Reverse Engineering

Graphic imports and Reconstruct from graphics are two features of Fabrication Manager allowing for reverse engineering of printed circuit boards from artworks in Gerber ASCII formats. This kind of reverse engineering in EDWinXP is divided into two basic stages. Firstly, the graphic elements in the artworks are imported and distributed in relevant categories. For example graphic elements that constitute pads are imported to Padstack categories and those that constitute traces are imported to Trace Master category.

Actual reconstruction is the second stage that may commence only when all necessary elements have been imported. Reconstruction consists of several steps that have to be executed in prescribed sequence. For example, it is impossible to reconstruct connections before reconstructing board outlines and components first. It depends very much on completeness of imported graphics, but in most cases all reconstruction steps with exception of component reconstruction may be executed automatically just by clicking on appropriate tool. Component reconstruction is basically a manual process, which is aided by several semi-automatic support features.

Two methods for reconstruction

There are two methods for reconstructing components in projects that are reverse engineered from imported graphics in Gerber ASCII format:

• The graphic elements in certain imported categories may be used as a template for placing components already created in Layout Editor. This method assumes that user knows what parts were used in reverse engineered board and that those parts are defined in System Libraries. This method allows not only to re-create PCB layout but also schematics– in other words a complete EDWinXP project. It is therefore worthwhile to check in advance whether needed parts are present in the System Library and eventually add those that are missing.
• Components (electronic parts) are graphically represented on the PCB by packages that are fetched from the System Library. Newly introduced features in EDWinXP 1.90 allow recreating complete packages from graphics and subsequently the components referencing them. The parts are also recreated. However, since no information about their schematic view and structure may be derived from imported graphics, only PCB part of the project may be recreated in this way. Recreating component from recreated packages is faster and in case that the schematic diagram of the board is needed, there are options to recreate this part of project later.

Both methods may be of course combined and there are also ways for speeding up this process through applying certain other features of EDWinXP. In this document we shall focus on the first of above mentioned methods.