Supplier Search Panel

Main article: Live Links to Supplier Data

Supplier Search panel.

The Supplier Search panel provides the interface to the live supplier data – a direct portal to parts databases provided through supplier web services.

Searching for a Supplier Item

Use the Keywords field to enter one or more keywords relevant to the supplier item you wish to search for. Click the ... button, to the right of the Keywords field, to access the Search Filters pop-up. From here, you can specify how many results, per supplier, are displayed on each 'page' of results within the panel. You can further filter Supplier Items based on whether they are in stock, lead free, or RoHS -compliant.

Additional filtering can help to zero-in on the
Supplier Item you require!

Having defined the search criteria, click the Search button. The upper region of the panel – the results region – will populate with all Supplier Items matching the search criteria, and in accordance with any advanced filtering options.

Supplier Items 'netted' by the search will be listed in the results region of the panel.

Navigating Search Results

Depending on the scope of the search and the number of suppliers enabled, multiple pages of results may be returned. Typing Resistor for example will return far more results due to its generic nature, whereas typing 1K Res 1/4W is a finer search and will therefore return fewer results. Throw in a manufacturer name and the results will shrink further still!

Controls to the bottom-left of the results region enable you to move back and forth through pages of results.

To the right of these navigation buttons, summary text is displayed, showing which results (out of the total number of results) are currently being viewed.

Example results summary.

Click on the symbol to access individual summaries for each enabled supplier.

Example results summary, expanded to
show results per supplier.

Changing Displayed Information

Once the results from a search are loaded into the results region of the panel, you have the ability to change the way in which the information is presented. The following is a summary of what you can do:

• By default, four columns of information are displayed in the results region of the panel, relating to the attributes Supplier, Manufacturer, Description and Unit Price. By right-clicking on a column header, you can access a pop-up listing of all available attributes that can be enabled for display in the panel. Clicking on an entry will add a column for that data into the results region.
   
  NOTE: The following attributes are static and can be displayed for any searched Supplier Item – Supplier, Supplier Part Number, Manufacturer, Manufacturer Part Number, Description, Category, RoHS, Stock and Unit Price. All other attributes that can be displayed will change, depending on the collective parameters associated with the returned Supplier Item results.
   
• You can change the order in which columns are displayed. To move a column, click on its header and drag it horizontally to the required position. A valid position is indicated by the appearance of two green positional arrows.
   
  NOTE: Attributes are gathered into three defined groupings. Column order can only be changed within a particular grouping – not accross groupings. If you right-click on a column header, you will see these defined groupings, highlighted by the use of divider lines. So, for example, the first grouping, which will always be displayed to the left in the panel, consists of: Supplier, Supplier Part Number, Manufacturer, Manufacturer Part Number, Description, Category, RoHS. The second grouping consists of all detailed attributes – dependent on the parameters of the returned items – and will display to the right of the first group. The third grouping , which will always be displayed to the right in the panel, consists of: Stock and Unit Price.
   
• Data may be sorted by any column by clicking on the header for that column. Clicking once will sort in ascending order. Click again to sort by descending order.

Quantity and Pricing

"Pay less – buy in bulk!". Quite a common phrase and no more so than with Suppliers and distributors of electronic components. Suppliers will typically have different pricing based on the quantity of an item you wish to purchase from them. The quantity levels required to access increasingly reduced unit price points differs not only between different suppliers, but also from item to item for the same supplier.

This 'quantity pricing' is readily found in the detailed information region of the panel (see next section) – specifically the detailed Pricing section for the Supplier Item currently selected in the results region of the panel.

By changing the entry in the Order Quantity field, at the bottom-right of the results region of the panel, the displayed pricing in the Unit Price column will change, in accordance with supplier-specified quantity pricing levels in-place for the displayed Supplier Items.

Example of displayed Unit Price change, based on the specified Order Quantity. In this example, making the quantity 25 instead of 24 would have reached the final available
quantity pricing level for that item and saved an extra AUD20.16 per relay!

To quickly display all Unit Price information – within the results region of the panel – in a single currency, simply choose the required currency from the drop-down field available to the left of the Order Quantity field. For more information, see Live Supplier Data - Currency Conversion.

Detailed Item Information

The lower region of the panel provides deatiled information for the currently selected item in the results region above.

Example of the detailed information available for a Supplier Item, in this case an interface relay.

Depending on availability, the region contains:

• A photo of the Supplier Item.

• A Parameters section – listing the parametric data for the item, by name and value.

• A Documents section – listing, for example, any datasheets for the item.

• A Pricing section – providing a list of the quantity pricing levels applicable to that item. Prices are displayed in the currency specified by the supplier and cannot be change as part of the panel's currency conversion feature.

• A Stock section – showing how many units of the item are currently in stock.

Any or all Supplier Item information (except the photo!) can be imported, as parameters, to an Altium Designer component. This can be achieved in a number of ways:

• By manually importing Supplier Item information to a target component (see Live Supplier Data - Import to Libraries and Schematics).

• When adding a Supplier Link and parameters simultaneously to a target component in a single step (see Adding a Supplier Link and Parameters Simultaneously).

• When creating a new component directly from a Supplier Item (see Creating a New Library Component from a Supplier Item).

Right-Click Menu

The Supplier Search panel has various right-click context menus. A menu is accessible for the results region of the panel and for each section in the detailed information region of the panel. The content of a menu will change in accordance with the focused document (SchDoc, SchLib, DbLib, SVNDbLib).

In Results Region

The following commands are available when accessing the menu from the results region of the panel:

• Add Supplier Link To – use this command to add a Supplier Link to the selected Supplier Item. If a Schematic, Database or SVN Database Library is active, the Supplier Link will be added to the focused component/component record. If a Schematic document is active, you will be able to click on each part to which you want the Supplier Link added.

• Add Supplier Link And Parameters To – use this command to add parameters, data sheet links, pricing and stock information for the selected Supplier Item, along with a Supplier Link to that item, all in the one step. If a Schematic, Database or SVN Database Library is active, the parameters and Supplier Link will be added to the focused component/component record. If a Schematic document is active, you will be able to click on each part to which you want the parameters and Supplier Link added. For parameters, pricing and stock information, the import will proceed in accordance with any defined parameter import options.

• Import Into LibraryName As ComponentName / PartNumber – use this command to create a new component in the target library (SchLib, DbLib, SVNDbLib) directly from the selected Supplier Item. The ComponentName/PartNumber for the new component will be named using the Supplier Item's Manufacturer Part Number parameter. A Supplier Link to the item will be added to the component, along with all parameters for that item (parameters, data sheet links, pricing and stock information). Parameters will be imported in accordance with any defined parameter import options.

In Detailed Information Region

The following command is available when accessing the menu from the Parameters, Pricing, or Stock sections, in the detailed information region of the panel.

• Add Parameter To – use this command to add the respective parameter(s). If a Schematic, Database or SVN Database Library is active, the parameter(s) will be added to the focused component/component record. If a Schematic document is active, you will be able to click on each part to which you want the parameter(s) added.

 
The following commands are available when accessing the menu from the Documents section:

• Open Document – use this command to open the selected document for viewing.

• Add Document Link To – use this command to add a ComponentLink parameter pair, targeting the data sheet. If a Schematic, Database or SVN Database Library is active, the parameters will be added to the focused component/component record. If a Schematic document is active, you will be able to click on each part to which you want the parameters added. By default, the same value will be entered for both the ComponentLinknDescription and ComponentLinknURL parameters – the URL for the data sheet.