Altium Harness issue - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: max@rp-engineering.de
author_rank: Newbie
timestamp: May 06, 2019, 02:40:31 pm
content: Hello,i saw this Altium Schematic in this Altium Schematic:http://www.pender.ch/docs/ZHAW/ZHAW-HDMI2CSI_connector_rev1-1_20160201.pdfI like the way the use the harness to make it clearly visible. I tried the same for my own project, but i only get a lot compile errors:The altium documentation is as always not very helpfull...Is there any Harness pro and can give me a short instruction.Thank a lot.Max

author: ajb
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: May 06, 2019, 02:46:24 pm
content: What error messages are you getting? Do you get correct connectivity when you push to the board? Harnesses sometimes generate spurious error messages, which is annoying, I think the harness compilation routines aren't quite fully baked.

author: simiGuru
author_rank: Newbie
timestamp: May 06, 2019, 05:20:21 pm
content: MAX, you are right.I was working professionally for tree years with Altium. Horrible experience. A board took 3 months and 3 guys.Now, it is same. Somebody has the wishful thinking that it works. Same shit same day, not connecting wires.There is only one thing that can be done with Altium - flush it in toilet - WC - water closet.All the suggestions with languages and software toys. Today, every program works differently on every machine.Soetime it works, sometimes it doesn't work at all, on the same machine.When forced Microsoft updates come, nothing works correctly.Now think. The last software compiler fully documented to the register level is C.C++ is not fully documented to the register level. Therefore, on every machine / processor it will work differently.Do you see the accumulated shit over the years?When we were young, pleple flew to the Moon. Today, they fly to the software support with no results.My best advice, move away from Altium and don't waste time with that.Even if you write your own software, it will be better than anything else.

author: admax
author_rank: Newbie
timestamp: November 28, 2019, 05:08:08 pm
content: Sorry for another question, but let me rerise and refine this abandoned question.The one of the issues is the "conflicting harness definition". Every time I add a harness connector to a sheet, it creates a new definition file that easily gets out of sync during active development, so what's the best practice in using these connectors? Is it possible to define connector somewhere once, and use it everywhere around project? Themanualadvises to add the "LOCKED" attribute within definition file to get a connectorless linking of nets, but it being removed (as of even 19.0 version of Altium) every time the original definition is edited visually making me to add that attribute again. And moreover is there a way to refer some deeply nested net or bus within, e.g., harness of harness w/o placing connectors twice? Is it possible?

author: VK3DRB
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 03, 2019, 11:12:38 am
content: That there is a harness definition text file somewhere. If you have changed any harness labels or added or removed a signal, upsetting the definition, then the compile will break unless this file is accurate. The actual harnesses and definition file MUST be in sync.The concept of harnesses is brilliant, but Altium really needs to rewrite the dog's breakfast underneath it all, or at least have a button to automatically recreate the harness definitions hassle-free when a change is made. It is far more complicated than it needs to be and when things go wrong, time and money are wasted trying to sort it out.

author: VK3DRB
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 03, 2019, 11:26:31 am
content: By the way, nice schematic sheet. Suggestions, in case they are useful..I assume DNI means Do Not Insert. I use variants to "cross out" the Do Not Fit components. That way, the not fitted parts do not show up in the BOM either. (Altium 19: Project, Variants, click on Component Variation for the part in question, click on Not Fitted). The PDF file will also show it as not fitted.I also place "No ERC markers" on unused pins. Besides no ERC on that net, it shows me I have not accidentally omitted any signals.