Re: gEDA-user: gEDA just hit SlashDotOrg

[John Doty <jpd@xxxxxxxxx>]

On Aug 11, 2009, at 5:22 PM, spuzzdawg wrote:

>
>    I think that this is basically an argument in usability vs
>    flexibility. John is basically arguing that gEDA's lack of
>    restrictions means that it can be used for a multitude of tasks. A
>    person's workflow can be developed to the user's taste

It's not just the user's taste. The customer may have requirements  
you have to meet. I have a customer on the far side of the world who  
wants schematic design from me, but they have a different contractor  
they prefer for board design and fab. gEDA, as a toolkit, not an  
integrated tool, is ideal in this case.

> rather than
>    through wrestling against the program.
>    On the other hand, Kai is arguing that you need to be a gEDA  
> expert,
>    understand the intricacies of backends and front ends to accomplish
>    even the simplest task.

To use the chainsaw, you have to fuel it, oil it, start it, ...

For small jobs I'll pull out the bowsaw. But the bowsaw doesn't scale  
well to big jobs.

>    My opinion is that to a certain extent, both approaches are  
> correct.
>    If I'm designing a circuit board I want to be able to click on a
>    component and add it in to my schematic and then flip to pcb  
> view and
>    put it on the board with some tracks.

Then you want an integrated tool. That's not what gEDA is. It's a  
toolkit.

> With gEDA I need to understand
>    symbol properties to assign a footprint. I need to know about M4
>    footprints vs the newer style.

That's pcb, not gEDA. They are not the same thing. gEDA supports many  
ways to get to a PCB (or an IC, simulation, BOM, ...).

> The only way to find out the correct
>    footprint name to use is too look through the footprint files in a
>    folder that changes depending on the method of install.

Changes even more if the layout shop uses software you don't have ;-)

> If the
>    footprint doesn't exist I need to create it using a cryptic  
> language.
>    Some basic functions, like moving a component to an absolute  
> location,
>    only have a command line action with no gui counterpart. Users then
>    have to email the mailing list to find out what all the hidden
>    functionality is because the documentation exists but is very  
> hard to
>    find and decipher.

That's pcb, not gEDA.

>    Sure gEDA is more flexible than other programs, but this  
> flexibility
>    is really a hinderence to my workflow

Is it really a hindrance? Are you only doing very small jobs? GUI is  
quicker for doing something a few times. But when you need to do the  
same thing repeatedly for a selection of 5000 items, scripting is  
much faster. Also, GUI is so pleasant people don't notice what a time  
waster it is.

> and I'm sure others are turned
>    away for similar reasons.

John Doty              Noqsi Aerospace, Ltd.
http://www.noqsi.com/
jpd@xxxxxxxxx




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