A method for automating pin assignments through an electronic design automation (EDA) development tool is provided. In the method, components for a chip design are selected and a board in which the chip design is to be implemented is identified. A port of one of the selected components is associated with a pin of the board through a component-based file. Thus, the component-based file maps the port to the pin. By utilizing a component based file, the mapping of the port to the pin is maintained during propagation of the chip design from a component level to a system level, even if the port name should change. A system for generating a chip design is also provided.