Parent page: Altium 365 Workspace
The Workspace gives you convenient access for browsing all of the managed components that are currently stored within that Workspace. Accessible through the Workspace's browser interface (a constituent part of the parent Altium 365 Platform Interface) not only can you quickly see what (and how many) components you currently have at your disposal, but you can also view a summary of the health of those components. Delving deeper, you have access to view more detailed information regarding component health, through a dedicated Library Health dashboard. This provides greater detail on issues and enables you to assess and fix components accordingly.
This document takes a look at working with existing managed components through the Workspace's browser interface. For an overview of working with those components in your design software, including the creation of new managed components and the migration of existing file-based component libraries, see
Building & Maintaining Your Components and Libraries.
While the term 'managed components' simply means components that are stored within a Workspace, there are differences in functionality associated with these components, which is determined by your current Altium Designer Software Subscription.
With Altium Designer Standard Subscription for example, the managed components do not have lifecycle management or where-used functionality. In this respect, they could be thought of as a lighter form of components – not as strongly managed, but available from your Workspace all the same. Where there are differences between the Altium Designer Software Subscription options, in terms of features and functionality available to you through Altium 365, these will be noted below where relevant.
Accessing Your Components
Access your managed components through the Components page of the Workspace's browser interface. The page is comprised of three regions, as shown in the following image and listed thereafter.
Browse the managed components currently available within your Workspace from the Components page of the Workspace's browser interface. The Library Health region provides a summary of the components and their health.
- Library Health – this region of the page provides a summary of the health of your components, since last running a health check. Access is provided to the detailed Library Health dashboard page, from where you can run health checks and inspect component health issues in greater detail.
The summary becomes populated once an initial component health check is performed. This is performed automatically the first time the Components page is accessed.
- Components – when the page is first accessed this region presents a tiled array of the various component types, along with the total number of existing components of each type. From here you are able to drill down to see individual components and get detailed information about them.
- Supply Chain Data Sources – this region of the page lists the supply chain data sources that are used. If you have Altium Designer Standard Subscription, your data source is Octopart. If you have Altium Designer Pro or Enterprise Subscription, you also benefit from IHS Markit® Parts Intelligence and the ability to connect to your own internal company parts database. For more information on these sources, see altium.com/part-data-sources.
Access to IHS Markit® Parts Intelligence is fully automated. There's no setup, enablement, or configuration involved – just enhanced data through a monthly sync with the IHS Markit® Parts database. This data includes manufacturer lifecycles, part alternates, component parameters (technical) and datasheets.
For many organizations, component supplier data is (and must be) sourced from an internal company enterprise system that provides a proprietary set of parts supplier data – which might be based on a tightly approved range of vendors and/or special pricing structures.
This situation is catered for by the alternative Altium Custom Parts Provider, which when configured for synchronization through Altium Designer, allows the supplier data from a specified database source to be mapped to the Workspace supply chain data. This functionality requires Altium Designer 20.2 or later, and is not available with Altium Designer Standard Subscription. For more details, see Supply Chain Database to Workspace Data Synchronization.
Browsing Components
When first accessed, the Components page presents a summary of the components in the Workspace, by type. Clicking on a tile will present a flat listing of all components of that type. This listing can also be accessed by choosing a component type from the drop-down at the top-left of the page. The type of component category a particular component is listed under is determined by its Component Type parameter. This parameter is specified when creating or editing a component, or when components are imported into the Workspace. See Building & Maintaining Your Components and Libraries for more information.
Since the category a component is listed under is set by its Component Type parameter and not the folder it resides in, moving a component to a different folder – say, using the Explorer panel on the design side – will not affect its type category on the Components page.
► See the design client's Explorer panel and (the equivalent) Components panel for more information.
An example of browsing all diode-type components in a Workspace.
Click the
control at the far right of the header region to access a window in which to control which columns of data are displayed. All parametric data can be displayed in unique columns. Use the
Search field to quickly find the component you are after.
