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How to access user preferences via SKILL?

EvanShultz

I found article 20482607 in COS (https://support.cadence.com/apex/ArticleAttachmentPortal?id=a1O0V000009ET07UAG), titled "How to customize the User Preferences Editor with custom variables".

This seems to work fine and the customizations show up in the UI, but I haven't figured out how to access those new user prefs (or any user pref, for that matter) in my SKILL programs. axlDBGetDesign() doesn't seem to have any property that helps me and I don't get any hits with a bunch of search terms in algroskill.pdf. Nor does searching this forum or online help. They also aren't shown when running "set" in the Command window (though many user prefs aren't there so I'm not concerned).

Can anybody show me how to access user prefs, especially custom ones, via SKILL?

As a related aside, is there any way to set a default value for a custom user pref? With a checkbox the wording of the pref could be inverted to make unchecked the desired default state, but with a STRING or ENUM how can I set the default value?

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  • eDave

    Use axlGetVariable to read the value and use axlSetVariable (possibly in you allegro.ilinit file) to set the values.

  • eDave
    in reply to eDave

    or use the DEFAULT field to set the default value

  • EvanShultz
    in reply to eDave

    Thanks Dave! That works to get the user pref. Now I find I've done this before but I didn't know where to look earlier...

    So using the example from COS, along with your suggestion above, I might think editing one line to variable1:TYPE=STRING:DEFAULT=10:EFF_ONRESTART:\ would work. But I tried that and a few variations without success. What am I doing wrong? (Setting it in allegro.ilinit would surely work, and I could check for an existing value, but this seems even easier and doesn't have any startup time impact so I'd like to at least try it out.)

  • eDave
    in reply to EvanShultz

    I hadn't tried using a default value before now and I see the same lack of effect. Indeed I don't see the"defaults" button that's referenced in the user.prf document so I suspect this may be a legacy feature. I can see why it wouldn't work because the settings GUI is really just an interface to the variables.

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  • eDave
    in reply to EvanShultz

    I hadn't tried using a default value before now and I see the same lack of effect. Indeed I don't see the"defaults" button that's referenced in the user.prf document so I suspect this may be a legacy feature. I can see why it wouldn't work because the settings GUI is really just an interface to the variables.

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  • EvanShultz
    in reply to eDave

    Thanks for the confirmation.

    I assume there is some way to set a default value. Check out Display/Roam/roaminc. The help says the default is 96 pixels and "96" is in the textbox. Display/Align Guides/Ratsnest is checked by default and the help says "Setting will be On by default". I don't see any pulldowns with a default value but perhaps I'm just missing it. Anyway, a textbox value is what I'm looking for now.

    Will submit a case on COS to ask about this.

  • EvanShultz
    in reply to EvanShultz

    "$CDSROOT\share\pcb\configure\prfedit\display.prf" shows usage of DEFAULT which seems to work for the included prefs, but isn't working for me.

  • eDave
    in reply to EvanShultz

    Note that roam.prf doesn't contain a default for roaminc. It is set in the share\pcb\env file

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