Detailed Information on Installing the Electric VLSI System

Return to the Electric VLSI page at CMOSedu.com (for the quick install)

See clearing registry at the bottom of the page, increasing memory limits, etc. in addition to installation instructions for Electric, IRSIM, and SPICE.

Installation (for Windows, see bottom of page for detailed Linux/Unix installation)

  1. Ensure Java is installed on your computer by going to Java.com
  2. Create a directory C:\Electric
  3. Download the electric (binary release) jar file into this directory
  4. Ensure the file extension is *.jar since Windows may try to change the download to *.zip
  5. Double clicking on the jar file starts Electric

·         Examples are found in (open these libraries after you start Electric, right click to “Save As”): opamp.jelib and ee5410.jelib (save C5_models.txt to same directory for SPICE simulations).

·         Hundreds of examples are found on the CMOS books' webpages!

 

Setting up an Icon (optional)

  1. Right click on the desktop and select New -> Shortcut
  2. In the type location of item field (assuming the binary version 8.11) enter

 

C:\Electric\electricBinary-8.11.jar -sdi

 

  1. After selecting a name for the Icon (e.g., Electric CAD) and clicking on “Finish” a generic Icon should appear on the desktop
  2. Next, save Electric’s Icon (right click on the link and select Save Target As) in C:\Electric
  3. Right click on the desktop generic icon and select Properties.

·           Set the Start-In directory as C:\Electric (this is where the log file is stored)

·         “Change Icon” to the Icon downloaded in step 9

 

  1. Doubling clicking on the desktop Icon starts Electric.

·         Examples are found in (open these libraries after you start Electric, right click to “Save As”): opamp.jelib and ece5410.jelib (save C5_models.txt to same directory for SPICE simulations).

·         Hundreds of examples are found on the CMOS books' webpages!

 

Installing IRSIM (optional)

  1. Download the IRSIM (binary) jar file into C:\Electric (again ensure that Windows doesn’t change the extension to *.zip)
  2. In step 7 above now enter (assuming that Java was installed in C:\WINDOWS\system32\, but it may be in C:\Program Files\Java, C:\Program Files\Java\<JAVA VERSION>\bin or even "Program Files (x86)" on some systems)

 

C:\WINDOWS\system32\java.exe -classpath "C:\Electric\electricBinary-8.11.jar;C:\Electric\electricIRSIM-8.11.jar" com.sun.electric.Launcher

 

Using SPICE (optional)

  1. See: HSPICE or LTspice for SPICE information.

 

Increasing the Memory limit of the Java Virtual Machine (JVM) for larger designs and to ensure only one window is open when running Electric (optional)

  1. To increase Electric’s available memory (default is 64 MB) go to File -> Preferences -> General -> General and increase the maximum memory size as seen below. Note that if you are using the waveform viewer in Electric and not increasing the maximum memory it will be easy to run out of memory when reading a SPICE raw file and get an “Exception Caught!”

 

http://cmosedu.com/cmos1/electric/elec_mem.jpg

 

 

Setting up the Electrical Rule Check (ERC) for n-well CMOS processes that use n-well resistors or higher than VDD voltages (optional)

Note how we don’t require that the n-well be tied to VDD as we would in a pure digital design that doesn’t use n-well

resistors or PMOS devices with potentials above VDD (as found in a charge pump).

 

http://cmosedu.com/cmos1/electric/well_check.jpg

 

The Electric Windows registry can be cleared (which eliminates all of your setups including key bindings, colors, preferences, history, etc.) by going to Start -> Run then running regedit (registry edit) and deleting the folder HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\JavaSoft\Prefs\com\sun\electric

 

Detailed Electric install information for any Unix operating system including Solaris, Linux and MacOSX (from a xterm)

 

To start Electric from the jar file (without add-ons) use:

 

$JAVA -Xmx$M -Xss2m -XX:MaxPermSize=128m -jar $JAR @ARGV

where

$JAVA: your java binary
$M: heap memory like -Xmx3000m  for 3GB
-Xss2m -XX:MaxPermSize=128m: you might want to use those values or not define them at all.
$JAR = electric.jar
@ARGV: commands like -help, -version, -debug, etc. -help will give you all the online commands.

 

An example (type in a terminal window):   java -Xmx512m -jar electricBinary-8.11.jar &

For adding additional plugins (e.g., IRSIM), follow the instructions given by the -help option.

 

Electric tutorials are found here.

 

Return to the Electric VLSI page at CMOSedu.com