Coordinate

Modified by Susan Riege on Aug 21, 2018

Summary

A coordinate is a group design object. It is used to mark the X (horizontal) and Y (vertical) distance of a point in the design workspace relative to the current origin. Coordinates can be placed on any layer.

Availability

Coordinates are only available for placement in the PCB Editor by clicking Home | Place | from the main menus.

Placement

After launching the command, the cursor will change to a cross-hair and you will enter coordinate placement mode. A coordinate will appear "floating" on the cursor:

Position the cursor then click or press Enter to place a coordinate.
Continue placing further coordinates, or right-click or press Esc to exit placement mode.

Additional actions that can be performed during placement are:

Press the L key to flip the coordinate to the other side of the board.
Press the + and - keys (on the numeric keypad) to cycle forward and backward through all visible layers in the design, respectively, to change placement layer quickly.
Press the Tab key to access an associated properties dialog, from where properties for the coordinate can be changed on-the-fly.

While attributes can be modified during placement (Tab to bring up associated properties dialog), keep in mind that these will become the default settings for further placement.

Graphical Editing

This method of editing allows you to select a placed coordinate object directly in the workspace and change its location graphically. The size and shape of a coordinate object cannot be changed graphically. As such, editing handles are not available when the coordinate object is selected:

A selected Coordinate

Click anywhere on the coordinate and drag to reposition it. The position values are automatically updated as the coordinate is moved.

An object that has its Locked property enabled cannot be selected or graphically edited. Double-click on the locked object directly then disable the Locked property to graphically edit the object.

Non-Graphical Editing

The following methods of non-graphical editing are available:

Editing via an Associated Properties Dialog

Dialog page: Coordinate

This method of editing uses the following dialog to modify the properties of a coordinate object.

The Coordinate dialog

The Coordinate dialog can be accessed during placement by pressing the Tab key.

After placement, the dialog can be accessed in one of the following ways:

Double-click on the placed coordinate object.
Place the cursor over the coordinate object, right-click then choose Properties from the context menu.

Quickly change the units of measurement currently used in the dialog between metric (mm) and imperial (mil) using the Ctrl+Q shortcut. This affects the dialog only and does not change the actual measurement unit employed for the board as determined by the and buttons in the Home | Grids and Units area of the main menus.

Editing via an Inspector Panel

Panel pages: PCB Inspector, PCBLIB Inspector

An Inspector panel enables you to interrogate and edit the properties of one or more design objects in the active document. Used in conjunction with appropriate filtering, the panel can be used to make changes to multiple objects of the same kind, from one convenient location.

Notes

The current origin can be set to be any point in the PCB workspace by selecting Home | Grids and Units | » Set then clicking on the location for the new origin. To set the current origin back to the absolute origin ((0,0), in the lower-left corner of the workspace), select Home | Grids and Units | » Reset.

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