Online Design Boosts Analog Engineer Productivity

MICROCHIP
All of these tools invite you to jump in and see what happens. If you make an entry that doesn’t conform to good design practices, they may even warn you and suggest an alternative. Microchip’s MINDI is different in several ways.

Like Linear Technology’s tools, it runs on your machine rather than in a browser window. But that’s not the big difference. Smart users approach MINDI with its manual in their hands. The reward for this is greater design versatility for experienced engineers and greater depth of explanation for novices.

To get the feel of the tool, download the documentation from the Microchip site at www.microchip.com/stellent/idcplg?IdcService=SS_GET_PAGE&nodeId=2534&pageId=64&redirects=mindi. Each of its three manuals is a 2- to 4-Mbyte Adobe file. They’re comprehensive enough for basic instruction for sophomore EE candidates, making them great just to refresh your memory. But depending on how familiar you are with the material, you’ll probably want to print out selected pages and put them in a binder.

Downloading and installing the actual software on a Windows XP machine is quick. Launching the program starts a command shell. If you experiment, you can find demonstrations. MINDI provides more flexibility than the other tools discussed here, including actual schematic capture and more extensive simulation. I could have played with MINDI’s capabilities for several days, if I didn’t have deadlines for this story.

It’s always rewarding to produce a design from the sweat of one’s brow and an intuitive understanding of fundamentals. But sometimes design time is short and it’s been a long time since you’ve thought about those fundamentals. When the chips are down, it’s handy to be able to access the experience of engineers who live and breathe particular application areas. And most importantly, it’s wise to know what’s out there.