Why not use the Ipc SMD Naming Convention
I will give you a short history of my experience with the Ipc SMD Naming Convention and then my reasons based on this experience why I have created the Zentroid SMD Naming Convention.
As early as 2004 I started programming Mydata, Digital Test and Orbotech machines. In the environments that I worked, have seen, and still work, there is need for a good naming convention and clean libraries. Shortly after 2004 I started to include parts and pieces of the Ipc Naming Convention in my personal libraries. At the start of 2008 I started working for Viscom AG here in Germany. I was really pleased to see that Viscom had also started to convert their package library to IPC names. Although none of the other AOI Application Specialists personally used the Ipc Convention I continued to use it. Throughout the next 2 years I supported the use of the library and tried to teach the library's merit to the Viscom customers I supported. I was not successful to have a single customer switch to the Ipc Naming Convention. I continue to work with SMD package libraries but no longer use the Ipc Naming Convention. My personal reasons for this follow.
First and foremost Ipc names are just too long. If you have the opportunity to visit several SMT production floors take note of the percentage of workers that can effectively type. It is surprising. Take note of the available room in graphical user interfaces for the display of such long Ipc package names. Surprisingly enough as I started with Viscom the character number limit for package names was less than that of the Ipc names themselves. Do we really need names like TSQFP50P3000X3000X160-208N? There is not enough information in this name for someone doing printed circuit layout and too much for normal use in standard libraries.
In my opinion the order of information the name conveys is poor. The first two pieces of information you will likely have about a package are the prefix acronym and the number of pins the package has. If you have to search an alpha-numeric list for the acronym and then scroll to the pin quantity searching will not be effective.
The Ipc has been serving the electronics industry for 55 years now. There is an infrastructure to this organization that costs money to keep. Simple information such as where does a QFP end and a TSQFP start are things I would have to pay for. Even if I did purchase the booklets to answer this question the next question is, "are the manufacturers using the Ipc recommendations?"
For the above 3 reasons I no longer use the Ipc SMD Naming Convention. I have created the Zentroid SMD Naming Convention for myself and anyone else that has been frustrated trying to make sense out of a sometimes difficult subject.