timing diagram software

Certainly less daft then trying to use Excel borders and Wingdings font. :)

I've typed timing diagrams into software comments before. ASCII can be pretty expressive. Hard to do is to show arrows indicating cause and effect which sometimes is used. Harder yet is making changes. Text editors aren't very good for this.

I remember a guy in one of these groups some years back who was working on a stand alone timing diagram tool. He initially made it free, but I think he eventually had some small price on it. Can't recall any info that would help find it.

I think the guy started out thinking it was not a hard problem but kept finding that each level of added feature had an added level of difficulty in adding it.

What about the FPGA tools? Can't you use the stimulus input as a quick timing diagram?

Cheers

I don't have time to learn the FPGA tools.

Maybe I'll just draw it on vellum.

John Larkin wrote on 12/1/2017 10:39 PM:

I thought you learned enough VHDL to write code? You can describe the waveforms in VHDL easily, parametrically even and view them by running the simulation. The simulators I use don't provide exactly the same sort of drawings as are often used for timing diagrams. For example, the transitions in timing diagrams usually show a rise time rather than an abrupt edge, simulations don't. Timing diagrams usually show a range of time for a transition by multiple rising/falling edges during the time window, simulations show a single transition.

In other words, a simulation display is not really a great timing diagram as they are usually drawn.

Worth a look:

there is a free aviable Font called xwave.ttf

we do a lot of timingsdiagramms with this font

- Michael Wieser

I expect you could implement timing diagrams in Excel by devious use of charting X-Y graphs but it would be a real PITA for complex ones.

I found a really annoying aspect ration bug in Excel recently (apparently well known enough but never been fixed). Word is OK on this.

Shapes/pictures are only displayed correctly if you use a handful of of fixed width fonts otherwise everything gets squished by ~10% kerning.

Really annoying if you want to make equilateral triangles or circles.

Something like visio might be better than vellum.

George H.

On Saturday, December 2, 2017 at 6:41:40 AM UTC-5, Martin Brown wrote: ...

...

Another useful Excel add-in, if only for the high-resolution export feature:

I usually use Freelance 4.0 for DOS.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

I don't know Freelance. I've got to run a VM (windows 95) to use old DOS programs. That always scares me.

I might alternately use a CAD program, which is the other way I know to put lines and text on a page/screen.

George H.

On Fri, 01 Dec 2017 16:20:07 -0800, John Larkin wrote:

The LT Spice thing is a different way to look at timing diagrams. It becomes a cartoon simulation of the actual board, just enough to make the waveform diagrams. But I can use parts, like pulse generators and delay lines and maybe some logic gates, to help make the waveforms. It's an after-the-fact simulation with many of the timings derived from measuring a working board. Not necessarily useful for design but good long-term documentation.

One nice thing is that I could have 50 nodes available for plotting, any number selected and stacked the way some interested person wants to see them. Spice has live cursor readout and delta-t display, so they can measure any timing relationship they like.

And it's free, and everyone already knows how to use it.

