Changes

# A collection of Gerber files (and a text file) to send to Bay Area Circuits (or another PCB manufacturer)

# A collection of Gerber files (and a text file) to send to Bay Area Circuits (or another PCB manufacturer)

# A smaller collection of Gerber files to send to OSHStencils

# A smaller collection of Gerber files to send to OSHStencils

# An Excel spreadsheet to upload to Digikey (or manually order from other vendors)

# An Excel spreadsheet (called a Bill of Materials, or BoM) to upload to Digikey (or manually order from other vendors)

Luckily, we have a system for producing all of the above! Enter the '''outjob'''.

Luckily, we have a system for producing all of the above! Enter the '''outjob'''.

Master copies of the outjobs are in the SVN at {{svn-repo|altium-core/libraries/outjobs}}. Outjobs are also automatically included in the PCB project templates at {{svn-repo|altium-core/libraries/templates}}. If you didn't start from a project template (doing so next time will make your life easier), '''make a copy''' of the outjob you want to use and paste it into your project folder. Making a copy is important so that your project doesn't break on other people's computers or as people update the master copies of the outjobs (which your board may not be properly configured for). '''Make sure to pick the outjob that correspond's with your board's layer count. SSI.OutJob is for 2-layer boards, and SSI-4-LAYER.OutJob is for 4-layer boards. Picking the wrong outjob may result in your board coming back without the inner layers it should have or with two extra inner layers.''' Once you've copied the outjob, in the Projects pane in Altium, right click your project and select "Add Existing to Project" and in the window that comes up, select your copy of the outjob. You should now see a "Settings" folder under your project in the Projects pane with an "Output Jobs" folder within it (see right).

Master copies of the outjobs are in the SVN at {{svn-repo|altium-core/libraries/outjobs}}. Outjobs are also automatically included in the PCB project templates at {{svn-repo|altium-core/libraries/templates}}. If you didn't start from a project template (doing so next time will make your life easier), '''make a copy''' of the outjob you want to use and paste it into your project folder. Making a copy is important so that your project doesn't break on other people's computers or as people update the master copies of the outjobs (which your board may not be properly configured for). '''Make sure to pick the outjob that correspond's with your board's layer count. SSI.OutJob is for 2-layer boards, and SSI-4-LAYER.OutJob is for 4-layer boards. Picking the wrong outjob may result in your board coming back without the inner layers it should have or with two extra inner layers.''' Once you've copied the outjob, in the Projects pane in Altium, right click your project and select "Add Existing to Project" and in the window that comes up, select your copy of the outjob. You should now see a "Settings" folder under your project in the Projects pane with an "Output Jobs" folder within it (see right).

Once you have the outjob in your project and are ready to export files, open the outjob by double-clicking on it from the Projects pane.

Once you have the outjob in your project and are ready to export files, open the outjob by double-clicking on it from the Projects pane. This will produce a screen like the first one below:

 

 

 

If you're in a hurry (BoM generation takes about 75% of the output file generation time) or for some other reason just want to generate Gerber and drill files and not an Excel BoM, you can disable BoM generation by clicking the little numbered circle in the Bill of Materials row. Your screen will look like the second image in the above slideshow with BoM generation disabled. To reenable BoM generation, just click the circle again.