Selecting a component entry will present detailed information for it within the right-hand pane, as shown in the following image and listed thereafter:
Select a component entry to load detailed information for it in the right-hand pane.
- Component Name
- Description
- Item ID
- Revision State icon and Revision ID
- Stock Availability
- Median Price
- Manufacturer Lifecycle State color icon
- Parametric Data
- Models – symbol and footprint(s)
- Reference Documentation – datasheet(s), pinouts, etc.
- Part Choices with Lifecycle State color code
- Where-used Information – where the component is used (within a design project, or on a managed schematic sheet) with a link to the parent entity.
Accessing the Manufacturer Datasheet
For each component, you can quickly access its manufacturer datasheet (which opens on a separate browser tab). To do so, select the component of interest, click the control at its far right, then choose the Open Datasheet command from the associated menu.
Quickly access the manufacturer datasheet for the selected component, which opens on a separate browser tab.
The datasheet can also be accessed by clicking the Datasheet link in the References region of the right-hand pane.
Accessing the Component Page in Octopart
For each component, you can quickly access its page within the Octopart site (which opens on a separate browser tab). To do so, select the component of interest, click the control at its far right, then choose the Show in Octopart command from the associated menu.
Quickly access the page on the Octopart site for the selected component, which opens on a separate browser tab.
Deleting a Component
You can also delete a component (provided you have editing rights to the folder in which it resides). To do so, select the component in the list, click the control at its far right, then choose the Delete command from the associated menu. The Delete window will appear, in which to confirm the deletion. The action is actually a 'soft delete', whereby the component will be moved into the Trash area of the Workspace. You can also opt to delete the component's related items (e.g. symbol, footprint model(s), simulation model, datasheet). Note that these can only be deleted if they are not being used elsewhere (by one or more other components).
Delete a component directly from the Components page. This is a 'soft delete', with the component (and any related items as applicable and permitted) moved to the Trash.
To proceed with the deletion, click the button. The component will be removed from the main listing of components. A Deletion Summary window will confirm the successful deletion of the component. If any related items could not be deleted, this will be flagged to you.
All components deleted in this manner can be found on the Trash page of the interface. Note that you can only view components (and any other items for that matter) that you have personally soft deleted. Administrators will be able to see the full content of the Trash page – so all items that have been soft deleted.
Things to consider in relation to a soft deleted component:
- The component will not be available from your design software, or from within the Web interface.
- Anywhere the component was being used will reflect that the component has been deleted.
- A component can be restored or permanently deleted from the Trash page. Permanent deletion is only possible if it is not being used on a managed schematic sheet, or within a design.
Note that if you have soft deleted a component – moved it to the Trash – you can create a new component with that same name again. If you were to subsequently restore the original component and the original name is taken, an integer suffix will be used to keep its name unique within the Workspace.
Library Health Dashboard
The top region of the Components page – Library Health – presents a high-level summary of the overall health of your Workspace components.
The Library Health region of the Components page summarizes the health of the components stored in your Workspace.
The summary becomes populated once an initial component health check is performed. This is performed automatically the first time the Components page is accessed.
As well as a handy visual indicator of health, the following information is presented:
- Total number of components in your Workspace. This is the sum of healthy components plus those components that have an issue (fatal error or error).
- The number of components that are completely healthy.
- The number of components that have an issue. Bear in mind that a particular component may have more than one issue.
- The number of components that have been recently added to the Workspace – in terms of the volume of the latest batch of new components created. For example, if yesterday two components were created in the Workspace and then three more were created today, the number reflected on the dashboard will be 3.
- The number of requested components – as part of the Part Requests feature (note that the Part Requests feature is not available with Altium Designer Standard Subscription).
- The number of unused components – not used in a managed schematic sheet, or directly within a design.
The health indicator bar visually conveys to you the health of your components. It reflects healthy components (those with no issue detected) in green, along with those that have a warning (yellow) and those with an issue – either an error (orange) or a fatal error (red).
