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This document contains references to Agilent Technologies. Agilent's former Test and Measurement business has become Keysight Technologies. For more information, go to www.keysight.com.


  

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Advanced Design System 2016.01 Release Notes

For general information about Advanced Design System (ADS), visit ADS webpage at http://www.keysight.com/find/eesof-ads.

What’s New in ADS 2016.01

Silicon RFIC Design

SIPro/PIPro

Simulation Enhancements

Layout Enhancements
 

Interoperability

  • iPDK support
  • Verilog-A support
  • Silicon like DC annotation
  • Numerous schematic design improvements
  • EM cosimulation

Electro-Magnetic Simulation

  • Parameterized substrates to model process variability
  • TSMC iRCX import
  • Via Simplification
  • Fast, efficient dummy metal fill simulation

    SIPro

  • New fast, accurate, high-capacity EM-based solvers
  • Fast, efficient analysis setup and 3D viewing environment
  • Fully integrated in ADS

    PIPro

  • Same environment as SIPro
  • DC IR drop, AC impedance, power-plane resonance analyses
  • Electro-Thermal on Windows
  • New Wireless Verification Libraries
    • 5G Modem
    • Bluetooth 4.0 (BDR, EDR, LE)
  • Faster/Robust Circuit Envelope convergence w/large S-parameter blocks from EM simulations
  • CE, HB & Linear parallel simulation
  • Schematic net-driven connectivity
  • Manufacturing grid control
  • Numerous usability improvements
  • RF-aware dummy metal fill generation

Feature Updates in ADS 2016.01

Signal Integrity/Power Integrity

  • PIPro simulation and analysis capabilities allowing to do Static IR Drop (PI-DC) simulations, PDN Impedance analysis (PI-AC) and Power Plane Resonance analysis (PPR).
  • SIPro allows to characterize the power aware signal integrity behavior of signal line in the presence of the complex power and ground metallization network. Within SIPro, the signal line behavior can be characterized by examining the S-parameter plots, TDR plots or extracted RLC values. The S-parameter model can be used easily as part of channel and transient simulations in schematic.
  • Documentation: Added New:

For more information, see  SIPro and PIPro. 

  • In case PIPro or SIPro window does not open or load the design, retry opening the window. On some machine configurations, there is a problem in the loading mechanism, which results in occasional failures in opening PIPro/SIPro.
  • Designs with hatch patterns may lead to slow response time of the SIPro/PIPro window. Depending on the complexity and size of the hatch pattern metalizations, the SI or AC simulation likely lead to unrealistic memory requirements as the hatch patterns are simulated as is. A manual simplification step of the hatch patterns is the workaround solution in this case.
  • In case of a mesh failure during a simulation, you can consider one of the following actions as a workaround:
    • Change the resolution option to a smaller or larger value.
    • Change the Arc resolution to a smaller value (e.g. 45 or 30 degrees).
    • Locate the area in the layout indicated by the mesh process and make a small change in the layout in this area, e.g. removing any metal when it is irrelevant for the simulation. A small change may be sufficient to make the mesh process successful.  

Silicon RFIC Interoperability

Silicon RFIC Interoperability allows ADS to edit and simulate designs created in Cadence Design System's Virtuoso software and vice-versa.  Following are the specific features that are added as part of the Silicon RFIC Interoperability in this release:

  • Improved DC annotation
  •  EM Simulation with CDF Components. Allows you to generate an EM model in ADS for a layout designed in Virtuoso and to use that model in a circuit simulation in Virtuoso.
  • VerilogA View Support
  •  iPDK Support  
  •  AEL-based Schematic pCells
  •  Additional Support for Common Components
  • Opening schematic designs (created in Cadence Design System's Virtuoso software) in ADS now does not:
    • contain small wires that are connected to a pin snap point on one end and open on the other end.
    • show a disconnection where a wire stops on the edge of a pin.
  • The new Si RFIC Dummy Metal Fill utility provides the designer and layout engineer with an easy to use tool to generate dummy metal fills for silicon RFIC chips in ADS prior to tape-out. The designer can quickly generate the metal fill for a circuit block or entire chip, tailor it to the required metal density requirements and validate its effects on the circuitry with Momentum early in the design process. Metal fill effects and potential degradation of the chip are recognized early by the designer, rather than experienced late in the stage or in the worst case after silicon ships. The layout fill data is generated hierarchically and is available through OA interoperability for use in other EDA platforms.
  • Documentation: Added New Tutorial: Setting Up iPDK for use in ADS.

For more information, see  IC Interoperability.

  • ADS 2016.01 supports primitive Verilog-A views only.
  • Cadence Design System's Virtuoso software may not be able to netlist a Verilog-A view created in ADS without first completing Verilog-A view setup steps required by Cadence Design System's Virtuoso software.
  • Back Annotation is not supported for interoperable Verilog-A instances in this release.

  • Unforced net names may be renamed by ADS after an edit.  In an IC Interoperable flow, these renames can break saved signals and measurements from Cadence Design System's Virtuoso software and initially cause missing DC Back-Annotation results in ADS.

    Workaround: Force net names that should be preserved.  To see DC Back-Annotation results, make a small edit to the schematic and re-run the simulation and DC Back-Annotation.

  • When opened in ADS, schematic designs created in Cadence Design System's Virtuoso software may contain extra circles in some places like where three wires connect.
    Workaround: These circles can be deleted in ADS. To avoid them, from Cadence Design System's Virtuoso software, perform "Schematic Editor > Options > Editor > Automatic Solder Dots: OFF" and save the design again.
  • Schematic "wide wires" from Cadence Design System's Virtuoso software are not fully supported yet in ADS.
    Workaround: Replace "wide wires" with normal bus wires.
  • Opening a schematic that was created by ADS in Cadence Design System's Virtuoso software may result in an information message of the form, "An attempt has been made to create a multi-segment wire by specifying more than two (3) points…”
    Workaround: This message is informational only and can be ignored.
  • iPDK callbacks does not work on Windows platform, if ADS installation path has spaces.
    Workaround: Remove spaces from the ADS installation path.

