Pinnacle Technologies
John W. MacConnell
john.macconnell@ieee.org
(509) 921-8016

July 4, 2000

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Comments and suggestions:
     I welcome your comments and suggestions.  Please email
     them to me at the above listed email address.

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BUILDING A DATABASE:

Probably the most difficult part of a program such as this
is building and maintaining the database of parts.  What is
supplied here is just a start.

The database supplied with the demo is built from the
sub-databases supplied here.  Different sub-databases are
built and them combined into the final database.  It is
certainly possible to just generate a single large database.
For our operation, however, we felt building the main
database from smaller sub-databases was an easier and more
accurate way to maintain and update the main database.

The individual sub_databases are combined together by
repeatedly using the included program JOINFILE.EXE.  For
convenience, this is controlled through the included script
file 0MAKE_DB.BAT.  The contents of this file are shown
below.

     rem  0MAKE_DB.BAT
     rem  build the Database out of all its components

     erase demo.db

     rem  The second file entry is modified

     joinfile header.db, demo.db
     joinfile resistor.db, demo.db
     joinfile no_load.db, demo.db
     joinfile 0603cap.db, demo.db
     joinfile 0603ind.db, demo.db
     joinfile tantcap.db, demo.db
     joinfile semi.db, demo.db

Should you choose to adopt this method for generating your
database, the script file can be modified to suit your needs
with a text editor.

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CAPTURING DATA FROM THE WEB:

It is possible to capture data directly from the web.  This
was done from Digikey's web site for the 0603 capacitor
database (0603CAP.DB), and is much much easier, and more
accurate, than entering each value by hand.  The method used
was as follows:

1.   Download the desired pages of the catalog in PDF
     format.

2    Highlight the entire PDF file and copy it into the
     clipboard.

3.   Using a text editor, paste the clipboard into a new
     file, and save it as a text file.

     If more than one page of data is being brought it,
     repeat steps 1 through 3, repeatedly adding to the text
     file.  Once all of the pages are included, save the
     text file.

4.   Use the included program COLUMN.EXE to convert the text
     file from #3 above to a file with the data arranged in
     columns.  The file format is:

               COLUMN input_file, output_file

     The comma must be present between the file names.

5.   Import the file generated in #4 above into a
     spreadsheet.  The columns can then be manipulated into
     the order desired for the database.

6.   Save the spreadsheet as a comma separated value (CSV)
     file.  This file is in the correct format to be
     combined with the other database segments, as described
     above.

This may seem like a lot of motion to go through to get the
data, but it certainly is easier than just entering each
part by hand.

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If people begin to use this program, and generate databases
of parts, it would be helpful if they would post them on
this bulletin board for others to use.  Even if they are of
a different format, it is likely that they could be easily
modified for another's use by importing them into a
spreadsheet, as detailed above.

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