Lesson 7: Annotating

OrCAD Capture 22.1 Walk-Through Lesson 7: Annotating

This walk-through demonstrates how you can annotate your design in OrCAD Capture 22.1 (2022). After you complete the topic, you will be able to:

Edit reference designator text
Automatically update schematic annotation
Understand the differences between unconditional reference and incremental reference updates

To follow along, continue with the design from the last topic or use the provided design files. If the design files were not downloaded in the beginning of the Capture Walk-Through, the design files for this lesson can be found under the Materials tab.

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Running an Unconditional Update

Note: The design was automatically annotated when parts were placed. The order in which parts are numbered was determined by the order in which they were placed. For educational purposes, this walk-through will discuss additional options for annotating a design.

Step 1: Select Tools > Annotate from the menu.

Step 2: Under Action, select Unconditional Reference Update.

Note: There are multiple options to annotate a selection or your entire design:

Select Incremental reference update to annotate only components with question marks in the name.
Select the Unconditional reference update to re-annotates all components. Use this option if specific names are not required for components.
Select Reset part references to “?” to reset all reference designators to question marks.

Configuring an Unconditional Reference Update

Step 3: Under Mode, select Update Instances.

Note: Update Occurrences is recommended for hierarchical designs. Updating instances will update all parts in the design, even parts on unused pages. In other words, unused parts will factor into the annotations.

Step 4: Click OK to run the annotation.

Step 5: You may be prompted that running annotation will clear the undo/redo cache. Click Yes to proceed.

Step 6: You will be prompted that the tool will annotate then save the design. Click OK to proceed.