Circuit Simulation

Electrothermal

  • Improved internal timestep control in thermal solver to handle  large  outer-loop  time-steps between the circuit simulator and HeatWave.
  • Enabled the scaling of input layout and power-source geometries in X,Y.
  • Improved the Persistent mode for DC and HB to eliminate known problems, such as indefinite waits for data.
  • Specified a default constant temperature color-key that is valid across the spatial and time domains when viewing a movie
  • Supported on Windows Platform
  • Documentation: Added new Example: Coupled Electro-Thermal Simulation.
  • If you get licensing errors while running thermal simulation, you may need the following workaround.
    Workaround: Rename the file $HOME/.eesofrc. For example, $HOME/.eesofrc-orig.
  • Electrothermal does not support remote simulation, batch simulation, Monte Carlo, tuning, Optimization, Measurement Equations and sweeping of the global temperature variable. Also, you cannot sweep directly on the DC controller.
  • All libraries referenced in a layout should use the same layout resolution, namely the OA database units (DBU) per user unit (UU).
  • You cannot run both a transient and envelope simulation on the same design from one testbench.

  • The calculation of power dissipation from passive components other than resistors may not be correct in harmonic balance simulations.

  • ETH does not support the transient or envelope simulation that is controlled by a ParamSweep.

High Speed Digital (HSD)

  • New S-Parameter Checker (available on the HSD toolbar and in the "SnP" component's dialog box) that
    • Displays S-parameters from a Touchstone file, CITIfile, or dataset.
    • Checks the S-parameters for passivity and reciprocity.
    • For Touchstone files and CITIfiles, you can
      • Name the ports
      • Re-order the ports
      • Save a file with a subset of the ports
  • PAM4 support in ChannelSim AMI flow.
  • Support for BIRD 155.
  • Support for IBIS per-pin package model.
  • Support for 64 bit PRBS source.
  • Update proprietary overclocking solution to BIRD 168.
  • For ChannelSim, ADS differential Tx/Rx/Xtalk components can be simulated with AMI components in the same design.
  • GoldenGate Tools (GG Tools) documentation is now integrated with ADS documentation. To access the full on-line GG Tools product documentation, click here.
  • Cadence IC 5.1.41 (and other Cadence versions without 64-bit MPS libraries) will not work for GGTools and Dynamic Link. The rfdemp (GGTools) and idfmp (Dynamic Link) executable files are linked to Cadence 64-bit libraries. Only Cadence versions with 64-bit em_sh, mpsc_sh, cdsCommon_sh, and sman_sh libraries are supported. Supported Cadence versions are listed in $HPEESOF_DIR/idf/supported_cadence_versions.txt.
    Workaround: Use ADS 2013.06, 2012.08 or earlier versions of ADS for GGTools or Dynamic Link when using Cadence IC 5.1.41. Alternatively, Cadence IC 5.1.41 libraries can be converted to Cadence IC 6.1.4 or newer versions to use GGTools and Dynamic Link in ADS 2014.01.
  • Dynamic link: ADS Output probing does not works with Virtuoso schematic.
  • While performing iRCX import the technology file without '.tf' extension gets deleted automatically, if the technology file and momentum module name are same and are present at the same location.
    Workaround: Before performing iRCX import, make sure the PDK technology file name has the '.tf' extension.

Envelope

  • Improvement on ENV convergence for designs with S-Parameter components.

Components

  • New "SnP" component, which is similar in behavior to the S1P, S2P, and S3P components, but
    • Its symbol dynamically redraws based on the number of ports.
    • It provides several useful pin and reference-pin configurations.
  • Due to this new "SnP" component, the "Insert SnP Component" HSD toolbar item has been removed.
  • There is a new, one-terminal TermG component that is basically a Term component with its reference pin implicitly grounded. 
  • Documentation: Do not install Vendor Libraries or Design Kits under $HPEESOF_DIR, otherwise the associated help links will not work.
  • Encoded Component is not simulated if uselib line is mentioned as #uselib “libName”, “compName”.
    Workaround: Modify the uselib line of instance netlist format of the encoded component as follows:
    #uselib “libName”, “compName_libName”
    Where,
    • libName - name of the encoded library
    • compName - name of the netlist file or schematic

Miscellaneous

  • Improved DC annotation
  • Duplicated Definitions tab in Component Options that will help you to change the default behavior for the redefined parameters/expressions, functions, models, subcircuits, and instances.
  • Simulation error detected by hpeesofsim in loading Verilog-A device during netlist parsing, though Verilog-A files are placed in “<PDK>/veriloga” directory of a PDK. '#load' command failed to find `xxx.va' in the simulator's model search path.
    Workaround: Place Verilog-A files (xxx.va) in the location:<PDK>\circuit\models to overcome simulation error in ADS2014.01, ADS2015.01, and ADS2016.01.
  • While sharing through the product Cisco Webex, the second circuit simulation can hang the running ADS session.
    Workaround: Change or add the registry entry HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\WebEx\AppSharing\DisableSharingIndicator to be equal to zero. The following is reg file example for this setting:
    Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
    [HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\WebEx\AppSharing]
    "DisableSharingIndicator"=dword:00000001
  • Certain user-compiled MINT models are not threadsafe.
    Workaround: You should recompile the model or run the simulation as single threaded.
  • Verilog-AMS is not supported on SUSE11 platform using ADS 2014.01.

  • In some cases, the Transient Simulations might be slow.
    Workaround: You may set DefaultConvStart=0 on the analysis line to use the default convergence mechanism.

  • Before tuning or optimizing the AMI parameters, check that the AMI model parameter values are in valid range.

  • “: No such file or directory.” error message may occur on compiling MINT or User Compiled models (UCM) on 64-bit Linux platform.

    Workaround: Ensure the make/config files do not have Windows line endings on the Linux platform.

  • To use VTB, ensure ADS is installed in a path that has only ASCII characters.

