I recently received E-mail from ExpressPCB (EPCB) announcing that they have acquired the rights to the Copper Connection printed circuit board design software. Here's a copy of the most recent message I received:

At ExpressPCB our mission is to solve the software and manufacturing problem for low cost, quick turnaround prototyping. Future versions of Copper Connection with new manufacturing options and pricing will provide our customers expanded features over the current ExpressPCB Classic version, all for free! Combining Copper Connection with our world class PCB Manufacturing and Support will greatly enhance the experience. We expect to have the updated version for ExpressPCB ready for release within 60 days. Don’t worry. Your current version of Copper Connection up to 3.0.5875 will continue to function completely. If you lose your product key, contact us and we’ll be happy to give you a replacement key. As a welcome gift, everyone who purchased Copper Connection is eligible for a Free Lifetime ExpressPCB Engineer Membership upon request.

A feature of Copper Connection, and the reason I purchased the software, is its ability to convert the proprietary EPCB file format to industry-standard Gerber and Exelon equivalents. I have taken advantage of this feature several times to get boards made at better prices than available from EPCB. I suspect that the conversion feature will be removed from the EPCB "update" to Copper Connection, as that will reestablish EPCB's vendor lock-in that they have enjoyed with their proprietary software. For that reason, I plan to stick with my current version of Copper Connect. If you have the software I recommend you do likewise.

Incidentally, I visited the EPCB site looking for how to request the Free Lifetime ExpressPCB Engineer Membership they mention. I couldn't find it, but did find a link to purchase an individual membership for 99 USD per year.

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x86?  We ain't got no x86.  We don't NEED no stinking x86!

Send them an email. They will send you a coupon code to use, and you buy the subscription at a cost $0. Their emails states lifetime subscription, but there is only a yearly subscription available, so it will be interesting to see what happens in a year.

I also got Copper Connection after paying ExpressPCB the Gerber fee about 300 times over the last 15 years.

Will I be able to export Gerber file with a new key? My computer crashed.
If I can recover will sw still work?

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x86?  We ain't got no x86.  We don't NEED no stinking x86!

Not being able to export a Gerber from a PCB layout package? That is a really good reason to immediately chuck it and switch to something not insane. Perhaps some years ago there was a reason to lock yourself in with a proprietary PCB manufacturer, but today you can get sizeable 4-layer boards for a couple of bucks apiece - if you can send in Gerbers...

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In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice, there is. ...Jan van de Snepscheut

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x86?  We ain't got no x86.  We don't NEED no stinking x86!

Yes, I gathered that you can buy some proprietary software that you can use to convert another company's proprietary file format to something sensible. However that seems absurdly irrational to me. Especially for someone that will not go on Github

I suppose we all have our pet peeves: I spend an inordinate amount of time and effort to avoid Google (which is nearly impossible these days), and will never, ever touch Windows or Apple products (because of Jobsian ripoff philosophy). But I cannot imagine a scenario where I would voluntarily pay for a proprietary piece of software if there was a choice, especially proprietary software fixing terminal flaws of another proprietary package. No offense intended.

I've tried perhaps a dozen PCB design packages, including some very expensive ones, and found that they all suck about the same. Is EPCB particularly good - so good that you are willing to overlook its inability to do accomplish the ultimate goal of generating an industry-standard output file?

I am not being argumentative or trying start a fight. I am genuinely baffled.

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In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice, there is. ...Jan van de Snepscheut

I think it's just a historical fluke -- at least that applies in my case. Express PCB's software is quite easy to learn, and in fact it lets you start placing traces and doodling around without having entered a schematic. Because of that I became engaged immediately, doodling away and learning a menu or two; and, before I knew it, I was "off and running" on the learning curve! It was fun, right from the start. Now I'm reluctant to start over again and learn a different package.

So, yeah, I got hooked by their strategy. I actually admire their shrewdness in making engagement so easy & enjoyable. EPCB's prices (not to mention their extortionate shipping charges to Canada) don't bother me too much because I don't do a lot of boards, and so far it's usually been for a customer anyway, so I'm not the one who pays.

