I have been given a lybrary of symbols for models written in a .lib file.
Each symbol has been made with the symbol editor. The “Lybrary File” field contains the whole path where the creator had placed the .lib file, which is of course different than my path. So now I have to edit every symbol to another path to make it all work.
I guess the best location for the lybrary file is the Qspice lybrary default folder/s. This way it will not be needed to specify the whole path in the “Lybrary File” property of the symbol, but only the .lib filename. This would make the symbols “plug and play” between users, given the instructions where to place the .lib file.
What are the default paths in Qspice? Will it be possible for the User to change them in future releases ?
You can use a symbol with an absolute path. That will always be respected. When you double click the “Library File” field in the symbol attribute inspector, it gives you a file browser that leaves the symbol wired to an absolute path.
QSPICE will look in the directory that has the top-level netlist. This means you’re using the Windows file/directory structure as your “project file”.
You can use relative paths off the top-level netlist. Not sure how useful that is, but if you stipulate a relative path, it really needs to respect what you specified.
It will look in the installation directory and .\Qorvo\lib, e.g.,
User-specified library search paths will be added eventually as a new feature, but, honestly, I anticipate the absolute path and working directory to be the most useful no matter what other features are added.
Thanks a lot for your clarification, Mike. The inconvenience I see with the absolute path is that, like in my case, when sharing a symbol + netlist-file, such symbol will “point” to a path which is most of the time different among users.
At the cost of being repetitive, but for the sake of better explaining the matter, here is an example:
John Doe creates a symbol with his netlist.lib file located in its Documents\Qspice\PersonalLib folder. The Lybrary File field in the symbol properties will be
C:\Users\John.Doe\Documents\QSPICE\PersonalLib\netlist.lib
Even if I had the same folder structure as him and used the same location, my path will be
C:\Users\Emmanuel.Granatello\Documents\QSPICE\PersonalLib\netlist.lib
which of course is different than the one in the symbol’s Library File property.
At the moment I am instructing my collaborators to create symbols using relative path and we will use the Program Files\Qspice folder.
Looking forward to the feature of adding user-specified library search paths to the default ones.
The other problem is that schematics contain absolute paths to library files. I keep all my programs on the C: drive and my data on the D: drive for my home PC and E: for my work PC, so sharing schematics never mind libraries doesn’t work.
The work around I use is a junction: assuming that my libraries are in D:\ElectronicLibs\QSPice then the command mklink /J {QSpice install dir}\MyLib D:\ElectronicLibs\QSpice will create an alias MyLib in the QSpice folder. I keep symbols and library files together in the same folder, and in the symbol attribute I use a relative path. e.g. .\MyLib\opamps\LM324.txt