Expiration of Altium License

[sanwal209]

Hi,
I am currently designing an open source project in Altium Designer. My license will be expire in one month and I am confused will it effect the open source project in legal terms?

If i finish the project before license expires and post all the design files on our website does it will have any consequences in legal terms?

[T3sl4co1l]

If you bought a normal commercial license, it will continue to work with that version, perpetually.  You will no longer receive updates (subscription) or access to new versions.

If it's another like the free trial or student version, those expire IIRC.

Tim

[julianhigginson]

if it's actual expiration of a time based licence (ie, student, demo, or some other thing) you should check what the restrictions are for that licence.

I don't think there's any restrictions on doing open source designs and releasing them for free, but your own licence will be the ultimate source of truth there (the demo and student licences do forbid you doing commercial work of any type while you use them, for instance)

but whatever happens with the licence, once it's expired, the files you generated with it are still good for anyone else with a valid altium licence to pick up and use... the project files themselves aren't tied to the licence that created them, and don't expire.

[sanwal209]

Thanks Guys. I have student version and i guess i need to buy commercial version. Is there any way that i can transfer Altium design files into KiCad or Eagle?

[DerekG]

I have student version and i guess i need to buy commercial version.

You could consider moving over to Altium's mid-ship product, Circuit Studio. There are several threads running here on EEVBlog.com

[^_^]

@sanwal209:
Bro, so you've looked into the license and what? It's forbidden?

Right now as we speak, I'm demoing Altium Designer 2017 (demo is 15 days).
It would be stupid to just look around at the options, so I'm doing something real, a PCB that might be useful.

If there a problem with publishing the files from the demo to say github?   

[sanwal209]

The Project I have designed consists of 5 Different PCBs and all of them are mix signal architecture including dual band RF. 3 of them are 6 Layers and rest are of 4 layers.

Its really difficult to transfer all these to kiCad or eagle as its like redesigning everything.

Regarding Circuit studio i cannot use previous projects on it (Correct me if i am wrong) and its based on cloud storage.

[DerekG]

The Project I have designed consists of 5 Different PCBs and all of them are mix signal architecture including dual band RF. 3 of them are 6 Layers and rest are of 4 layers.

Its really difficult to transfer all these to kiCad or eagle as its like redesigning everything.

Regarding Circuit studio i cannot use previous projects on it (Correct me if i am wrong) and its based on cloud storage.

Circuit Maker is based on cloud storage, Circuit Studio is not.

Perhaps someone else can advise if you can export your AD files into Circuit Studio. It certainly was not possible when Circuit Studio was first released some 18 months ago.

I was trying to help you find an economical solution as you indicated you were a student ........... but as you are designing 6 layer boards, it is obvious that the boards are complex & it appears you are wanting to do this on a commercial basis.

So, probably no option but to pull out your wallet & spend the money for your own copy of Altium Designer.

You can now see that Altium was smart in offering you a cheap student licence. It has now worked in their favour.

[julianhigginson]

the issue seems to be changing.

originally it's just about finishing your open source project before expiry of license and posting the files online (almost definitely will be fine, but check your license terms if you really want to know!!)

But now you don't want to transfer to circuitmaker because it forces you to cloud storage? AFAIK, the files also live on your HDD, they are cached, not downloaded every time you want to work on them... with the cloud storage on circuitmaker they're just not place-able into whatever folder on your computer you want, and they are available for everyone else to see if your limited number of private projects are occupied.

If you want to keep using an AD license after your student one expires, that needs buying. Or maybe circuit studio also loads up AD files now? (I have heard mumbling about that but haven't seen it for myself.... you can check...) that also needs buying if it's an option, but buying that hurts a lot less.

Otherwise see if you can work out how to write some code that will parse the Altium format files and import them into KiCad yourself? I know the PCBs can be saved in ASCII format, for a start...