Back to the issue about being able to create a board without having entered a schematic. That's actually rather a sore point with me. Sometimes all I want is something simple, like a little breakout board to locate a tiny SMD chip on a .1" grid. With the EPCB software I can sketch that out instantly. But with KiCAD (for example, and last time I checked) I absolutely can do nothing at all until a schematic has been duly entered. NOT fun. Grrrr!

J.

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In 1988 my 65C02 got six new registers and 44 new full-speed instructions!
https://laughtonelectronics.com/Arcana/ ... mmary.html

No schematic is absolutely essential to me as well, especially for larger FPGA designs. Drawing a schematic of a couple of hundred IO lines? How is that useful? That is why I use gEDA PCB - an otherwise primitive and decrepit piece of software. However it shines when used with my workflow, and I am willing to put up with otherwise untenable defects and gaps, and a ridiculous learning curve (which I have to face over and over as I tend to take multi-year breaks between hardware projects)

gEDA allows me to just plop down footprints and draw traces. But more importantly, I can use hand-built partial netlist files to create airwires (AKA ratsnest). Other packages start with a pileup of airwires so dense that it is impossible to make any sense of them. With gEDA, I create a few separate netlist files (text files with one line per net, a readable listing of connections) which are great documentation, for debugging and for posterity.

I generally make a power netlist, an address bus netlist, a databus netlist, clock netlist, and a control signals netlist. I load a single netlist into airwires, and route it, moving onto the next one. I can also assign a distinct trace color for each group of signals - or keep them all the same color. When done, I can light up individual nets/traces to verify them against datasheets or see shorts.

I can make footprints that specify functional names of pins, such as IRQ or D7, then make a netlist that reads like English:
etc. Or use a pin-numbered footprint when that makes more sense. Footprints are just text files.

I am not aware of any other PCB layout package that allows me such flexibility where it counts.

Oh, and it is opensource and it writes Gerbers.

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In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice, there is. ...Jan van de Snepscheut

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http://WilsonMinesCo.com/ lots of 6502 resources
The "second front page" is http://wilsonminesco.com/links.html .
What's an additional VIA among friends, anyhow?

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x86?  We ain't got no x86.  We don't NEED no stinking x86!

No need to be defensive! I really do not want a fight. Your response answers my question completely.

As for Github, I was assuming you avoid it because of Microsoft, and desire to squash opensourced software and own your ass. Obviously people have different ideas of Satan.

There is a lot more to free/libre software than not paying for it. Proprietary software carries risks that I don't want to take on (unfixeable bugs, complete vendor lock-in, undocumented file formats, risk of vendor going out of business, etc) I've had many occasions to fix bugs in opensource tools I use. Many issues I've opened on Github and Gitlab are handled by authors within days if not hours. I've never had any luck with quick bug fixes by proprietary vendors.

I should give EPCB a try, just to see what the hubbub is all about. I find most software today largely unusuable, yet many people seem to get by without problems, so it is probably all me. If I had any balls I would sit down and write a decent PCB package. However, I doubt my idea of what's good would be acceptable to most engineers, and some of what I want is kind of hard to implement in a simple manner.

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In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice, there is. ...Jan van de Snepscheut

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http://WilsonMinesCo.com/ lots of 6502 resources
The "second front page" is http://wilsonminesco.com/links.html .
What's an additional VIA among friends, anyhow?

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x86?  We ain't got no x86.  We don't NEED no stinking x86!

I had it all wrong! I though it had to do with your convictions, not because of an annoyance. Well, good for you for being able to not give a sh**. I wish I could - my life would be a lot easier. I often feel I am the last hold-out.

However, recently someone on another thread posted a link to a file hosted on Github, and you (BDD) said you don't do github. There was no way to get lost. That is why I assumed you don't use Github on principle.

I find the search features of Github barely tolerable. There are topical lists and plenty of 'awesome' this or that aggregators... And I've found a lot of interesting stuff just poking about (when I find something good, I always look at the author's other repos, and I am rarely disappointed).

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In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice, there is. ...Jan van de Snepscheut