Version 4 SHEET 1 1908 680 WIRE 800 128 752 128 WIRE 832 128 800 128 WIRE 1008 128 960 128 WIRE 1040 128 1008 128 WIRE 1200 128 1152 128 WIRE 1232 128 1200 128 WIRE 1392 128 1344 128 WIRE 1424 128 1392 128 WIRE 1584 128 1536 128 WIRE 1616 128 1584 128 WIRE 1824 128 1712 128 WIRE 1856 128 1824 128 WIRE 1888 128 1856 128 WIRE 32 192 0 192 WIRE 48 192 32 192 WIRE 368 192 336 192 WIRE 384 192 368 192 WIRE 752 192 752 128 WIRE 752 192 656 192 WIRE 816 192 752 192 WIRE 960 192 960 128 WIRE 960 192 912 192 WIRE 1008 192 960 192 WIRE 1152 192 1152 128 WIRE 1152 192 1104 192 WIRE 1200 192 1152 192 WIRE 1344 192 1344 128 WIRE 1344 192 1296 192 WIRE 1392 192 1344 192 WIRE 1536 192 1536 128 WIRE 1536 192 1488 192 WIRE 1584 192 1536 192 WIRE 1712 192 1712 128 WIRE 1712 192 1680 192 WIRE 1824 192 1824 128 WIRE 816 224 752 224 WIRE 960 224 912 224 WIRE 1008 224 960 224 WIRE 1152 224 1104 224 WIRE 1200 224 1152 224 WIRE 1344 224 1296 224 WIRE 1392 224 1344 224 WIRE 1536 224 1488 224 WIRE 1584 224 1536 224 WIRE 1712 224 1680 224 WIRE 0 240 0 192 WIRE 336 240 336 192 WIRE 656 240 656 192 WIRE 656 336 656 320 WIRE 752 336 752 224 WIRE 752 336 656 336 WIRE 960 336 960 224 WIRE 960 336 752 336 WIRE 1152 336 1152 224 WIRE 1152 336 960 336 WIRE 1344 336 1344 224 WIRE 1344 336 1152 336 WIRE 1536 336 1536 224 WIRE 1536 336 1344 336 WIRE 1712 336 1712 224 WIRE 1712 336 1536 336 WIRE 1824 336 1824 272 WIRE 1824 336 1712 336 WIRE 0 368 0 320 WIRE 336 368 336 320 WIRE 656 368 656 336 FLAG 0 368 0 FLAG 32 192 EN FLAG 336 368 0 FLAG 368 192 OG FLAG 656 368 0 FLAG 800 128 BK FLAG 1856 128 RX FLAG 1008 128 R1 FLAG 1200 128 R2 FLAG 1392 128 R3 FLAG 1584 128 R4 SYMBOL voltage 0 224 R0 WINDOW 0 -46 112 Left 2 WINDOW 3 -130 188 Left 2 WINDOW 123 0 0 Left 2 WINDOW 39 0 0 Left 2 SYMATTR InstName V1 SYMATTR Value PULSE(0 0.75 0 1n 1n 90n) SYMBOL voltage 336 224 R0 WINDOW 0 -59 110 Left 2 WINDOW 3 -115 188 Left 2 WINDOW 123 0 0 Left 2 WINDOW 39 0 0 Left 2 SYMATTR InstName V2 SYMATTR Value PULSE(1 1.75 5.6n 1n 1n 90n) SYMBOL voltage 656 224 R0 WINDOW 0 -69 108 Left 2 WINDOW 3 -75 188 Left 2 WINDOW 123 0 0 Left 2 WINDOW 39 0 0 Left 2 SYMATTR InstName V3 SYMATTR Value PULSE(2 2.75 8n 1n 1n 2.5n 7n 12) SYMBOL tline 864 208 R0 SYMATTR InstName T1 SYMATTR Value Td=700p Z0=50 SYMBOL tline 1056 208 R0 SYMATTR InstName T2 SYMATTR Value Td=260p Z0=50 SYMBOL tline 1248 208 R0 SYMATTR InstName T3 SYMATTR Value Td=260p Z0=50 SYMBOL tline 1440 208 R0 SYMATTR InstName T4 SYMATTR Value Td=260p Z0=50 SYMBOL tline 1632 208 R0 SYMATTR InstName T5 SYMATTR Value Td=260p Z0=50 SYMBOL res 1808 176 R0 WINDOW 0 63 43 Left 2 WINDOW 3 64 72 Left 2 SYMATTR InstName R1 SYMATTR Value 50 TEXT 1128 408 Left 2 !.tran 100n TEXT 1440 400 Left 2 ;K9 TIMING TEXT 1416 440 Left 2 ;JL Dec 2, 2017

I use Visio for simple block diagrams, to go in Word docs, but I think it would be a major pain to use for a complex timing diagram. See my other post about using LT Spice.

I do like to draw on d-size vellum with a good pencil.

You guys mentioned Visio and I did a quick search... Theres an add on called 'Easy Timing', just what you want.

Don't as me about compatibility or how well it works, but most of the time Visio add on's are straight forward and some times not.

Cheers

Scratch that. Better luck with

Cheers

Martin Riddle wrote on 12/2/2017 2:26 PM:

I think that is the guy who posted in some of the newsgroups maybe 10 years ago. I see he has a Google group to provide support. I recall tracking him down and his site indicated they would start charging a nominal fee once it reaches version 1.0... after some years it still isn't 1.0, lol. But it seems to be usable.

John Larkin wrote on 12/2/2017 1:19 PM:

I use LT spice because it is free and functional, not because it has a good UI or because it is flexible and easy to use. Heck, I don't use it often and have to go back to learning mode every time I want to work with it. Some aspects are so cryptic I have to spend more time learning the tool... again... than I do designing the circuit usually. So picking it up to do timing diagrams is a bit of a stretch for me.

And yet they still seem to keep coming back. SVG is pretty pervasive these days (chances are, any diagram you run into on Wikipedia is SVG), and it's nothing but plaintext. XML (SVG is basically XML anyway), JSON and more dominate the internet, and are all plaintext based. Seems so ancient... ;-)

Now, SVG /editors/ with handy interfaces and higher level macros, that's where you want to be...

Tim