> Van: Bob Drzyzgula <bob@drzyzgula.org>
> Aan: PICLIST@MITVMA.MIT.EDU
> Onderwerp: Re: Professional PCB Schematics NOT shareware
> Datum: zondag 29 november 1998 4:22

Hello Bob,

> On the low end of all this, does anyone have experience with Electronics
> Workbench Layout?

EWB -layout is actual the UltiBoard layout package.  I've got experience
with it, and I cannot say I'm happy with it (That's an understatement !).

After more than TEN years they, ultiboard, cannot come up with anything
else than what they dropped upon us, the customers.  The version I've got
(the LAST dos version made, _should_ be best ..) is full of bugs,
non-intuitive ways of doing things, and even changes an the way of drawing
lines between PCB editing and Component creation

How do you draw a non-straight line in the Component-creation editor ?
Simple !  You draw two _straight_ lines, linked to each other, the first
line beginning from where you want the diagonal to start and the second to
where you want it to end.  than you remove the link between the two lines.
It than 'rubber-bands' to a diagonal.

The PCB drawing is as bad as the Schematic package.  To edit a non-visible
item of a component you have to switch-on ALL unvisible components
(creating a Dark-blue GARBAGE on your screen), pick the one you want to
edit, wich is impossible, so you have to shift the full component to a
non-used part of the PCB, pick-and-edit, and shift the full component back.
 Moving a diagonal track can result in a stair-way, with no means to
convert it back else than to delete the track & redraw it. Shortkey's are
not there.  _Preferences_ made will be overwritten by the program.  If
part's are close together (or ontop of each other, like with two SMD-parts,
one on the top, the other on the bottom) it's allmost impossible to get one
of the parts without moving the other (LAYO give's you a list with close-by
parts, and lets _you_ choose)

In short : Use ULTI-(S)HELL/CAP/BOARD if you know _exacly_ what you want to
draw, because editing is not easy ...

Oh, by the way : User-support ?  Yeah.  We had a problem with our Dongle.
We called.  No response for _TWO_ weeks. They took a vacation and did not
leave an alternate adres for the support, they did not leave _any_ message.
 After two weeks they just where there again.  The problem with the dongle
was simple : it's ID-code was gone.  They send another code & whe had to
upload it to the dongle.  After that we could work again.

Oh, before I forget : Don't try to print anything outside of
ULTI(something) while it's running.  It's likely to crash your computer.
It happened to me a few times ...

Customer advice : DON'T BUY Ulti-Crap

I'm sorry for EWB, because the simulation of EWB is quite good (IMHO).
They just made the wrong choice to add UltiBoard to it ...

Greetz,
  Rudy Wieser