Working with Renesas 365 Solutions

Altium Designer, when connected to a Renesas 365 Workspace, allows you to open your Renesas 365 solutions to explore hardware (PCB) projects linked to them and pull changes from the solution's System Data Model (SDM).

To learn more about Renesas 365 and working with solutions from within its browser-based interface, refer to the Renesas 365 page.

Opening a Solution

Before opening a Renesas 365 solution, make sure that you are connected to your Renesas 365 Workspace from Altium Designer. The process of connecting to a Renesas 365 Workspace is similar to that for connecting to a Workspace hosted on Altium Platform (learn more).

Opening a solution from your connection Renesas 365 Workspace is performed directly using the Open Solution dialog accessed by selecting the File » Open Solution command from the main menus. Alternatively, right-click the Workspace entry in the Projects panel or click the  control at its far right and select the Open Solution command. The Open Solution dialog provides a single location to search for, browse, and open solutions. The dialog presents a list of solutions available in the connected Renesas 365 Workspace (by their names).

When the  icon at the top right of the dialog is clicked, the right-hand side of the dialog displays additional details about the selected solution, including its description and a collapsible list of hardware projects linked to it.

Use the Search field at the top of the Open Solution dialog to filter the list of solutions by their names by entering alpha/numeric characters. Click the  icon at the right of the Search bar to remove the currently defined search string.

To open a required solution, select it in the list and click the  button at the bottom right of the dialog. Once opened, the solution will appear under an entry for the Workspace, in the Projects panel. Hardware projects linked to the solution will be appear under the entry of the solution. You can expand and collapse the solution structure in the Projects panel to expose and hide its linked hardware projects and their constituent documents.

Pulling SDM into a Hardware Project

To keep a hardware project synchronized with changes made in other aspects of the solution (for example, the solution's ESD document), Altium Designer provides the ability to pull the solution's SDM into the project.

When the project's schematic document (*.SchDoc) is the active document, use the Design » Pull from Solution command from the main menus. Altium Designer will compare the data between the solution and the project, and in case of detected differences, the Engineering Change Order dialog listing the corresponding set of Engineering Change Orders (ECOs).

By default, all changes are enabled in the dialog. Disable any changes you wish to hold off for now. Use checkboxes in the Enable column to enable/disable specific changes. Alternatively, right-click anywhere in the list and select Enable All or Disable All command to enable or disable, respectively, all changes in the list.

The following changes are supported for synchronization:

• Addition and removal of a hardware component – this change allows adding or removing association of a component placed in the hardware project with a hardware component placed in the solution's ESD document. By default, a hardware project component is selected in the Engineering Change Order dialog automatically based on a match between the ESD's hardware component text and the hardware project's component Comment field value, but you can select another component in the hardware project using the drop-down in the Associated Object column for the change's entry in the dialog ().

• Addition and removal of a pin function – this change allows adding or removing a pin function to/from a pin of a hardware project component according to the device configuration of the corresponding hardware component in the solution's ESD document. The applied pin function will automatically be enabled for the pin, and its default name will be disabled. Click the displayed pin name in the design space to the open a pop-up with available functions ().

  For more information about working with multi-functional pins, refer to the Working with Placed Components page.

When you are satisfied with the changes to be performed, click the  button to execute the ECO and effect the valid changes contained therein. Execution results will appear in the State and Message columns dialog.