Annotating Ref Des in schematic yet not impacting Layout parts

You could set the Auto Rename flag in the PCB Editor Configuration Manage to allow changes to only those parts you want to update. Then you can specify how you want the parts renamed before you run the auto rename function. After running that then back annotate those changes into Capture. You may have to do this several times if you schematic is several pages........

Save your board and schematic to new files (or backup your existing files first......) Then generate a new netlist and load it into the board before trying the renaming. Doing this will link the two files together and will allow the back annotate to function properly.

Have Fun!

Thanks for the comments here. Very much appreciated.

To confuse things further with detail ... what we actually want to do is add a new sheet in the middle of an existing schematic with new circuitry and keep to the naming convention. Then not rip up any existing circuits when we move to layout.

In a 3 sheet schematic we want to add a new sheet 2 and make the previous sheet 2 now sheet 3 and the previous sheet 3 now sheet 4.

So … existing 200 - 299 ref des will move to 300 - 399 and the existing 300 - 399 to 400 - 499 so I can use the 200 - 299 for the new circuit on sheet 2.

Any way I look at this I can’t seem to keep the layout untouched.

You have to rename ALSO on allegro side the components before read the new schematic.

If R200 becomes R300 in schematic, rename in allgro R200 to R300.

Tip: if R300 already exist in allegro, it will be automatically renamed to someting else in order to not have twice R300 which is impossible from allegro's point of view. Doing this, if it remame it, say, R888; you can not know that R888 have to be renamed to R400. So start rename first FROM the higher refdes (exemple: if higher is actually R887, rename it R987) TO the lower one to avoid it.

Of course, have a copy of your boad before starting: a wrong manual change can occure...

You have to rename ALSO on allegro side the components before read the new schematic.

If R200 becomes R300 in schematic, rename in allgro R200 to R300.

Tip: if R300 already exist in allegro, it will be automatically renamed to someting else in order to not have twice R300 which is impossible from allegro's point of view. Doing this, if it remame it, say, R888; you can not know that R888 have to be renamed to R400. So start rename first FROM the higher refdes (exemple: if higher is actually R887, rename it R987) TO the lower one to avoid it.

Of course, have a copy of your boad before starting: a wrong manual change can occure...

This is what I was thinking we needed to do and I appreciate the tip.

I was hoping there may be a feature I was missing but renaming before net listing is the only way and it makes sense.

Thanks

Kevin

I haven't used reftxt in a while, but if you can get a wasis out of your schematic tool you could rename refdes' in allegro with a text file

At a dos prompt type reftxt and follow prompts.