Patent ID: 7434180
Filing Date: 2008-10-07
Classification: G06F

Abstract:
1. A computer-aided circuit design application comprising: a virtual node feature, which accesses design specification information in a first data format and which produces a virtual data node object that represents the design specification information as in a second data format within a list of at least two node objects and without translating the design specification information, the virtual data node object including pointers to the design specification information in the first data format; a design tool operable on the list of node objects and the virtual data node object to alter the design specification information, the design tool to access the design specification information in the first data format via routines for reading from and writing to the first data format specified by the virtual data node object; wherein the virtual data node object includes a pointer to a library having the design specification information and an access translation software routine accessible by the design tool to access selected data related to the design specification information in the first data format; wherein the design tool is adapted to alter translated design specification information according to input from an operator; and wherein the virtual node feature is adapted to access the translation software routines for writing the altered design specification information to a file in the first data format.