  • Users performing simulations from the command-line, or ADS GUI simulations that use #include'd netlists, may encounter issues (such as multiple definition errors) due to a different naming scheme used with include files. Before, the netlister would use a scheme like this for the (example) include file, "/path/to/file":

    #ifndef inc__path_to_file
    #define inc__path_to_file inc__path_to_file
    #include "/path/to/file"
    #endif

    This has been changed to:

    #ifndef inc__YqZ_path_YqZ_to_YqZ_file
    #define inc__YqZ_path_YqZ_to_YqZ_file 1
    #include "/path/to/file"
    #endif

    Included netlists that use the old scheme may encounter errors, as the old scheme may no longer prevent multiple inclusions of the same file.

    Workaround: Move the #ifndef/#define/#endif statements to each include file (surround the include file contents).
  • Budget analysis might fail if ADS is installed on Windows 8 platform.
    Workaround: Use other supported platforms.
  • For MATLAB cosimulation, MATLAB 2012 and 2013 have problems, and MATLAB 2014a works correctly.
  • SystemC cosimulation does not support 64 bit ADS.
  • Verilog-A simulation is not working when ADS 2016.01 is used to perform simulation in ICCAP.

EM Simulation

General

  • The capability to use variables in the substrate and material database editors. For more information, see  Overview of Using Variables in Substrates.

    • View the impact of selected substrate stack parameters on the eye diagram of a high speed link.

    • Sweep through substrate stack corner cases to obtain more confidence in the MMIC or RFIC design.

  • New preprocessor options: 

    • To automatically simplify via patterns as part of the EM simulation flow. For more information, see Preprocessor Options to Simplify Via Arrays.

    • To model unrelated metal fill: either automatically remove unrelated metall fill or replace them by an equivalent dielectric layer to do a fast impact analysis which accounts for the dominant effect of the metal fill, or keep them for a rigorous analysis. For more information, see  Preprocessor Options to Model Unrelated Metal fill.

Momentum

  • The Momentum simulation performance of a rigorous analysis of the unrelated metal fill has been improved.
  • The DC point in the adaptively sampled dataset ('<name>_a.ds') will be an exact copy of the simulated DC result (no longer based on the rational fit), the low frequency sampling will generate at least 5 samples per decade from 10 kHz to 1 GHz to improve the interpolation accuracy, and all actually simulated frequencies will be part of this dataset.
  • An issue has been fixed in the microwave mode where low frequency results of a design containing TML calibrated ports didn't match the RF mode results.

FEM

  • EM simulation with CDF components:
    • Not integrated with the history management systems available in CDS Design Management.
  • If you see a failure while doing a 3D FEM simulation, creating a 3D view from ADS layout, or when exporting a design from ADS layout to EMPro, check for either of the following error messages:
  • RuntimeError: Unable to create a new Eigenmode simulation because the simulation settings are invalid. The invalidity message is: Eigenmode simulation cannot have absorbing boundary conditions.
  • RuntimeError: Unable to create a new FEM simulation because the simulation settings are invalid. The invalidity message is: FEM 2D Port solver requires waveguide ports.
    Workaround: Open up EMPro and check the selected simulator in the Simulation toolbar. If it is set to FEM Eigenmode Simulation or FEM 2D Port Simulation, change the selection to be FEM Simulation and save the opened EMPro design.
  • The FEM LSF cluster simulation may fail with the error "Cannot find a license file or connect to a license server".
    Workaround: Specify the ADS license file or server in the file .eesoflic in your home directory on the LSF cluster. This can be done by adding a line of the form
    ADS_LICENSE_FILE=<license file name or server name>
    to the .eesoflic file.
  • The ADS to EMPro export is not compatible with EMPro 2011.12 or older. Use EMPro 2012.09 or later.
  • FEM simulations, viewing field and current plots in the 3D viewer are not supported in case the workspace path has international characters. The FEM simulations can be executed if the name of the simulation directory specified in the emSetup resources tab is set to a location without international characters.
  • In case of a FEM simulation with one or multiple calibrated ports, the following warning may appear ("Warning detected by hpeesofsim during netlist flattening. Simulation results may be incorrect. Errors encountered when looking for S11 (orY11/Z11/H11/G11) in the file: ..."). In this case either use a citi file or the layout component or 3D component infrastructure to use the FEM simulation results as part of the circuit simulation.

Layout and Schematic Editing

Design Synchronization

Design differences window has been redesigned as a docking window. Along with the existing functionality, it will also identify differences in the following areas:

  • Net name mismatches
  • Incomplete Net connections
  • Overlapping Nets

For more information on design differences, refer to Design Synchronization.

Basic Editing

  • All TrueType fonts are now supported in Layout and Schematic view. The default font type is "Arial For CAE," you can click the Font drop-down in the Text properties window to change the font.
  • Basic selection improvements. For more information, refer to Using the Selection Filter.
  • Edit commands improvements. For more information, refer to  Editing Shapes.
  • Move command is improved for the following:
    • Move selected points - Enables you to move the selected segment (an edge where the begin and end points are selected).
    • Move and break with selected points - Enables you to move and break the selected segment. Select the segment, press ctrl and move the selected segment. This will break and move the selected segment.
  • Shapes/objects/Interconnect/traces with orthogonal edge retains the orthogonality while editing (such as dragging the selected vertices or edges).
  • Physical connections are connected with blue dots where as all logical connections such as flightlines are connected with diamonds.
  • ADS now uses the tee size and color preferences for drawing schematic wire tees.

Manufacturing Grid in Layout

You can now enable and set the manufacturing grid in a technology for a library using the Technology setup dialog box. For more information, refer to   Manufacturing Grid.

3D Layout Viewing

ADS 2016.01 has a faster 3D layout viewer solution, linked the 3D View button in layout (or  View > 3D View > all in Layout). The 3D EM preview and EM Visualization and Far Field 3D views use the same solution as in previous ADS releases.

  • View > 3D View > Selection shows the entire design.
  • Invalid bounding box for designs with layers mapped in the substrate that have no shapes.
  • Performing connectivity check on complex designs potentially can take an additional amount of processing time.
  • Turning on transparency for complex design on Linux systems, primarily when operated through a remote window, can lead to slower performance.
    Workaround: Try changing the Transparency Algorithm to e.g. Dept Peeling Fast.

