

Alpha by end of year.

If possible, could the app also support SVNDbLibs? I use those, and find they help sync up library management across multiple machines.

Yes. Could possibly become a requirement, as synchronizing files is not a trivial task, and it appears by recent tests we need to do it in order to have an good workflow.

What do you mean by "Automatic parsing of PcbLib and SchLibs to retrieve the list of components"
Are you takling about the PcbLib and SchLib used in the DbLib structure of are you talking about old libraries (like IntLibs etc.)?

Otherwise it sounds like a great idea!
Keep us updated!

The one used in DbLibs.
When you make a DbLib/SVNDbLib, it links to SchLibs and PcbLibs that may contain more than one symbol/footprint. Unfortunately, discovering the symbols/footprints inside is quite impractical. SVNLibs usually have one-file-per-symbol/footprints, but even then naming in those must be manually matched between symbol/footprint and library filename. Duplicate symbol/footprint names are also a mess.

The app does all the tedious heavy lifting of matching components in the database with Symbols and Footprints.

Davide

[Philfreeze]

When you make a DbLib/SVNDbLib, it links to SchLibs and PcbLibs that may contain more than one symbol/footprint. Unfortunately, discovering the symbols/footprints inside is quite impractical. SVNLibs usually have one-file-per-symbol/footprints, but even then naming in those must be manually matched between symbol/footprint and library filename. Duplicate symbol/footprint names are also a mess.

The app does all the tedious heavy lifting of matching components in the database with Symbols and Footprints.

Yeah that is probably a good idea, we always have some problems because someone forgot to rename the footprint inside the pcblib to match the file name.

Cloud VM would be the preferred way of deploying it. Alternatively, a local Linux VM using hyper-v on windows for companies that are Windows-only. The app runs on Linux exclusively nonetheless.

Cannot comment on open or closed source nature for now. Currently awaiting some feedback from enterprise customers. Personally, I prefer open source, and would gladly like to find a way for the software to be free for entusiast. Main issue, for now, is that we're based in Europe, and most of the market is US/Asia, with no judicial continuity, so we need a licensing model that is solid in practice more than on legal terms.

It's going to be paid for business customers. Not planning to make money off individuals.

Alpha by end of year.

I would recommend the licensing model to by tied to the support (a lot of open source software does it this way) so as a business customer you are required to buy the software and only they can expect any kind of support.

[ddavidebor]

Thanks we'll consider it.

Also, I want to clarify something: Both database and dblib file comes pre-configured and both works out of the box, with only the right IP address to set.

Davide

[ddavidebor]

Hello Guys,

Just wanted to update you. The fancy features are still in the work. The hard part was actually the basic data entry. All present web development frameworks but one SUCK at being efficient. All very fancy and lovely for admin panels and websites and whatever, but actually very impractical to use.

So, we're going with that one. The UI is not the prettiest, but it's damn quick to use.

An update feature-by-feature from the originally proposed one.

- Easy management of Component Links (from web, local server, etc etc)
--- this works quite well. You can upload documents, share them on the local network, add http links. Any amount per-component. The system will automatically generate only the required amount of columns in the database table to avoid clutter.
- fetch and store documentation: added links are automatically downloaded and stored to avoid broken links
--- done some careful evalutation. This feature will be present only if we can find existing backend software that can do this and it's well tested, because otherwise it breaks the complexity-usefulness balance.
- Automatic parsing of PcbLib and SchLibs to retrieve the list of components
--- working on it. Well, it works. The issue is how to share the files, it's not trivial. Unfortunately, windows suck at this sort of things. for now we're oriented on Git.
- Automatic Symbol and Footprint path verification
--- not needed as it's part of the automatic parsing.
- Custom "comment" (AKA component values + part number + tolerance etc etc) string generation with easy syntax
--- postponed as a list of the most common combinations seems to cover 99% of use cases
- Full electronic units of measurement (example: enter 10nF > converted to 10*10^-9 farads)
--- Even better than anticipated. All SI units of measurement are available.
- pretty units of measurements generation (always readable and autoscaled regardless of how you enter them)
--- working on it
- Support external OBDC databases integration (for example ERP)
--- works!
- history of modifications
--- works, but it's pretty crap... hitting limitations of the framework...
- User management
--- works
- basic octopart integration (MPN verification, datasheet retrieval)
--- postponed as altium 19 implemented most of the features already in the new bomdoc

[voltsandjolts]

This sounds interesting.
Can you share some screenshots of the user interface?

[martin1454]

looking forward to it

[ddavidebor]

This sounds interesting.
Can you share some screenshots of the user interface?

Sure, it's still an ugly bird.

[ddavidebor]

more screenshots