README.md

Inspecting a whole project

A project file (.PrjPcb) is the entry point to a board design: it lists the schematic sheets, the PCB layout(s), the libraries, the BOM and output jobs, and records the configurations, assembly variants and compiled sheet hierarchy. This guide loads a .PrjPcb and prints a "what's in this project?" report, then opens the real source documents through the project — so you can drive whole-design tooling (rendering, BOM, ERC, …) from one handle instead of juggling individual files.

The complete, compiling source for this guide is Program.cs.

Run

dotnet run --project examples/InspectProject -- "C:\path\to\MyBoard.PrjPcb"

A .PrjPcb references its documents by path, so point the example at a real project on disk (the example needs the sibling .SchDoc/.PcbDoc files to open them).

Where the data lives

AltiumLibrary.OpenProjectAsync(path) returns an AltiumProject. When a sibling .PrjPcbStructure file is present (Altium writes it when the project is compiled), it is loaded automatically into project.Structure.

var project = await AltiumLibrary.OpenProjectAsync("MyBoard.PrjPcb");

// Design-wide settings ([Design] section).
Console.WriteLine(project.Design.Version);
Console.WriteLine(project.Design.DefaultConfiguration);

// Documents, classified by extension into ProjectDocumentKind.
foreach (var group in project.Documents.GroupBy(d => d.Kind))
    Console.WriteLine($"{group.Key}: {group.Count()}");

// Convenience filters.
foreach (var sch in project.SchematicDocuments) { /* … */ }
foreach (var pcb in project.PcbDocuments)       { /* … */ }

The typed collections — Documents, Configurations, Variants, Parameters, OutputGroups, GeneratedDocuments — are views over the file's [Section]s. The raw sections remain on project.Sections, which is what the writer emits, so a load → save round-trip is byte-for-byte identical.

Assembly variants

foreach (var variant in project.Variants)
{
    Console.WriteLine(variant.Description);
    var notFitted = variant.Variations.Where(v => v.Kind == VariationKind.NotFitted);
    var alternate = variant.Variations.Where(v => v.Kind == VariationKind.Alternate);
    foreach (var pv in variant.ParameterVariations)
        Console.WriteLine($"{pv.Designator}.{pv.ParameterName} = {pv.VariantValue}");
}

Sheet hierarchy

The compiled hierarchy comes from the .PrjPcbStructure file. BuildTree() turns the flat sheet-symbol records into a navigable tree (each node is one sheet instance, so a document instantiated several times appears at several nodes; re-entrant references are pruned and flagged via IsCycle).

if (project.Structure?.BuildTree() is { } root)
    Print(root); // root.FileName, root.Children, child.Designator, child.SheetNumber

Opening the source documents

foreach (var doc in project.SchematicDocuments)
{
    await using var sch = await project.OpenSchematicAsync(doc);
    Console.WriteLine($"{doc.FileName}: {sch.Components.Count} components");
}

foreach (var doc in project.PcbDocuments)
{
    await using var pcb = await project.OpenPcbAsync(doc);
    Console.WriteLine($"{doc.FileName}: {pcb.Pads.Count} pads");
}

OpenSchematicAsync/OpenPcbAsync resolve the document's path relative to the project folder (ResolveDocumentPath) and open it with the existing readers. There are matching helpers for .SchLib/.PcbLib documents.

Creating & editing projects

The model also writes. AltiumLibrary.CreateProject() starts an empty project; editing a typed property writes straight back to the underlying section.

var project = AltiumLibrary.CreateProject();
var sheet = project.AddDocument("MyBoard.SchDoc");
project.AddDocument("MyBoard.PcbDoc");
project.Design.DefaultConfiguration = "Sources";
await project.SaveAsync("MyBoard.PrjPcb");