Design Environment

Platform

  • Cells from external libraries can now be copied through the new "Copy Cells" dialog box.
  • Library, cell, and cell view references can now be updated through the new "Update References" dialog box.
  • Custom schematic toolbar settings are now retained.
  • Registered toolbars for menus under "Tools > App Manager..." are now retained.
  • Tuning and the "Simulation Variables Setup" dialog now recognize variables from default schematic designs.
  • Several Menu picks have been modified in ADS 2016.01 for ease of access and use. Refer to Changes in ADS Design Environment for further details.
  • After opening a substrate, using Version Control to check-out a different revision of the substrate will not show any changes.
    Workaround: Close the workspace and reopen it.
  • When running ADS on linux and displaying it on a remote system, in some configurations, some graphics drawing such as displaying menus are slower than on ADS 2013.06 and prior releases.
    Workaround: Launch ADS with "-graphicssystem" as a command line option to the "ads" startup script. If you are using an X11 connection over ssh, the "-C" option compresses the data and can improve drawing performance.
  • When a project is converted to workspace, there is a chance that string type parameters of some components may show invalid values. To get the correct parameter values, open the Component Parameter dialog box, click the editable parameter and click Apply. If a large number of components need to be modified please contact Keysight for better support.
  • Version Control dialog box is enhanced to automatically list the items required for a complete check-in. However, on Linux platform, the “Library Configuration” option must be visible in the main window project tree in order to correctly check in a library. Right-click on the workspace, Select Filter View, and check the Library Configuration option.

Printing

  • ADS printer interface now supports all paper size that are supported by the OS printer driver.
  • Postscript output is no longer supported. To generate Postscript utilize a PDF to PS converter (a number of these converters are available online and for download).
  • Selection of custom paper sizes is now supported directly in the ADS printer interface.
  • On the windows platform changing the paper size in the "Advanced Printer Setup" dialog will produce incorrect output.  On the Linux platform correct results are generated.
  • When using an SVG or PDF file generated using the ADS printer interface in other applications the fonts used in the file may not be found by the other application. When this occurs the text will be displayed using a different font that may not appear to be the same size as the original font used inside ADS. This is caused by the other application not being able to find the ADS fonts used in the SVG or PDF file. To workaround this issue install the ADS fonts into the local systems font configurations using the "fontconfig" or "xset" commands. The ADS fonts are located in the "$HPEESOF_DIR/lib/fonts" directory.

PDK Builder


  • PDK Builder is not fully functional on Linux.

  • From ADS 2016.01, on the Linux platform you need to add $HPEESOF_DIR/bin in the  LD_LIBRARY_PATH.

  • If a PDK is re-generated using the PDK Builder at the same location as was created earlier, the technology library inside this PDK will be deleted.
    Workaround: Delete the PDK before re-generating it at the same location, through the PDK Builder.

  • When packaging a PDK using PDK Builder, the ‘zip’ option doesn’t work.

    Workaround: Create a PDK and then manually zip it.

  • The PDK Builder still creates folders named ‘linux_x86_64_GCC462’, ‘win32_64_VS2010’ and ‘win32_VS2010’ inside the ‘bin’ folder of the generated PDK.

    However for ADS2015.01 the compilers have been updated. So these folders should be renamed to – ‘linux_x86_64_GCC472’ and ‘win32_64_VS2012’ for ADS2015.01 UCMs. There is no replacement for the ‘win32_VS2010’ folder, since ADS2015.01 is not supported on Windows 32 bit.

International Character and Space Supportability

  • The GDSII translator does not currently support spaces in the workspace path.
  • Mentor’s DxDesigner does not support international characters. When cells named with international characters are transferred to Mentor, the international characters gets modified.
  • In case of Budget Simulation, when user tries to open the results of simulation (.csv file) with international characters, MS Excel gives the incorrect filename error.
    Workaround: Ignore the incorrect filename error; open the file manually to view the results.
  • DRC AEL Rule files (like “drc.ael” or “spacing.ael”) cannot contain international characters in the name. It otherwise works well with the international characters.
  • LVS AEL Rule files cannot contain international characters in the name. It otherwise works well with the international characters.

  • IP Encoder does not support spaces in the destination encoded library name.
    Workaround: Specify a library name that does not include spaces.

Documentation

  • Improved the image quality of large schematics. You can now zoom in and zoom out a schematic image for better readability.
  • GoldenGate Tools documentation is now integrated with ADS documentation.

  • From ADS 2016.01, in ADS help when you open a page using the "Open a link in new tab" option the help does not opens a page in different tab by default. You need to set the preferences to open any link in a new tab.
    To set the preferences:

    1. From the ADS 2016.01 Help, Click File > Edit > Preferences.

      The Preferences Dialog box is displayed.

    2. Select the Options tab.

    3. Under Appearance, select the Show tabs for each individual page option.

    This is one time setting for a particular release of a product.
  • Unable to open online help in Linux on Mozilla Firefox browser.
    Workaround: Use Mozilla Firefox version 39 or above or keep the Firefox window open and then try to open online help.
  • ADS online help is not supported on the Google Chrome browser.
    Workaround: Use Internet Explorer or Firefox version 39 or above to view ADS documentation.
  • Mozilla Firefox version 3.0.5 crashes on RHEL 5 machine while accessing protected ADS on-line documentation from Qt Help window.
  • If the ADS help does not show any content, throws an error, or does not display any search results.
    Workaround: Close the help and delete the contents of the following directory:
    • On Windows 7: C:\Users\<Windows_Login_ID>\AppData\Local\Keysight\Help
    • On Windows XP: C:\Documents and Settings\<Windows_Login_ID>\Local Settings\Application Data\Keysight\Help
    • On Linux: $HOME/.local/share/data/assistant/Keysight/Help
  • ADS Qt search does not support [] or {} or any other text using these combinations.

