gerber to .doc format

Looks like you can convert from Gerber to TIFF or BMP. If you need to change image format (like BMP to GIF) and/or size, use NCONVERT.

Mark

Print to PDF If you can. Than use:

There are other converters

Regards,

Boris Mohar

Got Knock? - see: Viatrack Printed Circuit Designs (among other things)

void _-void-_ in the obvious place

How do I easily get a gerber (or HPGL) plot into word?

I am away from the office and have no Viewmate to hand - are there any freebies to download to do the task?

Must be finished by monday.

Help.

Ta

"R.Lewis" wrote

gerb2tif. Open-source, free (GPL), command-line utility.

Claims to be "beta", but has worked well for me.

well if your a programmer here you go.

Download GC-Prevue, import the Gerbers, save the screen to the Clipboard and edit with Paint or whatever, then save as a bitmap.

Leon

The primary (perhaps only) difference between 274D and 274X is that the X version includes the aperture data, while the older D format required a separate aperture file. I would expect that most board shops can still handle the separate aperture file.

It should be a fairly simple matter to write a perl script to merge the aperture data into a gerber file.

--
Peter Bennett, VE7CEI  
peterbb4 (at) interchange.ubc.ca  
new newsgroup users info : http://vancouver-webpages.com/nnq
GPS and NMEA info: http://vancouver-webpages.com/peter
Vancouver Power Squadron: http://vancouver.powersquadron.ca

Thanks to all for the suggestions. I isn't going to be finished by monay so the immediate problem disappears. For the record though I would like to know if there is any freebie 274D to

274X conversions available to liven up some old designs rather than running them thro' Viewmate et al back at the shop.

Aperture files come in many formats - I expect that originally there was no need for them to be machine-readable. The original Gerber photoplotters apparently used something resembling a slide projector as the print head. An operator would read the customer's aperture file, and load appropriate "slides" in the slide projector. To avoid extra costs and delays, the customer had to select apertures that the plotting company had in stock. (and the plotters could only handle 12 or 24 apertures, if I recall correctly.)

Nowdays, the plotters and associated software can generate any aperture desired on the fly.

To produce the necessary D->X translation software, you'd have to look at your aperture files, and at the aperture section of a 274X file, and determine how to convert one to the other.

--
Peter Bennett, VE7CEI  
peterbb4 (at) interchange.ubc.ca  
new newsgroup users info : http://vancouver-webpages.com/nnq
GPS and NMEA info: http://vancouver-webpages.com/peter
Vancouver Power Squadron: http://vancouver.powersquadron.ca

disappears.

to

running

Indeed you are correct in that I have never encountered anywhere that could not handle both D & X gerbers.

What would need to be done to put the apertures into the -D ? The -D & -X gerbers are both ASCII files - surely it is not just cutting and pasting the apertures into the -D: things are *never* that straightforward.. (As we move inexorably toward ODB++ and IDF formats my old 274-D's will eventually be obsolete)