Things You Didn't Know About Virtuoso: Options? What Options?

Recently, I got involved in helping out a customer who had become frustrated using the "stretch" command in the Virtuoso Schematic Editor.  They were posing all kinds of detailed questions about the different options to the command. 

Options?  The stretch command has options?  You just grab the stuff you want to stretch, select the command, and then you...well, then you stretch.  Oh, wait a minute, I remember now.  Lots of Virtuoso interactive commands have an options form that is normally hidden, but can be brought up during the command with a function key.  Quickly rummaging around in my brain, I determined that it was the F3 key.  (Actually, I started the stretch command and then tried pressing the function keys, one at a time, until the form came up--F1 opens the manual, in case you were wondering).

For future reference, in IC 6.1, there is an icon on the "Create" toolbar (just to the right of the "Create Pin" icon) which brings up the options form.  Also, you can force the options form to come up automatically by clicking the "Options Displayed When Commands Start" box in the CIW->Options->User Preferences... form (but that can get kind of annoying after a while, IMHO).

At this point, I spent the better part of the afternoon in "what does this button do?" mode exploring all the different combinations of options, the end result of which is the video below (as well as a few enhancement suggestions to R&D as to how to make some of the options a bit more intuitive). 

I was truly amazed at how many little tidbits I learned in just exploring this one basic command.  Hopefully you will too.

If video fails to launch click here.

 Back to more new IC 6.1.4 features next time. 

As always, your tips, comments and feedback are welcomed!

Stacy Whiteman