Verification

Layout vs Schematic (LVS)

ADS LVS now provides designers with the ability to run:

  • A component-based LVS using physical nets. For more information on this new feature, see  Component Based LVS with Physical Nets.
  • An LVS at different levels of the module design:
    • Top-level connections only.
    • Top-level connections and interface connections to pads in an IC technology.

For more information on this new feature, see  Module LVS.

Design Rule Checker (DRC)

ADS-Assura DRC link now supports:

  • Nested/recursive syntax inside the error reporting commands such as  “errorLayer” and  “drc”.
  • Merging of all the errors with same DRC rule message.
  • Clicking the ADS DRC "Cancel" button does not terminate a process called "jade," preventing DRC errors from being reported until jade is terminated.
    Workaround: Kill the jade process from the Operating System and run ADS DRC again.
  • Users may need to adjust memory settings for ADS DRC to get complete results, depending on the size of design and the number of rules. From the Layout window, go to Options > Preferences... > Verification > Memory Management to increase the available memory.

Artwork Translators

  • Layer-Purpose Pairs can now be exported individually by the DXF, Gerber, ODB++, and Mask exporters.
  • The Pre-Production Editor does not support Hershey Roman and Hershey Roman Narrow font styles and uses its default font style.
  • DXF Export does not support cell names that differ only in case.
    Workaround: Rename one of the cells that differs only in case to the name of another cell.

  • ADS now supports the ability to import a Cadence Allegro BRD file into layout. For more information on this new feature, see  Cadence Allegro BRD Translator.

  • ADS Design Flow Integration (ADFI) and ADS Board Link (ABL) imported designs with bulged holes (use the primitive polygons) filled when plotting mode for shapes is filled.
     

Design Guides 


  • From ADS 2014.01 release onwards, the Linearization, PLL, and RF System design guides are obsolete and have been removed from the software.
    Workaround: To add the design guides, perform the steps specified in PLL DesignGuide missing.

  • If there is a space in the location of the .deb file, “Add DesignGuide” will display an error. By default, ADS is installed in a directory ‘Program Files’, which has a space in it. Therefore, the installation of the .deb files would fail from the default location.

    Workaround: Copy the .deb files to another location (which do not have spaces in the path) before installing them.

Data Flow

  • The following components are obsolete: PatGen_16522A_Sink, PatGen_16720A_Sink, VSA_89600_Sink, and VSA_89600_Source.
  • Connection Manager Client GUI is redesigned and the Help and Save menus are removed.
  • Hdlcosim does not support 64 bit ADS on Windows.

  • For MATLAB cosimulation, MATLAB 2012 and 2013 have problems, and MATLAB 2014a works correctly.

Examples

  • Unable to compile Pin Diode Model using Visual Studio 2012 on Windows 7 64-bit platform.
    Workaround: Delete the contents of the directory examples/Tutorial/UserCompiledModel_wrk/UserCompiledModel/lib.win32_64 before using UCMs.
  • An error occurs while running a custom VTB.
    Workaround: To run a custom VTB, download the SystemVue file from Knowledge Centre.

Installation and Licensing

Licensing

  • ADS requires: a) the version 2018.04 of the EEsof EDA licensing software, b) a minimum code-word version 2018.04 or above, and c) the licensing server software, lmgrd and agileesofd, to be upgraded to at least the same versions as what are included in EEsof EDA Licensing software 2018.04. ADS All-Versions will not start if any of these requirements is not met. Refer to the License Codeword Version Compatibility Table.
  • In the EEsof EDA License Tools version 2018.04, licensing vendor daemon (agileesofd) is integrated with FlexNet FNP 11.13.1.4 version (Windows) and FlexNet FNP 11.13.1.3 version (Linux) of FlexNet license manager daemon (lmgrd). For the Windows platform, ADS installer will automatically set up these two new license server daemons by default for the local node-locked license users; for the Linux platform, you need to follow the Linux Licensing Setup instruction to complete the licensing configuration process. For more details, refer to Licensing (For Administrators).

    • License Setup wizard may not be able to start license server with many license files. During setup, it may lead to a situation where a command prompt window appears/disappears incessantly. This is due to the fact that License Setup wizard is not able to start lmgrd with a long command line and may get stuck in a loop.
      Workaround: 

      1. It is recommended to combine all license code words tied to same MAC ID into single license file to avoid setting large number of license files.
      2. Try to use a shorter path to place license files.
      3. If #1 and/or #2 does not help, start the license server (lmgrd.exe) from the command line (e.g. lmgrd.exe -c <lic-file-path> -l <license_server_log.txt>) and then set <PRODUCT>_LICENSE_FILE=<PORT-NUMBER>@localhost for product you want to use on same PC.

    • Dongle drivers for Flex-10 dongles on Linux are release specific. Installing the latest dongle drivers on Linux will function properly only for the most recent EEsof releases.
      Workaround      : Install and use dongle drivers as needed.  If you need to run the most recent EEsof releases, use the latest  Flex-10 dongle driver. If you need to use older releases, uninstall the latest dongle driver and re-install the older dongle driver

    • FLO and EEsof License setup are writing server logs at different locations. However, the EEsof server log file location is updated in the License Manager > Environment tab.
    • When multiple same-named INCREMENT lines of different version exist on the license server, few advanced FlexNet options to reserve/limit licenses may not work properly. 
    • Product Selector “Check Availability“ generates incorrect results (which leads to license failure) for older releases when multiple date base versions of like-named bundles exist in the license pool.
    • In Linux, Product Selector OK and Cancel Buttons locations are reserved.
    • Starting from FlexNet Publisher 2015 (also known as version 11.13.1), the adoption of the best practice of the least-privilege security therein results in the License Server related Windows Service to run with the LocalService Account privilege (instead of the LocalSystem privilege as before.)  Running with the LocalService Account privilege, an executable can no longer access any files located in the per-user specific type of folders.  As a result, any license file placed in those folders can no longer be accessed by the License Server when the License Server is automatically started via the Windows Service upon each PC reboot. For the local node-locked license, this would not result in any disruption to the usage of EEsof applications; however, for the license installed on a network PC that is accessed by multiple client PCs, this may cause EEsof applications not to start after the network PC reboots
      Workaround: Store your license files in the Windows folders that are accessible by the LocalService Account privilege.  For example, C:\ProgramData or C:\users\public are both qualified choices.  In general, any folder that has the "Users" group listed in its Properties > Security page and this "Users" group has the read permission enabled should work. 

