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Introduction

The aim of this project was to fully implement the functionality of LT Spice from a command line interface (CLI). The motivations to build this project originated in irritation of LT Spice's poor cross platform compatibility and interest in developing a deeper understanding in the internal workings of a circuit simulator. This project also seeks to provide stronger support for standard output formats compared to LT Spice and make it simpler and easier to use the output of a simulation in another program. Our in-built plotter also aims to be more customisable and clearer, than the default graph-plotter packaged with LT Spice. Finally the team thought that, of all the tasks offered to us, development of a circuit simulator covered the greatest number of topics taught this year, making it an excellent opportunity to cement our knowledge. Topics required for the task:C++ programming, linear algebra, analysis of circuits and design of circuits.

Getting Started

System Requirements

Operating System

Linux: Ubuntu 18.04 or higher
MacOS: Catalina 10.15 or higher

Terminal Shell

bash (recommended)
sh
zsh

CMake

CMake is used for building and managing dependencies. To install CMake, click here. To confirm if CMake is installed correctly on your machine, run:

cmake --version

The version of CMake installed should come up. CMake 3.16.X is required!

Python (Only for the graphing tool)

To use the in built graphing tool, Python 3 is required. To install python, click here. To confirm if Python 3 is installed correctly on your machine, run:

python3

An interactive shell should come up showing the python version. Python 3.7.X is required!

Once Python 3 has been correctly installed, navigate to the root directory and run:

python3 -m pip install -r requirements.txt

To install the necessary packages required for the graphing tool to work.

Installing

To install the simulator, navigate to the build directory and run the installation script:

cd build

./install.sh

And follow the on screen instructions.

Usage

-i              <file>          path to input netlist
-o              <dir>           path to output directory
-f              <format>        specify output format, either csv or space
-p              <list>          plots output, space separated list specifies columns to plot
-s              <path>          saves graph output as html at specified location, requires -p
-c                              shows names of columns in output file, blocks -p and -s i.e. doesn't plot/save result
-h                              shows this help information
 
Usage: simulator -i file [ -ch ] [ -o dir ] [-p list] [ -s path ] [ -f format ]
 
Examples:
 
Plot Specific Columns:
    simulator -i test.net -p 'V(N001) V(N002)'
 
Plot All Columns and save result as interactive HTML:
    simulator -i test.net -p '' -s result.html
 
Generate result and check names of columns in netlist:
    simulator -i test.net -c

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