What exactly does this mean? (pcb fab)

[Jon Slaughter]

"Hi Jon, In bottom layer, whether it is lack of soldermask pad? Pls check
the attached picture. Thanks."

She keeps asking me these things and giving me pictures like

http://i48.tinypic.com/rrt7vq.jpg
and
http://i48.tinypic.com/2pqw8sy.jpg

A Soldermask pad is a "pad" that is meant to mask out the solder mask(so it
is "bare" copper or board)?

I included the gerber files with the solder masks for top and bottom so I'm
not sure why she is asking these questions. All the vias are masked except
for a few. (5 on bottom for a dip like header)

Gerber masks show exactly what I want. Is there any reason why she is asking
these questions? Is it od why I am puting a solder mask over them them? I do
not want to have any accidental/potential electrical connection with them,
which is the reason I am having a mask on all vias except for a few test
points I need. All the smt pads, of course, can't have solder resist.

For example, on my board I have, at the end, a 5 pin dip header used to
connect to external prepherials. The bottom solder mask gerber only has pads
for those 5 vias since I do not want solder resist on them(since I need to
solder wires to them).

The top board is more complex because of all the smts but almost all the
vias need resist. (hence no pads)

But as I understand what is going on, i.e., the solder mask layers is simply
the places where resist will not be put. A "pad" or positive region on the
solder mask layer means that no solder resist will be put on that spot. I
have checked the solder resist layers and they are exactly what I want.

 

[Fred Abse]

Then just reply:- ' solder mask layers are correct as supplied, pls use'. +
Thank-you for noting my possible errors, but they are correct as I want
them.

In other words, "MIL-TFD"

 

[Fred Abse]

"Hi Jon, In bottom layer, whether it is lack of soldermask pad? Pls check
the attached picture. Thanks."

She keeps asking me these things and giving me pictures like

http://i48.tinypic.com/rrt7vq.jpg
and
http://i48.tinypic.com/2pqw8sy.jpg

A Soldermask pad is a "pad" that is meant to mask out the solder mask(so it
is "bare" copper or board)?

I guess what she means by "soldermask pad" is "unmasked area".

Looking at the pictures, the marked "pads" appear to be vias.

It's up to you whether you want vias to take solder, or not. I guess, in
this case, from the way you drew it, you don't.

 

[markp]

Well, of course I'd prefer to have them connected but because of
clearance reasons they were created. The copper pour was created
automatically where it simply fills in areas that are larger than a
given amount(which can be quite small) regardless if they can be
connected. One does have the ability to remove dead copper. I prefer
to keep it "alive" since it adds to the "weight" of the board and
looks more consistent IMO. I can fix it though. The traces were
generated by a script I created and I have to set the "tolerance"
which is basically the corner amount. I might change it in the future
but it didn't seem to be that big a deal at the time.

Although it is an easy fix... can you give me any compelling reason
(hopefully to do with electronics) why I should change it? (this is an
honest question)

I tend not to have floating copper areas like this. Since they are floating,
they are essentially capacitively coupled to all the signals around it.
Imaging a long pair of signals with a floating strip of copper between
them - these signals are now capacitively coupled together via each
parasitic capacitance of the lines to the floating copper (essentially two
capacitances in series). This is an extreme example but illistrates the
point.

Mark.