    • Using the default port to connect to a license server may cause a delay when checking out licenses. If no port is given in the license file, Flexera scans ports 27000 to 27009 to find the port. Starting from FlexNet Publisher 2015 (aka version 11.13.1), the default timeout for the response from each port increased from .1 seconds to 3 seconds.

      To avoid the delay, KSM now issues licenses with port 27009 instead of leaving this blank. The EEsof License Setup Wizard (from Licensing 2017.01 onwards) handles some common situations such as: where it detects license file(s) without port, when users get a new license file with port 27009, or when all license files for a vendor daemon does not have same port.

      You will not be able to start the license server if all license files for a vendor daemon on a server does not have same port.
      Users who manually setup a license server or using EEsof License Setup Wizard with older licensing bits may need to manually edit license files to comply with the following rules:

      1. All license files for a vendor daemon on a server must use the same port (or all be blank). 

      2. Using the default port (blank) is allowed but may result in longer checkout times. 

      3. If setting up a network server, select an unused port that is not blocked by a firewall.

      Workaround: If the user cannot change the port, or wants to use the default Flexera ports, the environment variable FLEXLM_TIMEOUT can be set to .2 seconds (200000), to minimize the performance degradation. However, if the network latency is an issue in your environment, you may need to fine-tune this setting to minimize the general performance degradation while still accommodating the network latency.

    • Installation of EESof EDA tools (such as, SystemVue 2016.08, Genesys 2017.XX, or ADS 2017.XX) may hang at 4% (percentage vary based on the products) for few hours or even more on some specific machines.
      Workarounds:

      • Disable Firewall setting in Anti-Virus Software installed on the PC.
        or
      • Download and unzip process explorer from the below link and then invoke procexp.exe.
        https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/processexplorer.aspx
        Right click on the wusa.exe process under <Product installer exe> and select KillProcess. Now it will continue the product installation.
    • After installing EESof EDA tools (such as, SystemVue 2016.08, Genesys 2017.XX, or ADS 2017.XX) successfully and try to invoke the software or License wizard, you may encounter “api-ms-win-crt-runtime-l1-1-0.dll” missing error.
      Workaround: Install the Update for Universal C Runtime in Windows .  On Windows 64-bit system systems, the file to install is x64 version of the Microsoft hotfix KB2999226. A copy of the Windows6.1-KB2999226-x64.msu Microsoft 64-bit hotfix installer can be found under the C:\Program Files\Keysight\EEsof_License_Tools\bin directory.  The Microsoft hotfix KB2999226 can be found under the Update for Universal C Runtime in Windows  page at  https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/2999226/update-for-universal-c-runtime-in-windows as well.
    • On a newly formatted RHEL system, the EEsof Licensing tools may fail to boot. This is because the FlexNet Publisher 2015 requires a certain rpm
      Workaround: Under the EEsof product installation directory, there exists a utility script named "Linux_sys_check.sh" under the bin directory. Run this script to find out whether any rpm is missing; run this script with a "-y" command-line option to also have all the missing rpms automatically installed if you have the sudo or root privilege.
    • License server may stop recognizing Flex-10 dongle on some systems within a few hours after starting 
      Workaround: If you experience this problem, install the latest WibuKey drivers from Wibu Systems.
    • Unable to install Flex-10 driver if Flex-9 dongle is already plugged into a machine
      Workaround: Before installing a Flex-10 driver for the first time, unplug the Flex-9 dongle.
    • There is a known FlexNet Publisher issue, whereby mixing node-locked codewords and floating codewords in one license file can result in: a) Remote simulations not working or b) A second local simulation not working in case the license is node-locked and also has incorrect version.
      Workaround: It is strongly recommended that you do not mix node-locked codewords and floating codewords in one license file nor in any configuration that ends up with node-locked codewords and floating codewords both available on the same server. In other words, put the node-locked license and the floating license on different servers, and point to the respective one based on what you need to run.
    • If a user simultaneously runs two instances of a product and has mixed different versions of the same codeword on one license server, extra licenses may be pulled and result in unexpected “Licensed number of users already reached for this feature” errors.
      Workaround: We recommend you remove expired codewords, to separate out the new and the old versions of codewords into different files and different servers, and to point to the respective one based on what you need to run.
    • Not specifying the TCP/IP port for the license server during license setup may lead to unexpected behavior and/or license checkout failure on the Windows platform. We strongly recommend you to always explicitly specify the TCP/IP port associated with each license server.
    • A node-locked and floating bundle operating on Linux cannot be shared between products using EDA License Tools version older than 2014.01 when run at the same time.
    • License Setup Wizard does not remove any previous user-configured FLEX Windows License Service manually set up by a user using FlexNet's lmtools. 
      Workaround: You must remove the previous user-configured Windows License Service via lmtools.

      • Run the lmtools.exe from C:\Program Files\Agilent\EEsof_License_Tools\bin to invoke the lmtools utility. The lmtools utility window is displayed.

