Component Types Verses Folders

Summary:

In Altium 365, the component library is an essential place to store your electronic design data.  The library is organized in several ways.  The first way is through component types, or dynamic labels, wherein a component type is assigned to that component.  The second organizational method is via folders in the Explorer.  The Explorer is used to setup and organize items and set sharing rights.  

The video then moves into Altium Designer, and the Components Panel.  Users can filter by components within the Explorer.  A new component type is created in Preferences and is assigned to a default folder.  A new component is then created within this folder for a Standard Subscription. Then the video shows how to create a component template for a Pro Subscription, and then a capacitor component as well.  

Transcript:

00;00;00;00 - 00;00;27;09
Altium 365 is the place where you can store and manage your electronic design data and one essential part of your electronic design data is your component library. In Altium 365, we use three different ways to organize the component library. And the primary way, just a way that you see here is through these component types and these, the component types, can be considered as dynamic labels, like the ones that you might know from your email box.

00;00;27;11 - 00;00;57;22
And the component type can be assigned to a component without making a revision to that component. And the second way we use to organize data inside Altium 365 is through folders, and the folders are visible in the explorer. The explorer is more of a management interface that you use for setup and for organizing stuff. And here you can see folders for components, but also for the symbols, for footprints, or for templates, for projects for all kinds of stuff that's going on.

00;00;57;25 - 00;01;22;29
And you can use this to set sharing rights. Who has access to it? Who can make edits to items in this folder? Who can create new items, and that's what the explorer is for. And these are two different concepts at work, independent of each other. So let's switch to Altium Designer. And in Altium Designer you can see these component types in the components panel.

00;01;22;29 - 00;01;49;29
It's a panel that's optimized for your day to day work with components. Right, it shows you all the, component types. It has nice interactive filters which are currently empty as I don't have any components, and it's a quick and cached. Builder interface is also available, and it's called the explorer. Right in here you would see all the items if you're working with your templates, with your project templates, you would see them here.

00;01;49;29 - 00;02;15;16
But there's also folders for the components. But they don't have to be the same, right? You can have different component type names and folder names, although it could be convenient to have them to just keep them in sync. If you want to create a new component type, you can do so through the preferences. So if I go into Altium Designer Preferences, data management component types, I can see my component types that are currently in the workspace.

00;02;15;18 - 00;02;46;04
And as I am connected to a standard workspace or workspace with a standard subscription, I have this concept with default folder. So when I add a new component type, it could be that FPGA at the entry and hit apply. It writes the component type to the server and it automatically assigns it to a folder. So the folder is automatically created, but the FPGA type shows up.

00;02;46;06 - 00;02;59;05
And also in explorer I would have need to refresh and I have the FPGA folder. So when I choose to create a new component.

00;02;59;07 - 00;03;14;18
I got the type showing up FPGA, I can create it and I don't have to manually select a folder anymore. It's already set.

00;03;14;21 - 00;03;29;09
This applied to working with a Standard. So let's look at how this works with a Pro Workspace. So when I'm connecting to a workspace with Pro Subscription.

00;03;29;11 - 00;03;38;00
Then I have the concept of component templates.

00;03;38;08 - 00;03;56;22
I can create a component template in explorer. Here we can see managed content, and I can add an item which would be a

00;03;56;24 - 00;04;01;00
Component template.

00;04;01;03 - 00;04;10;26
It would be my first.

00;04;10;28 - 00;04;40;24
The component template, it controls the default folder. Right, if I create a component using this template, it will be a capacitor. It will use this naming scheme. I need to tie it in with capacitor type, and I can define the default parameters.

00;04;40;27 - 00;04;45;09
The capacitance.

00;04;45;12 - 00;05;17;06
Capacitance could be in farad and the maximum voltage could be in volts. All right, if I'm happy with this store this and this is what links my component type to the folder. So now when I create a new component in this workspace of the type capacitor where you can see the template is used.

00;05;17;08 - 00;05;36;29
I got my parameters coming in and I made my default linking because when I check this list. You can see that the default folder is also set. All right, and that's all I wanted to show here.