Accessing the Main Library Health Dashboard
Click the button to access the detailed Library Health dashboard page. The top of the page presents the same summary information found at the top of the main Components page of the interface. Below that are the health check analyses that are supported, gathered into various Issue Themes.
Accessing the detailed Library Health dashboard page – command central for analyzing issues in greater detail.
Enable the
Show and check used components only option, at the top-right of the dashboard, to only present health checking data for components that you are actually using in your designs (or managed schematic sheets). When the dashboard is refreshed – health checking is performed – all
unused components will be excluded from checking.
The following issue themes and health check analyses are currently supported in the Health Dashboard:
- No Defined Part Choices – a component fails this health check if it does not have at least one Part Choice defined and therefore has no link to a Manufacturer Part.
- Stock Issues* – a component fails this health check if it has a defined Part Choice that is not in stock.
- Risky Lifecycle States* – a component fails this health check if it has a Part Choice that is obsolete, not recommended for new designs (NRFND), or invalid. You may encounter challenges in purchasing and supplying your design components in these states.
* Not available with Altium Designer Standard Subscription.
Each health check analysis tile reflects the number of components failing that health check. Color coding reflects healthy/no issues (green), fatal error (red), error (orange), and warning (yellow).
Browsing a Health Check Analysis
Clicking on a health check analysis tile will provide a more detailed description of the check with steps to resolve (where available), as well as a detailed listing of all components failing that health check.
Inspecting components that are failing a specific health check – caught by that check's corresponding analysis.
Along with the listing's default data columns – Name, Description, etc – additional columns may be added through the control drop-down options at the far right of the header region. Select Show More in the window to enable the full list, and check a parameter name to add its data as a column in the main analysis list.
Selecting a component entry will present detailed information for it within the right-hand pane – the same as that presented when browsing components through the main Components page of the interface.
You can quickly access the component's page within the
Octopart site (which opens on a separate browser tab). To do so, select the component of interest, click the
control at its far right, then choose the
Show in Octopart command from the associated menu. Choose the
Open on Desktop command to view the component within Altium Designer's
Explorer panel. Altium Designer will be opened in order to do this (you'll be prompted if you want to open
X2.exe – Altium Designer's source executable). If Altium Designer is already running, that instance will be used.
In the dashboard's upper information list, click the number associated with unused components (Unused) to open a full list of those components and their details.
Select the unsued components number link to open a full list of those components.
Refreshing the Dashboard
The detailed Library Health dashboard page is the only place from where you can run another health check – refreshing the dashboard as it were. This can be performed at two levels:
- Comprehensive Dashboard Refresh – running an update across all issue themes and their associated health check analyses. This level of refresh is performed by clicking the button, at the top-right of the main Library Health dashboard page. During the refresh, the button will change to and the text will appear next to each of the supported issue themes.
Run a full health check update by performing a comprehensive dashboard refresh – involving all health check analyses across all issue themes.
- Partial Dashboard Refresh – running an update across all associated health check analyses in a particular issue theme. This level of refresh is performed from two places – by clicking the control next to the issue theme entry on the main Library Health dashboard page, or by clicking the button in the heading of the detailed page, when inspecting one of the health check analysis types in that issue theme.
Run a partial health check update – involving all health check analyses associated with a specific issue theme.
Excluding a Component from a Health Check Analysis
You can also exclude components from a health check analysis, on an individual basis. To do so, click on the tile for the required health check analysis, select the component to be excluded from this check, click the control at its far right, then enable the Exclude from analysis option on the associated menu.
A component Delete option is also available from the entry’s menu which will move that component, and optionally any related items, to the Workspace Trash – and therefore excluded it from the analysis. As this is a ‘soft’ delete action, the component can later be restored from the Trash or permanently deleted. See Deleting a Component above for more information.
You can exclude a component from a health check analysis, or remove (delete) it completely.