        If you have installed an EEsof product released before 1st August, 2014 on your system prior to installing an EEsof product released after 1st August, 2014 then the default EEsof Licensing tools path will remain C:\Program Files\Agilent\EEsof_License_Tools. On the systems that only have EEsof products released after 1st August, 2014 installed then the default EEsof Licensing tools path will be C:\Program Files\Keysight\EEsof_License_Tools.
      • In the Service/License File tab, check the Configuration using Services option. All user-configured FLEX Windows License Services will be listed.
      • Select the service you wish to remove.
      • Select the Config Services tab and click the Remove Service button to remove the service.
        To ensure that the license service or lmgrd is running, click View Log. A log window appears that confirms whether agileesofd and lmgrd are up and running.
    • While running multiple versions of prior ADS releases together, set ADS_MAXIMUM_BUNDLE_USAGE=ON in your environment so that all of them will use the same method to check out licenses. Otherwise, you might receive an error message, "Licensed number of users already reached".
    • On some Windows 7 machines, when more than one definition of an Ethernet adapter exists (duplicates), license checkouts may appear to hang up.
      Workaround: Disable the duplicate network card definitions in your network settings: Control Panel > Network and Internet > Network Connections. This issue has been acknowledged by Flexera and they have created a bug report (SIOC-000103097).
    • For LSF style distributed simulations, ensure that the PATH on the client computer points to the $HPEESOF_DIR/EEsof_License_Tools/${architecture} directory that corresponds to the EEsof release being used. This needs to be done in order to ensure that the proper version of the Flexera utilities (like lmutil ) gets picked up in the path before any older in-compatible versions (that may also be installed on a users’ system.)
    • License Setup Wizard ( aglmwizard.exe ), which is used to set up and record the license path would not work if you already have an environment variable set for ADS_LICENSE_FILE.
      Workaround: You can use ADS_LICENSE_FILE variable to point to license file or refer to Licensing (For Administrators).
    • The License Setup Wizard will exit or not properly configure a license server, if the server has all of its licenses currently in use.
      Workaround: Wait for a license on the server to become available as you normally would before launching the product.
    • Unable to set license in case unicode characters are used either in path or license file name because the Flex License Service does not support these characters.

    • The Product Selector tool will be unable to display the license server status properly when connected to older license server.
      Workaround: Upgrade your license server to the latest version.

    • EEsof Licensing Tools installer can hang on systems with McAfee LiveSafe installed and running the default firewall settings.
      Workaround:  Prior to installing EEsof Licensing Tools, temporarily turn off the McAfee LiveSafe firewall.

    • Licensing setup steps on systems with McAfee LiveSafe installed can fail.
      Workaround:  Under the McAfee LiveSafe firewall settings, under Port and Settings, allow the use of port 27001 for lmgrd.exe under the EEsof Licensing Tools installation bin directory.  Under Internet Connections for Programs , enable lmgrd.exe, aglmmgr.exe and aglmwizard.exe for all devices and turn off monitoring.

    • On Windows, EEsof product releases prior to 2014 can have boot time issues with licensing if an newer EEsof product is installed prior to installing the older product. For example, if a users installs Advanced Design System 2017 and then installs Advanced Design systems 2014.01, the user can have boot time errors with ADS 2014.01.
      Workaround:  For Advanced Design System users,  set a system environmental variable named ADS_LICENSE_FILE under the Control Panel/ System, and Security / System / Advanced system settings and under the "environmental variables".  Add an System variable named ADS_LICENESE_FILE and the value will be the path to your local license file or the port@host setting for your site.
    • On Windows 10 systems with  UEFI Secure Boot (BIOS) turned on, Wibu USB key or dongles are not recognized and licenses based on the Wibu key can not  used.
      Workaround:  Disable UEFI Secure Boot under the BIOS settings.

  • Unable to invoke ADS 2009 Update 1 with node locked license file on Linux.
    Workaround: Invoke ADS 2009 Update 1 with floating license file on Linux.

ADS 2009 Update 1 License Compatibility Hot Fix is now available

ADS 2016.01 requires licenses with a minimum codeword version number of 3.2. Per Keysight’s license backward compatibility policy, codeword version 3.2 can also serve ADS 2015.01, 2014.01, ADS 2013.06, and ADS 2012.08; but it cannot work with ADS 2011.10 or prior releases.

Nonetheless, Keysight has made an exception to this policy for ADS 2009 Update 1 release–with hotfix 527 (or any hotfix newer than 527)  installed, ADS 2009 Update 1 can work with version 3.2 or newer licenses. You can download the hotfix by visiting https://edasupportweb.software.keysight.com/page/show_add_on?id=337055 (Knowledge Center password required).

Installation

  • While installing a new version of ADS, if you see “Previous version detected” error even after you have already run the uninstaller for that version of ADS, you may need to manually uninstall ADS before installation of the new ADS. To manually uninstall ADS, perform the following steps.
    1. Exit the current ADS installation session if it is running
    2. Remove or rename the file .com.zerog.registry.xml under the folder  C:\Program Files (x86)\Zero G Registry. Both the folder and the file are by default hidden, so you may need to change the folder viewing setting to show hidden files and folders, do so via the Advanced settings of the View tab in the Windows Folder Options dialog box.
    3. Remove the ADS installation directory through the Windows Explorer.

             After performing the above steps, you can re-start the ADS installer.

  • While installing on Linux, if you see a prompt of "to insert Disk1”, it generally means the downloaded image has been corrupted. One of the likely causes of such a corruption could be due to insufficient local hard disk space. Be sure to specify a folder that contains adequate disk space when you perform the untar command.
  • Anti-virus Conflicts: ADS could report error during its installation time, bootup time, or during a simulation run if the hosting system has an anti-virus or other security protection software installed.
    Workaround: Add the following list of executable files (for products such as Symantec Endpoint Protection, McAfee or Bitdefender) as the exceptions to the anti-virus or security protection settings:
    • bin/hpeesofde.exe
    • bin/MomEngine.exe
    • bin/hpeesofdds.exe
    • bin/keysight-vacomp.exe
    • bin/hpeesofsim.exe
    • bin/win32_64/MomEngine.exe
    • bin/win32_64/hpeesofdds.exe
    • bin/win32_64/keysight-vacomp.exe
    • bin/win32_64/hpeesofsim.exe
  • If you install ADS on a RHEL 6 platform and receive a Gtk warning message on your terminal window, you can safely ignore that warning.  That warning is likely caused by the lack of  Gnome or KDE window manager running on your Linux box. 

  • ADS 2016.01 installer might error out on your Linux system if that system has a lower limit on the open file descriptors than what ADS requires.  To increase this limit, consult your Linux administrator, or if you have the “root” privilege, follow the instruction shown in the error message.

