Developer(s) Altium Development status Released Operating system | Initial release January 2015 Written in Delphi, C++, C# | |
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Stable release 1.3.0.119 / August 2016 | ||
CircuitMaker was originally an electronic design automation software. The company that published this software was bought by Altium in early 2000, and eventually the product was discontinued. Altium recently resurrected the brand for printed circuit board design targeted at the hobby, hacker, and maker community. CircuitMaker is available as freeware, and the hardware designed with it may be used for commercial and non-commercial purposes without limitations. It is currently available publicly as version 1.3 by Altium Limited, with the first non-beta release on January 17, 2016.
Contents
History
Open source hardware and easy-to-use development boards such as the Arduino and the Raspberry Pi have encouraged community interest in electronics, particularly in fablabs, hackerspaces and makerspaces. The leading EDA software vendors traditionally lack free versions, and professional licenses are typically unaffordable for amateurs. This resulted in high piracy rates for professional software packages, or users sticking to outdated software for their circuit board needs. In recent years, several initiatives have attempted to fill this void, leading to Altium's release of a simplified and easy-to-use version of their professional EDA software package, Altium Designer, targeted at less complex circuit board projects.
Features
CircuitMaker implements schematic capture and PCB design using the same engine as Altium Designer, providing an almost identical user experience. The schematic editor includes basic component placement and circuit design as well as advanced multi-channel design and hierarchical schematics. All schematics are uploaded to the Altium server and can be viewed by anyone with a CircuitMaker account, stimulating design re-use. CircuitMaker supports integration with the Octopart search engine and allows drag and drop placement of components from the Octopart search results if schematic models are attached to them. Users can build missing schematic symbols and commit them to the server, called the Community Vault, making them available for other users. The continuously growing part database eliminates the need for a custom schematic symbol or footprint design for common parts, increasing user-friendliness for beginners.
Concurrency editing was added in version 1.3
Transfer of schematics to a PCB is a straightforward process in CircuitMaker since PCB footprints are automatically attached to any component on the schematic that was picked from the Octopart library. PCB footprints may have simple 3D models or complex STEP models attached to them, enabling real time 3D rendering of the PCB during development. CircuitMaker supports design rule configuration and real time design rule checking. Some advanced features, including differential pair routing and polygon pour management, are also available. Production files can be exported directly, although an external Gerber viewer must be used to check the exports. The entire PCB can also be exported as a 3D STEP model for further use in mechanical 3D CAD software.
Open Source Hardware
CircuitMaker requires a free account to represent its users in the community. An active internet connection is required to start the software. Users are allowed to have 2 private projects, the so-called sandbox mode for practicing. By default, all schematics and PCBs are uploaded to the server and can be viewed by other users. While this renders CircuitMaker undesirable for closed source projects, it encourages collaboration in the community. Users are allowed to fork existing projects, or request permission to collaborate in existing projects. Importing schematic documents and PCBs from other EDA packages (OrCAD, PADS, P-CAD, EAGLE) is supported. Users are allowed to own unlimited projects, and there is no hard limit on board complexity. However, Altium warns that users may experience a performance drop for large projects.
All documents are under version control by default, allowing users to revert changes made in their projects, and build new versions of existing schematic symbols or footprints in the Community Vault. Users can comment on each others projects and parts, rate them, and propose improvements.
Operating Systems Support
As a result of its reliance on the Altium Designer schematic capture and PCB design engine, CircuitMaker is only available for the Windows operating system. This necessitates the user have access to a Windows license to use CircuitMaker. Dependence on Windows has been cited as a weakness of the CircuitMaker project, and Altium has reported to current users that a cross-platform solution is currently being researched. As of 2015, CircuitMaker cannot be run in Wine, requiring the use of a complete virtual machine. Unofficial support for Linux and BSD users is provided by Altium staff on the CircuitMaker forum.
A second concern is the lock-in resulting from CircuitMaker's cloud centric approach. While users can import resources from competing EDA software packages, CircuitMaker does not support exporting design resources itself. Reviewers consider this in conflict with the open source ideology. However, a workaround for this issue is provided by Altium Designer 16 which does support the import of CircuitMaker files.