GERBERGRAB FREE FOR A LIMITED PERIOD!!
In order to promote GerberGrab, you can now request a completely free full license. Just download, install, and email your ID number, and a permanent license (keyed to your PC) will be returned.
Future versions of GerberGrab may need new licenses, but the current version has been stable for a year or more so will be very useful as a reverse engineering, checking and testing tool. Some of the features of GerberGrab are only available in high-end CAD tools costing thousands.
GerberGrab is a PC software tool which offers a number of utilities to assist with the PCB data preparation and verification process. The main features are:
-extraction of component position and orientation information from a gerber file.
-matching a gerber file with a bills of material (BOM) to combine the component shape positions and rotations into the BOM.
-verifying a Gerber file or placement list against a real (scanned or other) image of a PCB
These features are highly valuable for anyone in the PCB manufacturing industry, particularly for contract manufacturers, who may need to check or create bills of material, build documentation, or placement lists, rapidly, off-line and with a high degree of automation.
You can experience the capabilities of GerberGrab by investing only a few minutes of your time. You can download the application, and convert a sample file with the help of a tutorial, in just a few minutes!
Main Features of GerberGrab
-Gerber / HPGL2 import / viewing
-Shape learning to library file
-Shape search in Gerber Files
-Finding component references and outlines from the shapes
-Options for output scaling and rotation
-Output component list csv file generation
-User attributes for shapes and component stored in the library, with selectable highlighting
-BOM importing
-Background image importing with alignment adjust
-Component list or BOM overlay
-Manual component learning, can be from image only without gerber
-multilayer, multicolour file importer / browser
-automatic import file type detection
-HPGL import, with support for HPGL2 labels. These are passed directly into the BOM list, and can be merged with other imported BOM information.
-HPGL export, BOM information can be exported in HPGL2 label format, for intelligent document processing
-decoding of 274x scaling and embedded pad shape information
-searching from a BOM back into a Gerber or HPGL to find the component position
-create bom from schematics