  • On certain Windows 7, 64-bit machines where you have multiple versions of jre installed, ADS might not uninstall successfully.
    Workaround: Rename or remove the jre directory under the installation directory and run the uninstaller.
  • When running ADS if you notice that the fonts shown on ADS menus appear smaller than usual, change the following environment variable with the size you desire, for example, EESOFQT_FONT_POINT_SIZE=14

  • When running ADS via Exceed On Demand, if you notice that the keyboard arrow keys and numeric keyboard don’t function properly, ensure that you are using Exceed on Demand version 13.8.6.x or newer, and that XkbExtension=1 is set under the Xconfig setting.  Consult your Exceed On Demand administrator for help.

  • When running ADS via Exceed On Demand, after running a EOD session for over 4 hours, if you find the menus under the ADS window are not responding, you need to download and install the latest Exceed on Demand service packs from OpenText.

  • When run in a VNC session, ADS might not open when the window manager is set to Tab Window Manager (twm).
    Workaround: Switch to Gnome or KDE as the window manager will fix this problem. Consult your VNC administrator for making this switch via updating the $HOME/.vnc/xstartup file.

  • When run in a VNC session, ADS will not start if the XRENDER extension is not present in the X server. 
    Workaround: You can run the following command to verify whether the RENDER extension is present:

    xdpyinfo | grep RENDER
    If the above command displays no results/output, the extension is not present, and you should consult your VNC administrator for upgrading your X server and/or VNC server to have the XRENDER enabled.

  • On Windows, ADS might not open while trying to open any dialog box if the Dell Backup and Recovery Solution is installed.
    Workaround: Unregister the shell extensions associated with the Dell Backup and Recovery Solution should fix the problem. Execute the following commands from a command prompt:
    regsvr32 /u "C:\Program Files (x86)\Dell Backup and Recovery\Components\Shell\DBROverlayIconBackuped.dll"
    Recovery\Components\Shell\DBROverlayIconBackuped.dll"
    regsvr32 /u "C:\Program Files (x86)\Dell Backup and

    Recovery\Components\Shell\DBROverlayIconNotBackuped.dll"
    regsvr32 /u "C:\Program Files (x86)\Dell Backup and Recovery\Components\Shell\DBRShellExtension.dll"

  • Slowness on Linux systems is observed while opening/closing ADS window.
    Workaround: This could be due to AMD/am-utils utilities used on Linux systems. Use autofs utilities instead.
  • Unable to Invoke ADS when running via Citrix

    Workaround: This issue is owned by Citrix and has come up with a patch to fix the problem. Please contact Citrix for support.

  • If ADS installer errors out with a message like "cannot create a virtual machine" or some other formats of java errors, follow the instruction below:
    Workaround 1:

    1. Install the latest version of Java from Oracle, https://java.com/en/download/.

    2. Open command prompt and run the following command, where the last argument is a working version of java.exe:

      ads2016_XX_XXX.exe LAX_VM  "C:\Program Files (x86)\Java\jre7\bin\java.exe"

    3. Restart the ADS installer.

    Workaround 2: Perform the following settings and restart the ADS installer.

    1. Click Start > Control Panel > System and Security.
    2. Click  View basic information about your computer under System.
    3. Click Advanced Systems Settings.
    4. Click the Environment Variables.
    5. Under System Variables, click Add and add the following variable:

      Name: _JAVA_OPTIONS

      Value: -Xmx512M

    6. Click OK.

     

PDKs

  • The Modelithic Kits needs to be compiled with the latest compiler version used with ADS2016.01 i.e gcc492 (for Linux) and VS2013(for windows).
  • If you make changes in the View-Specific Configuration tab of the Design Parameters dialog box, an itemdef.ael file may get created in the cell of the component. You can ignore this and delete it if you don't require demand loading. The Item definitions will be loaded as they were prior to this file getting created.
  • The PDKs created by RFIP Encoder still contains some files and folders which are obsolete in the ADS 2011 and onwards. You can ignore them.
  • ADS may issue a warning message requesting that you contact your foundries for an updated PDK. This warning message appears when popping out of the design hierarchy in a layout window, or using the Edit > Component > Update Component Definitions menu option. We are working closely with foundries to update these PDKs. PDK Users can determine whether a PDK needs to be repaired by calling de_check_and_report_pcell_parameters_in_library() from the ADS Command Line. If you are the owner of a PDK, you can fix the PDK using de_update_pcell_parameters_in_library(), as described in the PDK Documentation.
  • Layout Verification Tool: PDK layout verification tool does not open and gives error to install ADS 2009U1, even if ADS 2009U1 is installed

Data Display

  • Dataset aliases now support relative path names.
  • The var() expression supports user defined text strings.
  • The maximum number of history traces may be changed in the ddsdefault.ael file.

Working with Prior Releases

  • Deactivated component instances saved in ADS 2016.01 do not appear as deactivated in ADS 2015.01 and earlier releases. Features like Design Sync, Design Differences, and LVS will not treat these instances as deactivated.  However, they are correctly excluded from the netlist in ADS 2015.01.
    Workaround: When using an earlier release, deactivated instances from ADS 2016.01 can be fixed by selecting the deactivated instance, removing its custom nlAction property, and deactivating it again.
  • With older workspaces, a circuit simulation may fail during netlist flattening because of an apparent undefined device. This is due to a configuration variable, EESOF_MODEL_PATH,in the workspace's hpeesofsim.cfg file that tries to locate the 32-bit versions of dynamically loaded devices. These are no longer supported.
    Workaround:
    • Delete the directories named .*ams_work (note the dot) which can be located under either the workspace directory, or $HOME/hpeesof.
    • Delete the directory $HOME/hpeesof/tiburonda-vams-model-cache.
    • Rename the existing hpeesofsim.cfg file in the workspace, to something like, "hpeesofsim.cfg.old", and re-simulate twice. The first simulation will quickly fail, because the first simulation will have already read hpeesofsim.cfg before it was renamed, but the second simulation should succeed. Alternatively, you can quit and restart ADS.
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