New DipTrace PCB Tutorial

The good news:
Recently the DipTrace PCB Design Software group has created their first of (hopefully) many tutorials.

This far, I have struggled with just written complex documentation or mute tutorials for my learning process. This new tutorial is easy to follow, with voice over, and the ability to expand to full screen makes for easy viewing. See:

http://www.diptrace.com/tour/

I have been using DipTrace for several years, all of my projects contained within this blog have be created with DipTrace, with this new tutorial, I found several new things that will make my PCB Design Projects much easier.

Now the bad news:
I like DipTrace, but because the software appeared to have stalled in development, I have lately been looking for other software packages that may promise better use. But, yet nothing I have found works as well for my Projects ( details are a long list ).

There are still a few things that I think DipTrace needs to address in future releases, all of which I have provided feedback to the software design group:

1. Better Library Management, Access and Browsing
2. Easier Selection of items from the Design area - you must click on the unseen boarder of a object to move or modify (for example a VIA)
3. Clicking on the Copper Pour is problematic (again you can only select it via its boarder).
4. Automatic Mode Switching while routine always seems to get my intentions wrong.
5. Move to modern practices, include interactive 3D output within PCB layout.
6. Provide Hot key Management and Scripting.

I am looking forward to any New DipTrace PCB Software Updates ( but, will continue to explore others).

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UPDATE:
My difficulty with selecting/picking parts within the design window may be because of timing and the method used, the Tutorial implies that "hover" on a desired pick point changes modes as necessary for most tasks - I may have not been waiting long enough to effect the "hover" mode change! I will be working on this idea!

I am continually amazed of the effectiveness of watching someone for 10 minutes doing something vs hours of reading the manual - technique are best communicated via observation, details are best communicated via reading the manual.

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