Browsing the Active PCB Design using the PCB Panel in Altium Designer

Parent page: PCB Panels

Nets mode of the PCB panel.

Summary

The PCB panel allows you to browse the current PCB design using a range of filter modes to determine which object types or design elements are listed, highlighted or selected. The panel also has editing modes for specific object types or design elements that provide dedicated controls for editing procedures. Note that you can access the properties for any element listed in the panel.

Panel Access

When the PCB Editor is active, click the button at the bottom-right corner of the workspace and select  PCB from the context menu. Alternatively, you can access the panel through the View » Workspace Panels » PCB » PCB sub-menu.

Setting the visual filtering

The visual result of the applied filtering on the document in the design editor window is determined by a series of highlighting controls toward the top of the panel. The effect that is imposed in the editor view can be set to Normal, Mask or Dim, where in practice, Mask has the most obvious highlighting effect.

The Normal / Mask / Dim dropdown list provides options for visibly contrasting filtered and unfiltered objects within the design editor window.

Select the type of visual filtering applied using the masking mode drop-down list.

The visual highlighting effect for each masking mode:

• Normal - Filtered objects are visible in the design editor window and the appearance of unfiltered objects remains unchanged.
• Mask - Filtered objects are highlighted in the design editor window, with all other objects made monochrome
• Dim - Filtered objects are highlighted in the design editor window, with all other objects retaining their colors, but shaded. 

Display control

Controls for adjusting masking and dimming are accessed from the Mask Level button (bottom right of design editor window).

For each masking mode (Dim and Mask) the panel has two controls to set the contrast between filtered and unfiltered objects:

• When Mask viewing mode is selected, the Masked Objects Factor slide control determines the level of shade applied to unfiltered objects and the Background Objects Factor slide control determines the level of visibility of unfiltered objects. In this mode, unfiltered objects will be unavailable for selection or editing.
• When Dim viewing mode is selected, the Masked Objects Factor slide control determines the level of shade applied to unfiltered objects and the Highlight Objects Factor determines how white the filtered objects highlighting will be.

Click the Clear button to remove the display highlighting.

Filter options

The panel's three checkboxes apply these filter actions:

• Select - when enabled, the filtered objects will be selected in the workspace.
• Zoom - when enabled (default), the filtered objects will be zoomed and centered (where possible) in the design editor window. Use the Zoom Level button to adjust the zoom factor that will be used to close-in on filtered objects.
• Clear Existing - when enabled (default), any existing filter will be cleared before applying a new one. Disabling this option allows you to extend an existing filter, essentially refining the filter further by applying a new filter in addition to the existing one.

Any combination of these options can be enabled. For example, you might want to have all filtered objects zoomed, centered and selected in the design editor window, whilst applying masking to take away the clutter of other design objects.

Click the Clear button to disable the currently-applied filter. All objects in the design workspace will become fully visible and available for selection/editing. If you wish to re-apply the filter, click the Apply button.

Panel Modes

The PCB panel's functionality can change, depending on which mode is used. The different panel modes can be accessed and selected by clicking on the dropdown at the top of the panel.

The various panel mode options available.

• Nets - Used to browse and edit Net classes.
• xSignals - Used to manage xSignals in the PCB.
• Components - Used to browse and manage Components.
• From-To Editor - Used to add and remove user defined From-Tos.
• Split Plane Editor - Used to view and manage Split Planes.
• Differential Pairs Editor - Used to create and edit Differential Pairs.
• Polygons - Used to browse and manage Polygons.
• Hole Size Editor - Used to browse and manage Hole objects.
• 3D Models - Used to browse and manage 3D models.
• Structure Classes - Used to browse and manage Class Structures.
• Layer Stack Regions - Used to configure Layer Stack Regions for both rigid and flex designs.
• Unions - Used to browse and manage Unions and the primitives contained within Unions.
• Pad & Via Templates - Used to browse and manage Pad & Via Templates.

Panel mini-viewer

The bottom section of the PCB panel provides a mini-viewer for the current document, with an image of the PCB board central to its window. A white viewing box is imposed on the image to show the area currently displayed in the design editor window. As the editor display automatically pans and zooms in response to the PCB panel filter selections, the box moves and expands accordingly to indicate the board viewing area.

As you manually pan around the document in the design editor window - using the editor's horizontal and vertical scroll bars or the right-click panning hand - the viewing box in the panel will also move accordingly. Conversely, if you click inside the viewing box and drag it around the board image, the document in the design editor window will be panned accordingly, and at the current zoom level.

As you zoom in or out in the design editor window, the viewing box will be resized accordingly in the panel. Conversely, resizing the viewing box in the panel, by clicking and dragging on any of its vertices, will cause the zoom level to change in the design editor window. The smaller the size of the viewing box, the more the actual document has been zoomed-in.