Components, Pins & Positions

Components represent the physical devices in your design. Each has a mating behavior, derived from its shape or category, that determines how it connects:

• Connectors (e.g., Deutsch DT, DB9, Molex) have pins where conductors terminate. Connectors mate with other connectors via pin-to-pin mapping.
• Terminal points (e.g., DIN-rail terminal blocks, bus bars, spring-terminal PSU inputs) have positions — slots that receive terminations. Positions do not carry conductors directly.
• Terminations (e.g., ferrules, ring terminals, quick disconnects, flying leads) carry one or more conductors and mate with a single terminal point position.

See Mating Behavior for the full reference.

Creating Components

1. Press C to enter Add Component mode.
2. Click the canvas to place the component.
3. Choose a category from the submenu (connector shapes, or functional types like circuit breaker, fuse, relay, etc.).

An automatic designator is assigned based on category (e.g., X1, CB1). Edit in the Properties panel.

Component Properties

Select a component to edit in the Properties panel:

Pin & Position Configuration

Configure pins (connectors) or positions (terminal points) in several ways:

• Properties Panel — Add/remove, rename labels, set functions.
• Bulk Editor > Components — Edit counts across all components in a table view.
• Quick-Add — Press P with a component selected to add a pin or position.

Each pin/position has:

Conductor endpoint properties (termination method, contact PN) are per-conductor, not per-pin/position. See Parts & BOM: Contact Part Numbers.

Bridged Positions

Bridged positions are internally connected pins or positions — e.g., bus bar terminals or common-rail positions on a terminal block. All bridged entries resolve to the same net and share signal assignments.

Creating a bridge:

1. Select a component, open the Positions (or Pins) tab.
2. Check two or more rows, then click the Bridge button in the table header.
3. The bridge group appears in the Bridged Positions section below the table — edit members with the chip selector, or remove the group with the × button.

Multiple independent bridge groups are supported on a single component (e.g., positions 1–3 bridged separately from positions 4–6).

Visual indicators:

• Schematic — colored vertical lines with dots connect bridged pins on the opposite side from wire exits. Colors cycle per group: green, blue, orange, purple.
• Pin table — a colored bar with a group number badge appears on the left edge of each bridged row.

Jumpers

Jumpers are external accessories (separate BOM parts) that bridge positions on terminal blocks — distinct from inherent bridged positions which represent factory-internal wiring. See Terminology: Jumper.

Requirement: The component must have Terminal Point mating behavior for its positions to accept jumpers. This is the default for terminal block shapes. Other component shapes can be set to Terminal Point via the mating behavior override in the Properties panel.

Creating a jumper:

1. Right-click a position on a terminal point component → New Jumper. This creates a jumper (e.g., JB1) starting with that position.
2. Right-click another position (same or different terminal point component) → Add to JB1.
3. Click the jumper in the summary panel to open its properties — set designator, color, and MPN/manufacturer.

Tip: Use shift+click range selection to select multiple positions first, then right-click → New Jumper to create a jumper spanning all selected positions at once.

Visual indicators: Jumper positions show as colored dots on the bridge indicator column, slightly larger than inherent bridge dots, using the jumper’s assigned color. When a position is both inherently bridged and in a jumper, the jumper color overlays the bridge dot.

Key differences from bridged positions:

Shift+Click Range Selection

Select multiple positions on a terminal point for bulk operations:

1. Click a position row in schematic view to set the anchor (this also works as a normal pin click).
2. Shift+click another position on the same component to select the contiguous range (highlighted in blue).
3. Right-click any selected position to apply operations to all at once:

Selection clears on canvas click or Escape. Shift+click a third position to extend or shrink the range from the original anchor.

Designator Prefix Preferences

Customize the automatic designator prefix assigned to new components. Access via the toolbar settings icon.

Component Categories — override the default prefix per functional category:

Connector Shapes — override the default “X” prefix per connector shape:

Overrides apply to newly placed components only. Use Redesignate to rename existing components with the new prefixes.

Auto-relabel on category change: When enabled, changing a component’s category automatically updates its designator to use the new category’s prefix (e.g., changing from connector to relay updates X1 → K1).

Conflict warnings: A warning icon appears when two categories or shapes resolve to the same prefix, helping avoid ambiguous designators.

Mating Behavior

Each component has a mating behavior, derived from its shape or category, that determines how it participates in mate relationships and how its connection points function:

Behavior		Connection Points	UI Label	Accepts Conductors	Mates With
Connector		Electrical contacts in a multi-pin interface	Pins	Yes	Other connectors (pin-to-pin mapping)
Terminal Point		Individual slots that receive terminations	Positions	No	Terminations
Termination		A single connection point	Pin	Yes	A specific terminal point position

The default is derived from the component’s shape or category. Override it in the Properties panel dropdown. Flying leads are always treated as terminations.

When mating a terminal point with multiple positions, a submenu lets you pick which position to mate. Occupied positions are grayed out. Type a prefix to filter compatible targets and positions. See Connections & Conductors: Mates for creating mates, Bulk Mate, and alignment.