CCICAP is based on a modified nodal formulation as described by J. Vlach and K. Singhal [1].
CCICAP is a powerful, easy to use, linear circuit analysis program. The program can be used to study a wide range of linear electronic circuit behavior. CCICAP includes passive circuit elements such as resistors, capacitors, and inductors as well as controlled elements such as voltage to current converters and ideal operational amplifiers. There are built-in linear models for bipolar junction transistors, field effect transistors, and operational amplifiers.
Four digital elements are included to allow the analysis of digital filters and other digital systems in the frequency domain.
The user of CCICAP can specify voltmeters and ammeters at any point in the circuit so that circuit operation can be easily monitored. In addition, user specified calculated relationships among inputs, outputs, and element values can be obtained. Output is produced to a printable ASCII file specified by the user, and optionally to binary data files and plot files.
CCICAP provides both frequency and time domain analysis capabilities.
In the frequency analysis mode, CCICAP provides circuit responses at specified frequencies.
In addition, CCICAP can provide frequency dependent response sensitivities to specified network elements. Multi-parameter, worst case, and RMS sensitivities to a user specified component set are available.
Circuit noise from resistors and active elements may also be obtained. The noise analysis can provide the total circuit noise at a requested node or the noise resulting from a selected set of circuit elements at a requested node. Integrated noise over a user specified band width is provided as part of the noise analysis. A Noise Table can be generated which provides a detailed, sorted list of the elements and their noise contributions at requested frequencies.
A circuit can be optimized in the frequency domain, wherein circuit element values will be searched for that result in a user specified response.
As part of a frequency analysis the user may request that selected circuit element values be varied and the corresponding circuit responses be calculated.
In the time domain analysis mode, CCICAP provides either impulse or step responses.
CCICAP uses an easy to understand and use input syntax. The circuit nodes are assigned unique names by the user. For example, an output node could be named 'Eout'. This capability results in easy to read circuit descriptions. The only pre-assigned node name is that for the ground or reference node. Ground may be called '0', 'GND', 'Gnd', or 'gnd'. The circuit elements are also assigned unique names by the user, adding to the self-documenting nature of the input circuit description. Comments can be added on the element and control records and as separate comment records.
Several convenience features are provided by CCICAP. The units used for the AC analysis results can be set as real and imaginary, dB and phase, or magnitude and phase. The frequency and phase units for an AC analysis can be specified as either Hertz and degrees or radians per second and radians. Standard passive element decades can be specified and the specified element values will be adjusted to the closest standard decade values before analysis. Frequency and impedance scaling is easily done. Parameters can be specified as constants or calculated based on other parameters and circuit element values. Calculated response relationships can be specified using defined inputs, defined outputs, circuit element values, parameters, and other calculated responses as variables. Labeled, automatically scaled, line printer and high resolution graphics response plots can be obtained. Page length can be set by the user. Information about the system matrices can be obtained.
CCICAP can be run from an input file in batch mode or interactively from the keyboard.